buttercup & berries

Finished my second yarn of the year -- Buttercup & Berries. Only 131 yards, but it is so soft and beautiful!

Roving from http://juliespins.etsy.com


The singles


Plying


Finished!

puttering around

I've been having one of those weeks in which I knit a lot, but produce very little. I keep trying different cable patterns for gloves, but I can't find a yarn/cable combo that I like. (Except for my current pair of gift gloves. I finished the left glove on Tuesday and am quite happy with it.) I can't even knit socks decisively this week -- I want some ornamentation on the socks I'm knitting out of the birthday yarn from Lyl, but nothing I try is making me happy. Yesterday I finally got a project moving -- my Sloochie hat -- but I had to spend over half an hour ripping back to fix stupid mistakes.

I've been taking some refuge in spinning. I wound off some singles to free up a couple of spindles and played around with various roving/spindle combinations. I wound the singles for Buttercup & Berries onto the plying spindle and started plying. I started Zaria2, which is going to be a 3-ply light fingering weight, and Fan the Flames, which is going to be a 3-ply worsted.

spinspiration!

Inspiration! I found it! Here -- a listing for 10 mini batts from butterflygirl! Just enough to play with -- spinning for fun! Not for practice, not for a project, just for fun. Just for the sheer joy of watching the colors dance.

I can't believe how excited I am by this fiber. I've been on a fiber diet since being laid off, and it hasn't been difficult because I have a large and beautiful stash. But I'm at a stage where I'm still working on technique, and lately I've been really concentrating on producing an even single. I don't pre-draft at all anymore -- my drafting has definitely improved, and I'm playing with twist in the drafting zone. But it hasn't been just for fun, and these mini batts will be fun. Just playing with the sparkly colors, dude!

I also got another butterflygirl batt -- Cedar Waxwing merino/bamboo/firestar. Isn't it lovely? The perfect autumn brown. That batt inspired me to dig out the Leaf Lace Shawl pattern and yarn and see if I can get that going. I've been wallowing in a pile of unfinished socks and I just can't get excited about any of them. I've been crocheting bags for 2 weeks, and that has pretty much sucked the joy out of my string.

Inspiration! I has it! And I needed it!

progress! I have some!

I had some extra time today after a vet appointment that I had originally allocated for housework. I decided spinning would make me much happier.

I decided to see how the Buttercup liked the custom ornate spindle from Spinsanity. It loves it! I got another big chunk spun, and I'm down to less than a fifth of the original roving.

I also made progress on Autumn's Joy -- one more strip and the second bobbin will be spun. I definitely split the roving too many times and the long color repeats will be shorter than I'd like, but this yarn has some serious potential.

lavender to eggplant

I started a new project this week. (Of course I did. Sigh.)

It started with a very dark purple BFL batt (Sun Dried) that I had expected to have more tonal variation. I was trying to think of what I could ply with it to lighten it up.




Then I got this gorgeous superwash merino batt (Delilah).


I spun a test single on the same spindle as the test from the first batt. I noticed that the deep purple looked a lot less murky next to the Delilah, and that it shaded the Delilah towards purple rather than raspberry. So I plied them together and liked the result.



I'm planning a 3 ply sock yarn: 2 plies of Sun Dried and 1 of Delilah. It should be gorgeous.

Autumn's Joy SW merino

This is my first fractal spinning project. On Friday I read all the fractal spinning posts I could find on Ravelry and ordered the back issue of Spin Off magazine. That night I decided I didn't want to wait for the magazine, and figured out how I wanted to split the batt. I decided on a 3-ply, 2 plies with long repeats and 1 ply with short. I started spinning the short repeats that evening, and am now 1 hour away from finishing that single. Doesn't it look lovely on the spindle?







SW merino purchased from exclusivelylindalee.etsy.com

Spindle purchased from gmtlvsred.etsy.com

zaria: singles spun, ready for plying!

I am so excited! Last night I finished spinning the Buttercup single to ply with the 2 Zaria singles!



I wound the 3 singles together into a ball in preparation for plying. (I found this post from abbysyarns on Ravelry, and it is brilliant. Plying from 1 ball instead of 3 bobbins is so much easier.)



And a picture with a kitten. For scale, of course. :) The ball weighs 1.8 oz.



I can't wait to ply tonight! My first project will be finished!

wrap for spindles without a notch

Most of my spindles don't have a notch, which can be a pain in the ass with slippery yarn. I finally figured out a way to wrap the yarn so it stays stable -- I wrap it below the cone of spun yarn and bring it straight up to the hook.

zaria -- 2nd batch

I'm so pleased with this 3-ply! It's merino/tencel, and I overplied the hell out of it before I set the twist. (I was trying for a nice, tight ply and overdid it by quite a bit.) This morning I figured out how to take out the extra twist.

First, I loosely wound it on the large niddy noddy. Then I started at one end and ran an arm's length through my fingers until it had untwisted to the point of being balanced. I wound that into a tiny ball and secured it with a hair clip. Then I ran another arm's length through my hands and let the ball dangle so it would untwist. I did this for the entire 75 feet, and at the end, I had a well-balanced ball of yarn.

I feel so accomplished! I'm learning!

wrist distaff -- oh yes, yes yes!

Roving management is the one part of the spinning process that makes me crazy. Some people can just wrap it around their wrist and hand and everything works great -- I am not one of those people. So I decided to buy this wrist distaff to see if it would help. It's a very basic macrame distaff and falls under the category of yes I could make it, but I'd rather do something else with my time so I'll buy one, kthx.

It's fantastic! It actually works! I secure the tail of the roving in the bead cluster with a couple of figure 8s, then just wrap around the bead cluster and voila! Roving is managed, out of my way, doesn't get torn, doesn't get tangled with my single, and the distaff can double as a cat toy. (That last may not be a good thing, but Mr Eko loves it.)

If you have trouble with roving management, buy or whip up one of these babies and I'll bet you'll be glad you did.

bfl, my new favorite fiber

A while back, I bought a 5 fiber sampler pack from spinningbunny.com. Last night, one of my new spindles arrived and I decided to break out the BFL from the sampler pack to play with. I've seen some nice BFL rovings on etsy and wanted to know if I liked playing with it.

OH MY GOD. OH MY GOD. This is the easiest fiber I've ever worked with! It flows through my hands, it spins up insanely thin and even, and it's soft as hell. I usually avoid non-superwash wool like the plague, but I could dive into a vat of this stuff. I want more, and now!

Also, the funky gothic spindle? LOVE IT. It's light and fast and spins like a dervish. It's my second 3" diameter spindle, and I am surprised by how much I like that size. The millefiori spindles are 2-1/8", and that turns out to be as small as I want my spindles to be. The 3" spindles spin faster and longer, and I can usually draft an arm length's worth in one spin.

spinning: definitely not a phase

Goldenbaer taught me to spin a few years ago at a 4th of July party. I had never touched a spindle before, and he was extremely kind about sacrificing what he was working on to teach me. It was all kind of hilarious, because we weren't really used to being in the same place yet, and we kept getting holy shit, are they going kill each other, wtf? looks. Shortly thereafter, he gifted me with a Very Solemn Sheep spindle (tm Badcat, technically a Louet wooden spindle) and a gigantic ziploc full of 3 kinds of nice roving. Every now and then I'd pull it out and futz with it, but I had forgotten almost everything.

Fast foward to the first weekend of April 2008, the DFW FiberFest. Both Waterlylly and Badcat bought spindles and roving. I was tempted, but decided against it because a) it was a total impulse, b) I had already blown the back out of my budget at the show, and c) I don't knit as much as I want to as it is, and a new hobby is just going to make that worse. Good reasons, yes? Well, the following Thursday, Lyl brought her new spindle over and spun while I knit and watched her like a cobra watching a mongoose. It was positively hypnotic. She showed me what she was doing and put her spindle in my hand and that. was. it. After she left, I dug out the supplies from Goldenbaer.

That was on April 10th. Since then, I've spun every day, good or bad. I've spun regular wool, superwash merino, sw merino/tencel, and bamboo on a modest variety of spindles. I (obviously) haven't settled down to One Big Spinning Project, because I'm me, but I have plied test yarn and verified that I'm actually making something I can use. (Woo!) I'm no more capable of fiber monogamy than any other kind, and I'm really enjoying playing with different fibers and figuring out what I like. I'm almost ready to settle down a bit and start working on my technique with each fiber.

My mom is wildly curious as to what this "spinning" entails. I can't wait to show her, I think it will blow her mind.

spinning with hemp & flax

http://knitty.com/issuespring07/KSspr07GS.html

WET SPINNING
Wet spinning isn't really "wet". I think a more accurate name would be "misted" or "slightly damp".
This technique is very helpful in achieving a smoother, softer yarn. The moisture on your fingers will enable you to gently manipulate the ends of the fibers into the twist.

To do this, slightly dampen your fingers on the hand that is controlling the twist, either with a spray bottle/plant mister, or a few drops of water from a bowl or cup. Once you get to spinning, you will see how once the fibers touch the dampness, a bit of spinning magic occurs. Some spinners use natural oils such as lanolin as their lubricant. It's all a matter of personal tastes and finding what works best for you.

SETTING THE TWIST IN PLANT FIBERS
Setting the twist on a plant fiber uses a different method than with wool.
You will need to give it a quick (a minute or three) bath in some boiling water. (Some plant fibers, especially certain cottons will take longer.) In this case, add a few glugs of vinegar, on occasion the recycled silk sari likes to bleed dye, and the vinegar helps to ‘set’ it. Use some tongs or a large wooden spoon to remove your yarn from the boiling water. Once it has cooled enough to touch, give it a few good whacks & hang to dry. It is perfectly okay to block or weight down plant fibers when they are drying, it won't have any ill effects on your knitting yarn. Have no fear if it feels a bit rough. Both fibers soften considerably with wear and washing.

http://www.joyofhandspinning.com/flax.shtml

FLAX
Flax should be spin with little twist and light tension. Wet the fiber with your fingers as you spin, if you want to spin a smooth yarn. Do not use water if you want a hairy textured yarn.

spinning tricks from Sanguine Gryphon

http://sanguinegryphon.blogspot.com/2007/02/spinning-tricks.html

Plying, from Sarah:
Sarah uses the cap from a spice bottle to keep her ply balanced. She starts plying by threading the end of one strand of yarn through one of the holes in the cap, so that each singles gets its own hole. Then she plies normally, and the cap keeps the tension on the strands even so that no little boucle sections form.

which direction to ply?

askthebellwether says:

People are usually taught (and books usually say) to spin singles Z (clockwise) and ply S (counter-clockwise).

However, you can and might want to consider the end-use for your yarn and the technique you’re going to use to get there … crochet prefers the final twist direction to be Z, since it adds Z twist to a yarn (so if you were to take a final S twist yarn and crochet it, you’d be taking twist out … and if it were singles, this could be a mess if the yarn then drafted apart again …). Knitting depends: British/throw-style knitting adds Z twist and German/Continental/pick-style knitting adds S twist.

what to do with leftover yarn?

carolspinner says:

I take the leftover on my bobbin and wind it into a tiny center-pull ball. Then I ply it from both ends and make a swatch. That way, I know how the finished yarn will knit up.

Bloody brillant.

spinning resources

Great video for parking and drafting

How do I make sure my singles aren't underspun?

DFW FiberFest 2008: spinning stuff

Badcat's spindle & bamboo

http://fiberlady.com/
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5056259

Badcat's wool

http://www.ravelry.com/people/pisceanknits
http://www.pisceanknits.com/Home/Homex.html

Lyl's spindle
Spindles on etsy