Spinning blues

The Corriedale is up in the shop, and I'm very pleased with the pictures this time (for once), not to mention the yarn itself. You already heard all about the insanity that came with getting this yarn ready for sale, so I won't go into it again, but I did promise pictures, and pictures I have! You can see some at the yarn listing here, but I have more. Oh, do I ever. I had such fun photographing this.

First, about half of the 8 oz on my spindle. I am guessing that, uh, had something to do with the breakage. You can see my miserable attempts to turn my beloved spindle into something workable even after it broke -- a rubber band to try to catch the yarn so it didn't slip onto the hook all the time (sooo annoying, and I had no sharp knife readily available, so I couldn't carve a notch) and a crazy jury-rigged winding system. Sigh. The good news is, it works! Just not as well as one might have hoped.

This next picture is a shot of the big skein (for some reason that seemed like a good idea at the time I made two small skeins and one big one. Any ideas on what I was thinking there? Anyone?) hanging to dry. You can see my extremely high-tech yarn drying system!

Yup. I hang it on a doorknob. Since I tend to only overply a little bit, and the fiber relaxes when I wash it, I hardly ever need to block my handspun. Sometimes I'll hang a weight on the end of the skein but this just didn't need it.

Both of those pictures are fun, but neither really shows what the yarn actually looks like, so here are some close-up pictures. Pretty self-explanatory. Shiny yarn.



Now I am in the enviable position of a free spindle and a bunch of different fibers. Do I want to spin 2 oz of BFL? Or a pound of merino? Or maybe 14 oz of alpaca? Some combination of the aforementioned? WHAT DO I DO NOW.

I'm thinking I might spin up the BFL and make something for myself out of it. What, I haven't the foggiest idea, but knitting with handspun is caaaaaalllllling my naaaaaaame...

Also, I'm designing a bunch of things that start with s. (Ever notice how many things you knit start with s? Shawl, scarf, sweater, sock...) More on that later.

The good news and the bad news

The good news is:

I finished spinning the 8 oz of Corriedale for the shop! I plied it this morning. It just needs to be skeined, have the twist set, and then dry and it'll be ready to go up. I'm super excited. I hope someone makes something lovely out of it!

The bad news:

My spindle broke. I KNOW, NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. The hook came out. My spindle right now is just an Ashford teaching spindle that I've had for over a year (I told you I was poor) and I guess it just couldn't hold up under the heavy wear. (I'm guessing the ~5 oz of wool on it at once didn't help...) Anyway, the top of my lovely little top-whorl spindle was so mangled that I couldn't put the hook back in without divine intervention, so to finish off I turned the little guy into a bottom-whorl spindle. He works, but I so prefer top-whorls. Sigh.

The good news:

I finally learned how to spin lofty yarn (or, to use a technical term, SMOOSHY SOFT YAY MINE) in any sort of consistent way. This is very good news. For some reason it had eluded me for a long time, and I was beginning to get frustrated.

The bad news:

I learned halfway through. Erm. So this yarn is a little more thick-and-thin than was originally planned. It's still about a dk or a light worsted, never gets heavier than worsted for sure. Overall it's pretty consistent -- I think the gague would even itself out. But still, consistency is one of the things I pride myself on in my spinning, and this is slightly less consistent than I'd like. Blah. But on the bright side, that does give it more of a handmade look!

The good news:

I got to spend an evening at home with my kitty, spinning and watching movies (Wristcutters: A Love Story. Odd, but I liked it.), and it was chilly enough that I could feel fall coming on -- I love fall.

The bad news:

Said kitty would not stop trying to chew on my spindle, and if he weren't already broken I would be forcing her to pay for a new one for me. How? I DON'T EVEN KNOW.

The good news:

The corrie was lovely to spin with, and was handpainted.

The bad news:

It wasn't handpainted by me. It was like that when I got it. Sadness. Hopefully more dyeing soon!

Pictures tomorrow.

Long time, no dye.

OOH SHINY PICTURE OF YARN TO DISTRACT YOU FROM THE LACK OF UPDATES

So, obviously I couldn't sneak in a blog post while in Pittsburgh (it was a great wedding, by the way), and what's more, I got very little fiber-related work done in the past couple of weeks. The good news is we have a new colorway, called Blood Oranges. You can find more information about it here! I've been wanting to do an orangey colorway for a while. This one was more complicated than anticipated, mainly because of the base yarn, a very special silk/kid mohair blend that I absolutely adore but don't plan on offering anymore, so snap it up while it's there!

In non-dye but fiber-related news, I'm still working on that handspun I've been promising to put up for a while. Spinning on a spindle is fun but really time-consuming. I think I may start a Buy Elizabeth A Spinning Wheel fund (with all my extra income -- HA!). The yarn is turning out beautifully! Here's a (fuzzy) sneak peek:



I'm also working on any number of knitting projects, which I just may have to start parading out so we don't go this long without an update anymore! So, for next time: an exciting story about the most tinking I've ever done in my life. (Okay, so it's really not that exciting, as you probably guessed). But there will be pretty pictures!