I came to the computer today to report on a fairly large pile of fingering-weight 4-ply that I just finished spinning last week, and as I flipped through my little notebook of spinning projects I realized that I’ve been keeping quite a few bits of business out of the spotlight. Oh, and as I typed that last sentence, I realized that I probably should post about my spinning notebook at some point, but since the photos are all uploaded and ready to go, that is not going to happen today.
Instead you may feast your eyes on some luscious handspun and be satisfied with that. First, I took a pile of BFL roving from Spunky Eclectic in the Zodiac Light colorway – sorry, no before pictures, I’m afraid. Will try to do better in the future. I’m not exactly sure how much I started with. It was really nice roving, very soft, fluffy and draftable, so don’t think that any waste I had was because of problems with that. Somehow, I’m pretty sure I had a pound of the stuff, but when I weighed all the finished skeins it came out to only around 13 ounces. There were some leftover singles, I know I found a few fluffs of roving here and there after the fact, and – well, somehow a good three ounces disappeared on me somewhere.
Still, I have a very nice pile of yarn, and this project was quite a long one – a good three months’ worth of spinning, as the singles were frog-hair thin. So thin that I struggled with getting the wheel to spin fast enough to satisfy my drafting speed. So thin, in fact, that I decided to go with a four-ply instead of three. I’m thinking of knitting a sweater with this yarn, because a large shawl wouldn’t really do me much good, at least not at the moment and not in this colorway. The original roving had some mauve-y pink, black, gray, and tawny undyed parts. I like the way it made a very subtle stripey variegation when done. With 1550 yards, it should be plenty of yarn for a sweater, and I have a design in mind for it – not my own, but an EZ one I’ve had my eye on for years.
Daisy Cat loves checking out my yarn, by the way. If she is anywhere nearby when I plop a pile of skeins down, she makes a bee-line for it, making it nearly impossible to get a picture without some part of her in it. Sweet old thing – I can’t begrudge her any attention now that her best friend Harry is gone.
Next up, some yarn I spun up right after the lace weight was finished. I bought the wool for this crazy stuff at SOAR, from Velma of Colorbomb Creations. She sells these grab-bags of fiber in Hot and Cold colorways, with all kinds of different bits and bobs of locks, roving, cloud, nebs, you name it. When I saw her stuff, I knew immediately that I needed some of it. Crap! I was sure I’d taken a better picture of the wool, but all I have is this blurry one from my phone at SOAR, with Velma, who is hilarious and fun. Go check out her etsy shop to see them more clearly.
I bought one of each colorway, and then I waited patiently till the other project was finished before starting this one. Unlike with knitting, I feel a need to be project-monogamous with the spinning. I have a hard enough time deciding which project to work on first as it is.
Anyway, there was a lot of staring over my shoulder at the Smorgasbombs on the shelf as I finished up that very long project. When I finally set aside the Rose wheel and pulled down my Earl Oman wheel to whip this up, it was only a few days’ worth of spinning. I had some mill ends laying around from Blackberry Ridge, so I spun those in while I was at it.
I spun chunkier, bumpier, messier singles this time, and plied them as two-ply for a funky thick-and thin yarn.
My plan is to knit something – probably a scarf/hat/mitten set – using stripes of the two colorways, sort of like what people have been doing with the Noro yarns of late. This pile totals about 600 yards, so I might even be able to do sets for both of the girls. Or something. It will be kooky and delicious.
Moving on, here is a little project from June and July. I started with four ounces of superwash merino batts from Spunky Eclectic – I’d gone a little crazy ordering from her back in March. This is the Baby Rainbows colorway of her Heathered Sock Batts. I came out with a pretty true 3-ply fingering weight yarn, and 477 yards of it. This will probably be my next sock project.
We’ve got a couple more to go. I really have been holding out on y’all. This yarn started as two tops from Cloudlover 69. I’d bought from her before, and was very excited to meet her at Shepherd’s Harvest last May. She dyes up some beautiful colorways, and her wool is always soft and draftable. I chose a Merino Wool top in her Sangria colorway, and a Falkland wool top in her Brass Petals colorway. I spun each top separately, then plied the singles together.
It is yummy-soft and squishable. I think I’d call this about sport or DK weight, and there are 1090 yards of yum here. I’m not sure what I’m going to do with it just yet. Here’s a closer look…
I really love this next one. I started with two handdyed tops from Vines on etsy, a blend of superwash wool with 25% mohair and 15% nylon, 8 ounces total. She dyed them in a progressive rainbow along the length of the tops, so spinning them straight through and navajo-plying the singles gave me two skeins of long-repeat self-striping goodness.
I haven’t figured out exactly what to do with this batch either. There are a little over 600 yards here, and it’s somewhere between DK and worsted weight. I think it would be fun to do some kind of faux isle project with this – using this for the foreground and a solid color for the background. Maybe a yoke sweater.
And, finally. I bought a big 8-ounce top from Frabjous Fibers at Shepherd’s Harvest in May, and spun it in early September into a 3-ply, again somewhere around sport weight-ish. There’s almost 600 yards here, and I have *no* idea what to do with it. It’s lovely BFL, very soft and squishy. For now, it’s nice to just look at and pet till it speaks to me.
A closeup with flash – the top picture is more accurate for color, but the flash allows you to see the pretty barberpoling.
Lastly, a cute-kid picture that was on the camera with the yarn shots. Cousin K came over to play on Monday when they were all off school for Martin Luther King day. Sophie made a smile out of her sliced apple, and before I knew it they were all doing it. You can see Julie’s been wearing her sweater. She wore it again today, and still seems pretty happy with it.
Whew! It feels good to get all that off my chest. In the future, I really must remember to take pictures of the roving before I dive into it. By the way, most of these yarns would be available for sale if someone wants them badly enough. I charge twice what I paid for the wool, so if you’re seriously interested, e-mail me and I’ll give you a price. shellyk at shellykang dot com. Don’t ask in the comments, because I don’t get your e-mail address when you comment even if you’ve typed it into the form.
Lovely work.. I am just barely starting to spin and cannot begin to imagine a time when I will have skeins that look that good! sigh..
All your spinning is divine, and I'm so pleased to see my "rainbows" spun up! You did a great job!
I am particularly taken by the Spunky Electric and Frabjous Fibers results. Very lovely!