Time Warp Fiber

Working at a yarn shop, I am surrounded by mill spun yarn and knitting all day. I spend a lot of time thinking about my knitting, or helping customers was their knitting. As a result, some of my other fiber craftiness gets lost. Weaving is always slow going, I'm content to acknowledge that a few scarves and shawls a year is all I'll get from that. But I realized I haven't been doing much spinning either. Part of it is doldrums and lack of motivation that's all too common around here, another hefty part is not having a lot of time between working, job hunting, and trying to keep up with the housework. And my wheel is not at all portable. I'd love to have a folding lendrum someday, but that kind of purchase is way out of my league for now. My Louet S17 is serviceable, but I'm starting to outgrow it. The slow drive ratios have something to do with that. This wheel refuses to spin fine. Complaints aside though, I am very fond of it, with lots of memories of finishing it myself. And the past few weeks, I've turned some actual yarn out.

The first skein is a woolen-spun two-ply merino, dyed as roving on a field trip to Laura's studio. This is about 100 grams, and I think around the 300 yard mark. (yes, I bravely mix metric and english measurements, conversion holds no fear for me) I wet finished this, as I do with most of my yarn, via shock and strike. Soak in very hot, dunk in cold, beat madly on the shower wall. If Butthead finds this behavior odd, he's never said anything. The yarn bloomed massively, almost doubling in size. It's unbelievably soft and smooshy. 

Skein number 2 is a thick and thin singles, also dyed as roving on my field trip. The wool is a 21 micron merino from australia, bought in tremendous quantity at the Great Lakes fiber festival more than a year ago. Gloriously soft, the color is good too.I wet finished this too, but more with an eye toward fulling a bit. Terrifying, right? But I plunged ahead. Soak in hot, the dunk in cold, then into another hot bath in which I agitated a bit with my hands. Not a ton, but some. Then the beating on the shower wall. The twist distributed well and the skein was actually balanced when done drying. ( I don't block my yarn, I like to retain the elasticity of the wool.) It's about 50 grams and 240 yards. This particular yarn is going to be offered as a door prize at the Knit Picky Christmas party, on Dec 9. 

Another upcoming fiber adventure for me is going to be blending fiber. I've asked Jan, who originally showed me how to spin, to borrow some combs to experiment with fiber prep. I'm hoping to have a little spending money after christmas, and I'm wanting combs or cards. I'm leaning toward combs and hopefully getting  drumcarder in the future to have both kinds of prep at my disposal. I'll try to post photos as I try to blaze through a ton of fiber in the short time I have combs on loan.