Saturday, January 15, 2011

Distractions

So when I'm not knitting the endless sweater of tiny navy stitches, I've worked on socks and spinning.  Two pairs of socks have come off my needles.  One a pair of boot socks that I won't trouble you with further, the other pair are the sweet socks.

They're sweet, they're socks.  Not much more to say about them. 

I'm afraid that my spinning has exploded this week.  In much the same way that I have many, many projects on my needles, I now have multiple spinning projects in progress.  At first I was staying faithful to the Viola fiber and finished up a second skein:

Ruh roh! There's a little problem with consistency here.  Not within the skein but between the two skeins.  Lesson learned: one must spin with a reference.  These two skeins represent about one third of the fiber. 

Then I thought, I should practice my heavier spinning.  I don't really like that cheap merino I bought, so I've decided to use it for experiments.  Spinning it heavy seemed a good idea and it worked great for that, making a nice fat squishy yarn:

So happy results here.  I'm going to have to make more of this.  I also notice that I have less consistent yarn when I spin thicker. I need more practice at this weight.

And then I had a thought, I wonder if I can spin a laceweight?  Ahem. Apparently, I can.


This fiber is a merino cashmere blend that Paula gave me.  I hadn't felt worthy before this, but now.  Oh god, it's an obsession.  I want to spin this all the time.  What's with me and the fine gauge?!  I'm having dreams of knitting it up into an heirloom Shetland lace shawl. That will only take me a life time to finish, especially if I keep getting distracted, which seems inevitable because now look what has come for a visit:


The only thing that keeps me from playing with it all the time is that I'm such a noob.  It's another learning curve to surmount and I think I've retreated back to my spindles to remind myself of the fact that I CAN learn a new thing.

This wheel is on loan from the gracious, generous and oh so helpful Paula.  Paula is my hostess, who rents me a room to stay in when I'm working in Waterloo.  Next week, I have to stay two days and I'm going to get to see the new location of her yarn store. I promise, I'll bring my camera....

11 comments:

  1. An Ashford Traditional? I've got one and LOVE it!
    Welcome to the Dark Side. From here there is no return.....
    :-)

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  2. Those socks are beautiful!!!!!

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  3. Love those socks!

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  4. Gorgeous socks!! I must say...you are a fast learner because those two skeins of handspun in your second pic look really nice.
    The Ashford traddy is a great starter wheel.

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  5. Isn't it funny how all of a sudden in your spinning, you are like, "um, now I am going to be awesome and do microscopic laceweight singles and knit a shetland shawl". It is like all three things - your skill, your fiber, and your tool (wheel/spindle) all align and it all sings!

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  6. Where's Laurie? Oh, she's gone down the rabbit hole!

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  7. Just for the record, the laceweight sample is the single plied back on itself.

    Down the rabbit hole and into wonderland.

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  8. From the picture, it appears that the reason you are not playing with it all the time has more to do with the dog barring your way than your self-proclaimed noobiness. Which BTW, I truly doubt.

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  9. Love the spinning and love the socks. It's funny to hear you say that you're having trouble with consistency in heavier weight yarn. Didn't we say that once you've spun fingering/lace, it's hard to spin worsted.... :-)

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  10. Nice socks, I'm leaning towards color work soon.

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  11. Im saving spinning for my sixties.......I am way too obsessed with knitting right now!!!! Love your socks....you are a careful knitter that is evident

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