First bobbins

Why, what's this????



That is my first two bobbins full of singles spun on my super gorgeous delightful wonderful wish-I-was-spinning-on-it-right-now Majacraft Little Gem!

It is natural colored Finn top, spun rather thickly, on the slowest ratio (4.5:1). And it was a joy to make.

After struggling with a drop spindle for nearly a year, I can't explain how delightful it was to sit down and just have everything click. Plus, it makes yarn so quickly! I am going to ply tonight (first time ever!) and think I may use this to make a winter cap for myself. I have already started spinning something else: silver suffolk top from
Paradise Fibers. I am using the middle ratio and spinning a very fine single that I love. It took SO MUCH willpower to get up off the couch and go to work this morning, as you may imagine.

I can still feel the lanolin on my finger tips...sigh...

Sorry blog, I've been busy on ravelry...

Yep, thats my one and only explanation for not being here. I've been spending all my time on ravelry. If you knit or crochet, you should too! Its the best - still a waiting list, but sign up now and you'll be on within weeks. And trust me, its even better than you can imagine!

But enough about that (although you can now see my projects there...). Yesterday, I finished, as in totally finished, the tote bag for my aunt. It had been knitted and felted, and now its decorated and I could give it to her now if she was here! The proof:

Thats the front. And the back:

Adorable, right? This was my first experience needle felting and it was so much fun! I really had no idea it would be so easy and fast and fun. I bought the Clover needle felting tool and mat:

(photo from Betz White, whose blog will make you want to start felting NOW)
And I bought some black roving from new fave Paradise Fibers. Since this was my first time needle felting, I bought stuff that was sold in that section of the online shop; I didn't know you could use any ol' roving. So I bought 8 freaking ounces of this stuff, and didn't even use 1 whole ounce in felting! More like 1/16 of an ounce. I tried to spin it, but it did not go well. Ugh, it looked awful. Don't know if thats me, the roving or my spindle (which I'm beginning to suspect wasn't the best choice for a beginner...).

Anyway, the score is the first three bars of "Simple Gifts' since my aunt sang that at my wedding. I drew the notes and things on with a black sharpie (since it would blend into the notes anyway) and then just pulled off bits of roving, twisted it a bit, and then punched away. The whole thing took me maybe half an hour and it was really great fun. And it looks so cute!

To spin that black roving, I took off the undyed white I had on my spindle. I had used all that fiber up anyway and had to wind it. So I skeined it (sort of) and was surprised at how much yarn I had made! I do wonder if it has too much twist in it; going to have to get a shot of it and ask one of the spindling groups on ravelry. In the meantime, though, when I go back to MI for the holidays, my mom and I are going to Heritage Spinning and I intend to buy a basic, lighter drop spindle and see if I don't improve. I'm still very much in the slubby stage.

Mom's sweater is close to being done. I'm shaping the sleeve cap so I should be blocking the sleeves before the week is over. It would be so great to get the whole thing seamed this weekend. It didn't help that I had to come into work early this morning and the train was so crowded and I just had the worst luck in not getting a seat. So I knit only one lousy row. The nice thing about shaping the sleeve cap is its getting smaller and smaller - unlike the main part of the sleeve that gets bigger and bigger!

I blame it on Rhinebeck

I don't think I would have even considered learning to spin (being a lone knitter) if it weren't for Rhinebeck. Honestly, you see at least as much roving as yarn among vendors - if not more. And I LOVE naturally colored, undyed yarns (I love dyed yarns too, but since most of my and my man's wardrobe is black, brown and grey - sheep colors, all - I like the idea of wearing just what the sheep wore), and these fibers are abundant as roving but not so much as finished yarn.
I hadn't thought much about spinning ever, though the man sort of encouraged me to spin after watching the movie Gandhi, who spun the yarn for the cloth he wore:

My first year, I bought some roving and got instructions on making a CD drop spindle, which sat in my stash trunk for a year, mostly because I never got around to making the spindle. Then I found the $20 from my Grandma and decided to buy a nice drop spindle with it this year.
I've been messing around with my spindle since Rhinbeck which was just a little over a month ago, but it has just started to click within the last 10 days or so. It really did just take practice and experimenting with different ways to hold the yarn. Its not at all diffifcult, but it does take some getting used to. Now, I'm not a master (mistress?) of the drop spindle by any stretch of the imagination, but I have begun to really enjoy using it. I've almost used up the merino top I bought last year, and with my order from Paradise Fibers, I bought olive merino and grey Icelandic fiber. And I have nearly half a pound of naturally colored black wool that I didn't want to waste on learning attempts. Now that I'm close to consistent, I can start to spin it! I'm going to spin all of my fiber from last year first, though.
I'm a control freak, but I had never felt too much like controlling the yarns I knit with, because I knit with basic, simple yarns. But spinning does open up many more possibilities, especially among natural colors. And it has given me a sort of reverence for wool. That stuff is amazing. Its so satisfying when you see the twist go up into the draft, or when the twist takes in a new end of fiber. And I think its good to think of yarn as something more than a product that you just go to the store and buy.
Beginning to think about buying a spinning wheel - but still want a loom first. Then, once I have those things - move out of this city and get me some sheep!!!!