Friday, November 30, 2007

Fiber on Friday

What's this? Fiber Friday? I have some finished yarn photos for you! It's as if it were "Fiber Friday" or something!

But first, a word to the non-spinners. A long time ago, before I decided I wanted to spin, I used to read people's spinning posts and feel a bit bewildered by all the different terminology. I felt a bit left behind, if you will. I know it wasn't intentional on the part of those bloggers, and I stuck with them through the spinning (even if I didn't quite read the posts, but simply tuned in for the "oooh, pretty yarn pictures" factor).

So, to the non-spinners reading this, hang in there, this is still a knitting blog, and I sympathize if you're a bit weirded out by the sudden prominence of the word "spinning" in my topic tags. You don't really want to see a few more inches of Cobblestone, though, do you? Because that's all that's happening around here, I swear. Socks? Hats? Other holiday knitting? It's not happening. Cobblestone is on the needles and wants to be worked on, gosh darn it. (I've actually finished the body and started a sleeve, but I don't have a picture. Besides, it would look like a very small version of the body anyways, so my point stands).

That said, how about some fiber?

Thanks for all your hints and suggestions about the overplying of the blue lagoon yarn. I've decided to leave it as-is for now (partially because I lack any easy way to wind a center-pull ball).

Blue lagoon.JPG Blue lagoon dime shot.JPG
Look, a dime shot!

I also spun up all of the not-quite-4-oz. of the "autumn lake" roving. It went really, really quickly, quite possibly because I love the colors. I love how tweedy it turned out. I'm also glad that it's not quite as overplied as the previous skein was.

Autumn lake yarn.JPG

I don't exactly love that there are only 100 yards; I would have liked something longer. Nor do I like that it's a bit scratchy and scraggly, but that might be because I was playing around with letting the twist eat up the yarn.

Autum lake 2.JPG Autumn lake 3.JPG

Looking at the close-ups, I'm thinking the singles weren't very tightly spun; at least, they don't look that way in the closeups. I wonder if this is why it's scratchy and why there are so many fibers hanging out from the singles? Hmm.

Speaking of fiber, I'm highly suspicious of all the mysterious packages that have arrived at my door in the last half hour. I've seen a mail truck, a DHL truck, and a FedEx truck dropping things off. Good gracious! It's a veritable delivery parade out there. Now I only need to see a UPS truck to collect the full set. You'd think my birthday were on Monday or something, and that I'd be entering a whole new decade to boot!

(My birthday is on Monday, and I'll now have to say that my age is 3x, instead of 2x. I'm going to feel very old, I think. I also suspect I don't get to explore these enticing packages Coffeeboy has ordered until then. One of them, though, has a suspicious Amazon.com marking on the box, and two have really interesting return addresses that I shouldn't have looked at. Bad me! - but this is what happens when one works from home and receives the mail, I guess.)

Happy Friday, all, and have a good weekend!

6 comments:

sgeddes said...

Don't mind the spinning stuff at all. The yarn is lovely. I'm trying to learn myself too.

Greta_Jane said...

See, if Coffeeboy were smart, he would be sending the packages to work. Maybe they are from your parents.

Sheepish Annie said...

I'm well past the 3x mark...but you're never to old to snoop around the presents!!!

Nice spinning. You've really made a lot of progress quite quickly!

Unknown said...

hmmm stuff in the mail. A little bird in Durham tells me that more stuff will be coming in the mail soon.....

Anonymous said...

Happy early birthday!

Your spinning is looking great, you are improving so quickly, I'm so impressed!

Teri S. said...

Happy birthday in advance! And no, you won't be feeling old. I don't think that happens until you turn 5x, although I suspect some people will take issue with that (ask me next year). I can't wait to see what all those packages are!

From the photos, it looks like there might be shorter fibers mixed in with the longer fibers. Shorter staple and coarser fibers tend to be scratchier. Since you don't have too much, consider incorporating it as part of a sweater or a hat. That way the itch factor will be reduced.