Spectrum Spinalong

Be back soon!

2006-08-06T16:55:00.000-07:00

I'm on vacation till the 26th with no way to upload pictures, so no progress shots till then.

Have a great few weeks!

Neutrals

2006-08-01T19:49:00.000-07:00

Amie has done a lovely job on this month's Spunky Club fiber, silk:

These aren't colors I would dye myself, but that's part of the fun, to work with unexpected materials! I will be spinning this into sportweight or so singles on a spindle while I'm on vacation and will post a photo when I get back.

Project Spectrum I is coming to an end. Lollygirl is thinking about doing it again, though, maybe differently. Go over and give her your suggestions! I hope it continues even though I haven't done a Flickr page or anything. It's nice to be in a group project that is pretty low pressure. I am kind of envious of all the Secret Pal groups, but I know that I can't really afford to pamper anyone properly. Someday!

I will be back on August 26th and probably won't post till then. Let me know what you end up with!

Purple is going!

2006-07-28T19:21:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, I never posted a picture of the roving. But here is the yarn:

2 oz./164 yards BFL dyed by Amy Boogie at Spunky Eclectic for Project Spectrum

I really enjoyed spinning this yarn. It is my favorite wool spun into my most typical yarn. But that's why I like it!

Here is a picture of the skein of sock yarn (also BFL) and the socks from 7 handspun yarns that I entered in the fair, in case you haven't been over to my other blog.

I will be spinning the August silk on vacation from the 6th to the 26th. I won't be posting over here during that time as I won't have access to uploading pictures. I hope that the yarn will be finished while I am gone so that I can post about it that last week of August. I'm excited about spindling silk. I just wish I could decide what to do with it! I only have 2 ounces, so I can't fool around trying stuff too much. There is not much 2 ply silk yarn to look at on the web that isn't dyed after spinning, but plenty of singles. And singles would be very relaxing. I have seen a lovely navajo plied yarn, though, and that would take longer (more fun). Decisions, decisions! Amy's yarn is lovely but not quite my thing. I really want 100% silk, probably for wristwarmers or fingerless gloves.

What do you have in mind?

The crisis seems to be over

2006-07-13T08:20:00.000-07:00

Based on the current situation (thanks mom, thanks DH, thanks Aaron, thanks me), I should be able to let Amy do her thing, yay!

Singles as of this morning:

Hopefully 2-plyness will ensue soon, but the knitting takes precedence (see other blog).

Happy spinning!

I have a terrible fear

2006-07-09T19:41:00.000-07:00

That I will have to drop out of the Fiber Club for this month. I can hardly believe that $15 will make that much of a difference, but it probably will. You know (or maybe you don't), two trips to the pool for the kiddoes. Or two boxes of cereal and a gallon of milk. If you know how it is, you know how it is. And if you don't, count your lucky stars! (Does this count for Scout's meme of sharing something that might make you lose respect for me?)

Anyway, I have been spinning the purple, but due to an OBSESSIVE need to finish my socks for the L.A. County Fair in time to DRIVE THEM to the fairgrounds, I have really not been spinning much. Here's a photo if you're not reading my other blog

Since this picture, I have completed toe of the second sock, whew! Short row toes in two colors are...fussy. The stripes are cool, though, and I've gotten a lot of practice at Norwegian Purling.

And the needles (size 0) are so pointy, I've practiced my Continental quite a bit as well. But I still can't look up, so it's not for TV knitting so far. I need to practice at a larger gauge. Maybe on the FIL sweater (Wallaby), miles and miles of round and round.

Anyway, thanks for stopping by! I'll let you know if I'm still going or asking Amie if I can buy the roving in a couple of weeks instead, ho hum.

Spectrum June yarn is done and a cross post

2006-07-04T12:12:00.000-07:00

I have finished the low twist singles version of the Project Spectrum Spunky Eclectic roving for June. It is destined to become a One Skein Wonder shrug, at the moment, but not soon as I am furiously working on my L.A. County Fair socks which have to be finished by July 12 (a week from tomorrow!). So back to the knitting.

I am also cross-posting my Independence Day message from my other blog. Hope it's okay!

I believe in America. I believe in our Constitution. I believe that our Constitution is important and not a "g*dd*mn piece of paper." Freedom and Liberty are the bedrocks of our country and what have made that country great. But I am afraid that our country is going down a road, has already traveled quite far down that road, that leads to tyranny, abrogation of civil liberties, codification of discrimination, barbarism and shame.

Yesterday I sang "America the Beautiful" at my church. I chose the song not because I believe that the words express who we are right now, but because I dream of what we have been and could be again. Because I believe it states clearly what we have been striving for lo these many years. And what we are in danger of losing forever.

So without further ado, "America the Beautiful" by Katherine Lee Bates, a remarkable woman, a lesbian, a college professor, a proud American. This to me, right now, is a prayer. Let us please think of what we could be and find a way to right the wrongs done to our country. Let it become an anthem of what we are.

America the Beautiful

Oh, beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties,
Above the fruited plain.
America, America, God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea.

Oh, beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life.
America, America, may God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness
And every gain divine.

Oh, beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years.
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears.
America, America, God mend thine every flaw.
Confirm thy soul in self control,
Thy liberty in law.

Have a happy Independence Day and be safe!

Purple is coming!

2006-06-25T13:20:00.000-07:00

I've received my Spunky Eclectic Fiber Club Roving, BFL, my absolute favorite breed of sheep! The funny thing is it's very like some roving I dyed myself a couple of months ago for a "Pilgrim" test dye run. The purple is exactly the same, the green is yellower, there is not so much brown, but they are really very similar. I might have to ply them together or something. I will show photos of both when I take some!

Have a great Sunday!

I'm Sailing Away (humming the Styx song right now)

2006-06-13T19:24:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of the Sailing Away worsted (approximately) weight singles:

I really like the roving spun this way, plus it's FAST. I won't do the rest of it right now, as I am way behind on the sock spinning, but I will probably do it all this way. I'm thinking a little felted bag. This is about 1 1/3 oz and I got 80 yards.

What have you got?

Happy spinning!

Blue has arrived

2006-06-09T07:18:00.000-07:00

What a lame title! But I have been obsessing about my yarn for my L.A. County Fair socks and not about the Project Spectrum spinning, sorry! Gotta go for the deadline stuff first.

Here is a picture of the Spunky Eclectic Fiber Club offering for June, Sailing Away.

Mostly blue, a little red, a little white.

I'm a bit torn on how to spin this. I don't want to mix the colors as I like the patriotic feel. I don't want to ply it with white as the red will go pink (sorry, Pink Lemon Twist, it's just not my thing). I saw that Amie has spun this as nice fat singles yarn and I like that, too, as my other option was to Navajo ply, but the singles for that take SO LONG. I might not have time to spin it up this month, eek!!

So singles it is. Sport? Worsted? I don't know. Can't get to it yet, anyway.

Happy spinning!

Last day of Green

2006-05-31T08:35:00.000-07:00

This being the last day of green, a short post. I have received (and will post a picture of) the Spunky Eclectic roving for June, blue. It's blue with some red and very patriotic looking. But no white that I can see.

My thing is, red, white and blue would be fun. But if I add white to it, I get pink. I do NOT like pink. Hmm.

I will be spindle spinning singles of this roving on my Brownie camping trip this weekend and will post pictures of spinning in public next week. Then I will decide. I'm thinking about plying it with white. Or bringing some white and navajo plying in the end. Or something. I don't know.

But my first idea of plying the months together won't work here, as I don't want to have the red and the green together AT ALL. Blech.

More later!

Green Gables yarn

2006-05-13T12:34:00.000-07:00

Here's the yarn, Green Gables Superwash Wool from Spunky Eclectic plied with BFL dyed by yours truly with Easter Egg dye (yellow, blue/green, with the melon pulled out for some other project).

And the original roving, just as a reminder.

Both singles were spun from the fold, although the superwash was easier. I like this yarn very much. I think it looks like the original roving even though it isn't, as there was more white in the roving than was apparent at first glance.

I still have an ounce and a half or so of the roving left to do something else with, but I think I will wait. Maybe ply it with the blue of June, who knows. It would be fun to do some blending of the colors one into the other perhaps.

What's been nice so far about this is I've been really motivated to spin. I've been knitting more lately but I do have to get on the stick about the L.A. County Fair project, which involves spinning six different colors (only two of which have been carded yet). You can see that project on my other blog, Progressive Purls, but watch out for the political content!

Anyone else ready to send pictures?

Here's what I have so far

2006-05-06T07:22:00.000-07:00

The first bobbin is the Green Gables singles yarn. It does look greener than this, but this picture is at least better than the sample skein!

This is the two bobbins of singles to be plied. I wish I had gotten to this yesterday, but I'm taking 12 7-year-olds camping this afternoon and, surprise, surprise, I had to prepare! So no spinning probably till everyone's at school on Monday.

Have you spun anything yet?

I had one more idea

2006-05-03T19:11:00.000-07:00

So I tried spinning the Green Gables roving and the Easter egg roving separately and then plying them together. Here is a bad picture. It does not show the colors any better than the previous ones. The yarn is still primarily green but it does have more yellow and peach than the green roving. I like it, actually.

So the now I'm trying one more thing. I'm spinning the Green Gables roving from the fold (I could not recommend this highly enough; the superwash is SO slippery and it's fun and fast!) and then spinning the Easter egg yellow and turquoise (and occasional green patch) from the fold to be plied together. Whew! This mixes the yellow and blue together some of the time (more green!) but not all the time so there is still some nice variation. I should end up with about 3 ounces of that yarn in the end. Already finished the superwash singles.

I had forgotten how much I like spinning from the fold. It's got a similar magical feeling to the long draw, somehow. And it's nice to be basically using one hand, relaxing.

Anyone else spinning yet?

Sample Skeins

2006-05-01T17:58:00.000-07:00

I had a bit of time today to begin to spin up samples. Here's what I got. I couldn't get very good color representation on the photos, sorry. The first picture is, from left to right, Green Gables plied with itself, spun from the fold; combination drafted with some BFL dyed turquoise, yellow and yellow orange with Easter Egg dyes, plied on itself; and the same two rovings combination drafted as sportweight singles.

The yellow in the original roving really disappears in the spinning and plying. I think the combination draft/plied sample looks a bit more like the original roving than the original roving does! The singles are okay, but having to be soft spun so as not to be overtwisted, they are too matte looking for my taste.

The next photo is Green Gables combination drafted with some BFL from Paradise Fibers in Yellow/Red/Green/Blue/Purple space dyed and plied on itself. It's okay. I've made some yarn like this in Color in Spinning experiments, but I would rather do this with a yarn that was primarily red or purple than green.

The last picture is of my favorites. I dug up some space dyed merino in green/blue/yellow and combination drafted and plied on itself on the left. That's nice. Doesn't look like the original roving, though, which has no blue. Then I decided to spin the rovings separately and ply them together. This is my favorite so far.

Next I will try spinning separately then plying with the orignal roving and the yellow/orange/turquoise stuff from the first picture. It might not look green enough, then, but I'll see.

What are you coming up with?

We're Off!

2006-04-28T16:27:00.000-07:00

My fiber has arrived, as has Weaver's. So let's see what we're working with...

Here's mine:

Here's Weaver's:

Weaver has already spun up a sample and is thinking of adding beads (green, of course):

The fiber is Superwash Wool. I haven't spun any Superwash since very early in my spinning. I spun and Navajo plied some for my dearly departed MIL for socks. The yarn was VERY soft and lovely. I'm looking forward to giving this a try. But I must also sample to see what works best.

My general plan is to spin about two thirds of each fiber to ply with itself and save the other third to ply with something else later. This roving is more variegated than striping, so most likely whatever way I draft it, it would come out pretty much the same. I will probably spin this up to be a 2-ply sport to fingering weight yarn for socks. (Big surprise, this is what I usually do; I'm a big sock knitter).

I've also written out a sock pattern for the Project yarns already, which I will post if that's what I decide to knit. Maybe for next year's L.A. County Fair (it never hurts to think ahead, right?)

Send me your pictures and your plans!

I've had a great idea (I think)

2006-04-26T11:44:00.000-07:00

I've been keeping track of Project Spectrum and trying to work in the colors. Okay.

Then I found that Spunky Eclectic is having a "Fiber of the Month Club" and is dyeing various fibers to go along with the Project Spectrum colors. So I joined the club.

Now, wouldn't it be fun to spin up the fiber from the club and share photos and experiences with each other? Maybe see the different approaches and different results from the same dyepot, the same fiber?

So, without further ado, begins the...

PROJECT SPECTRUM SPINALONG

Join up, comment, post photos, let's see what we can do! Try new spinning techniques, show us your skeins! Maybe at the end of the project, we can all knit it up into someting together. Wouldn't that be fun?

Happy waiting for the mailman!

UPDATE: Amie at Spunky Eclectic tells me that the fiber shipped today!! I will post a picture of it when it arrives. If you have any pictures that you would like to post you can email them to me by clicking on the link in the sidebar and I will post them here. Thanks for participating!

UPDATE II: If you are NOT joining the Spunky Club but you ARE spinning something for Project Spectrum, you are TOTALLY WELCOME to join in! Please do! Send me a photo of what you're spinning and what your plans are and we will all have fun together!