A good day for spinning.

First, here is the red silk that was last on my bobbin. I chain plied it and it is finished now. It turned out beautifully. I'm not sure what it wants to be yet. There is 2.8 oz, which won't do a whole lot.

My plan had been to not really do any spinning until Spinzilla in October which, frankly, was a silly plan. Today was our local spinners guild meeting. I'm so glad I went! Firstly, my lovely husband said he would watch a friend's children so my friend could go for the first time. Her daughters are similar in age to mine, and it seems like it went well. 

My friend, K, wanted to rent a spinning wheel so she could join us for spinning in general as well as Spinzilla. She's taken to it very well and seemed to be having lots of fun! 

I brought some blue wool that I bought about a year ago to spin for a sweater. I've already spun 8 oz or so of it. I'm two plying it. I had just plied what I had on my bobbins so my bobbins would be ready for spinzilla. Today I put more of it on my bobbin:

I guess the next thing to do is fill this and a second bobbin and ply them before October 5.

The thing that got me today was 8 oz of this gorgeous merino combed top. I always browse what the vendors bring. I started lusting over this and had to go back to get it. I had just enough cash for it, so perhaps it was meant to be. I can't wait to see how it turns out, but I probably should finish the blue first. I'm not sure what the colors will do when spun. I've gotten out of the habit of buying these multicolor rovings because the color often just seems to muddy when spun. I couldn't resist this.

I am somewhat proud of myself for not buying the lace/fingering weight uber soft yarn that another friend pointed out. She had purchased some and let me pet it. The thing is, I have so much yarn of that weight (but not nearly as soft) that I need to get working through before I can really justify buying more. That didn't work so well for the combed top above.

Another thing that I have on my needles: 

This is a project I've been working on for a little while. It is simply an entrelac scarf. The yarn is Happy Fuzzy Yarn  superwash sport in July Garden and Pollen. I adore the July Garden, but I'm a bit saddened by the really short color repeats. I thought that entrelac would be the way to show off this beautiful yarn and, while it is better, the color repeats are still too short to get blocks of color. That's the main reason I don't buy much multicolor yarn. It looks gorgeous in the skein, but as soon as you ball it up, you can see that it muddies. It also muddies in the project.  I do like how it looks, but it wasn't quite what I was aiming for.

What's off my bobbin?

While on vacation in July, I spun up this beautiful fiber that I bought from Inglenook Fibers via Etsy. It is 3.5 oz of beautiful Tussah silk.

Beautiful braid from Inglenook Fibers

Midway through spinning silk singles

It felt like it took much longer to spin than a similar weight of wool, possibly due to the extra twist required. Possibly it was also due to my Dad repeatedly telling me that it would be easier just to buy the yarn. He just doesn't understand.

I chain plied it to maintain the colors and wrapped it in a skein and kind of forgot about it until this week when I set the twist (am I supposed to do this with silk, like with wool?), thwapped it and hung it to dry. It turned the water an impressive shade of green.

Thankfully the wool I had in with it was dark colored. It didn't seem to affect it.

Here is the final project. I'm not sure what I want to do with it yet. By my calculations, I have 105 yards.

This is what's on my bobbin right now. It is 2.8 oz of Tussah silk, also from Inglenook Fibers. Tonight I get to ply!

I know Spinzilla is coming up, but I didn't think silk would be the best option to get lots spun during the week, but then I finished plying this silk in two evenings after the girls went to bed, so that wasn't bad.

Next is plying this and then working on a couple samples to be ready for Spinzilla. When I bought wool last fall, I had this idea for some barber pole striped yarn. I'm not convinced anymore that the yellow and brown that I got for it is the best idea.