beginner spinning

Rainy days, tea, a Frasier marathon, rolags, fauxlags and my spindle Ebony = a perfect Sunday. I’m still working on my breed study but since I don’t have two wheels (Santa did you hear that) and the breed study fiber is still on my wheel, I’m going to spindle spin these rolags & fauxlags I made so I can make Christmas ornaments for my tree. Yes I said Christmas and don’t tell me it’s too early to start cause I’m a super slow crafter! 😛

My goal is all handmade ornaments this Christmas.

It’s been a while since I touched my spindles, but it’s really like riding a bike and I love the portability of using spindles. I’ll be out of town next weekend for my god-daughter’s birthday sleep-over and having the spindle means that I still get to spin.

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I’m going to get offline now — homemade quinoa patties and lunch are calling me. 😀

Here’s wishing everyone the best of Sundays and a great week ahead.

First off, thanks so much for your support of the first breed study post! I really do appreciate it. And secondly, sorry for missing last week’s post — I had a migraine that made my left eye swell shut and I’m just beginning to come out of the post migraine fog. Intentionally slowing down after that brutal headache gave me time to craft and spin, so I’m ready with this week’s installment.

The first post gave you information on the the categories of wool and this week, I spun from the fine wool category. Fibers in this category:

are great for making next to the skin items (for e.g. sweaters, shawls, cowls)
are soft and durable
are typically of staple length 3 – 5 inches
produce yarn that’s typically bouncy and soft

Some well known breeds are: Merino, Corriedale, Polwarth and Cormo.

The fiber I’m working with in this category is a lesser known fiber named Bond. This breed originated in Australia in the late 1800s, early 1900s and is a resulting breed which came from crossing Lincoln and Merino sheep. Other characteristics of Bond fiber are:

a longer staple length (4 – 7 inches)
that it’s a dense fiber
it’s soft
it’s very elastic

My findings from this spin are:

my balanced spin gave me yarn of 5 twists per inch. Meaning in order for me to produce yarn that is not skewed to the extreme left or right, I have to put five twists in each inch of the fiber I feed onto my bobbin.
the fiber is really dense. I usually draft forward (meaning, I pull the fiber forward before I let the twist enter it) but the density of this fiber hurt my hands drafting that way and it was much easier for me to draft backwards then feed.
the fiber is incredibly soft although it’s dense and has a type of hairy quality to it that I absolutely love.
the fiber is very durable. It took some effort to break the fiber after twist was put in.

I’m trying my best to spin this fiber as consistently as I can but the preparation of the fiber is not smooth. The prep resulted in fiber with bits and pieces of fiber “waste” (noils and nepps) that I absolutely love and am not removing. With my use of the short backwards draft (which gives less control regarding thick and thinness) plus the “waste”, I’m getting a spin that’s kinda rustic, thick and thin with enough texture to keep things interesting. I can’t wait to see the resulting swatch. This is not to say that you can’t get a fine spin with this fiber but that’s not what I’m going for here.

I would highly recommend this fiber for a beginning spinner. The long staple length is very accommodating as your hands and brain learn to work together learning this beautiful, meditative craft.

The goal is to finish spinning the rest of this fiber by next Saturday so I can start the second fiber I got from the seller. After spinning the second fiber, next up will be plying the two of them together as an experiment.

With this information, hopefully the next time you see yarn with Bond content you’ll be willing to try it for one of your yarny projects. 😀

Hope you’re each having a wonderfully crafty April! I can’t wait to visit you all to see what you’ve been up to.