Spindling

Recently I have started on yet another slippery slope to hell. Being a yarnaholic was bad enough. Then I started dyeing stuff. Then it got worse....

I bought some quite fine white 100% wool on a huge cone. There must be thousands and thousands and thousands of metres of yarn on that cone. Only it is so fine that I can't knit with it. It is like thick sewing thread.

So I thought maybe I could buy a spindle to ply it up. I read up on the net how to use a spindle and how to navajo ply. Then I got me a cheapie spindle at the Bendigo Wool Show.

So how did the stuff I now believe is called roving also get into my bag? Not much of it, just about 100 grams of a white wool/mohair mix and 50g of a nice green/blue merino silk mix. I still don't understand it. One of the bags was bought specifically because I needed a safe place to put the eensy teensy little goblet one of the lovely woodturners turned up for me whilst we were talking to his mates. Their tent seemed an interesting spot to shelter from the driving wind and rain....

So I played with some of the yarn that I wanted to ply up and then oops, dang it, some of that mohair/wool mix found its way onto my spindle. I still am not sure how it happened. Oh, and some of the mohair/wool mix was somehow dyed magenta and purple before it got spun. Still a complete mystery to me!

Before I knew it, I had two skeins of yarn made up. Can you tell which one was created after the lovely Catherine showed me a little bit about drafting the fleece?


Then a little bit of some multicoloured silk/merino roving fell into my clutches. I split it into main colour groups and started having a little more fun. I also discovered that my shoulders aren't up to spinning with a spindle so I had to lay off for a few days and modify my technique (no sitting with my arm stretched as high overhead as it can go ;-) Then 250g of beautiful blue/mauve/purple merino silk. Oops. Anyway, here is the outcome of some of the spinning so far:



I call it Australian landscape. It has lots of Aussie colours. I hope you like the river running through the heart of the country and out to the sea. The first to be spun was the mixed batch (the rangelands), then the orange/red (the red centre), then the greenish mix (the forests of the coast), then the green (the sea -from the 50g of different roving) then the blue sky with white wool cirrus clouds. Click on the pic for a bigger view.

Of course I really am not spinning at present. No, not at all! There wouldn't be any yarn on my spindle at present. None. Nope. Well maybe... but I really am working hard on my wedding dress! And the dishes. Yucko!

anon!