Tag Archives: BFL

round and round.

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I did A LOT of plying yesterday, or at least it felt like a lot. See?

fo cvm1

focvm2

This is the CVM in the impatiens colorway from cosy, and the Paradise Fibers oatmeal bfl I began with. Both became much softer with a good soak, and each have a very nice amount of squoosh. I’m realizing that I am that beginner I read about in rav forums (yay ravelry for all of the great info and advice available), and that I need to remind myself that what seems like too much twist to rooster-the-spindler is not necessarily too much to the rooster-at-the-wheel. I’m happier with the amount of twist in the CVM singles than in my last project (that verb corriedale), and my plying is getting tighter and bouncier (I think).

fo cvm3

Boh helped with the math: 190 yds of the BFL, and about 130 of the CVM.  That may be why he is so tired.

sleepydog

Also, I grabbed a book and a dishcloth-in-progress, and Boh and I headed down to a pebbly beach and bubbling creek. He spent a lot of time finding rocks under the water and bringing them to dry land.

sillyearsdog

We had a lovely day. Also, I made some serious progress in the dishcloth department. I realized I needed to knit more than one to fully put my new no-sponge plan into action.

boringdishcloths

There is something extremely satsifying about using up leftover yarn, particularly when it is dishcloth cotton.

On today’s list? Working on ply #3 of this:

2of3ply progress

I know you can’t really see the colors, but they are deep and lovely: blues, deep burgundys, greens. This is Spunky Club dark bfl in colorway Myrtle. I’m aiming to have something that I can make into socks, but we’ll see. I’m looking forward to plying my first 3-ply!

Also on the agenda? A walk in the woods, more reading, and dinner/drinks/live music with a friend.

Have a great weekend!

rooster = in love.

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6

I actually have a bunch of pictures to show you — boh being silly, the last piece of quiche, the couch covered in books, etc. but I know what you really want to see…

treadle

I know I said I wasn’t going to take this out of the box until I met my last deadline. But I wrote 4 pages before lunchtime! And I have no will power. None.

yarnonwheel

I heart my new wheel. I opened up some of the softest BFL I have ever touched (from Paradise Fibers), and set to it. Here’s an up close shot of the bobbin after about an hour:

wheelyarnmacro

The yarn at the bottom (what you can’t see) isn’t quite this pretty, but man! I love this! I got out my Maggie Casey book to look through the spinning wheel section, and have been playing with the tension on the brake band. This wheel is so intuitive. Unfortunately, I’m going to have to tear myself away this afternoon to keep writing. Boh was (of course) terrified of the cardboard box the wheel came in, but has been surprisingly calm, if a bit wary, of the wheel itself.

lenbohinback

Hooray! I have a spinning wheel! Can’t wait to be on the other side of this chunk of writing so that I can spin, spin, spin.

Along these lines, do you, oh wise readers, have any recommendations in the realm of books on spinning technique? Maggie Casey’s book is fantastic, and covers a few different kinds of drafting and some troubleshooting, but is there something else I should be reading/working through to build a good foundation?

yarrrrn.

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spindles

Those of you who’ve been reading for awhile know that I’ve begun practicing with a drop spindle. I posted some practice “yarn” this spring, but honestly, I was having a hard time with drafting and getting an even, longer-than-a-millisecond spin with my spindle. Enter Mel of Pipe Dreams and Purling Plans. In September, Mel held a contest in conjunction with fundraising for the Breast Cancer 3Day Walk in DC, and I won the beautiful spindle in the foreground above. This spindle has made all the difference. It spins forever, which has given me the practice I need to figure out how to draft and spin more consistently. I’m considering this my very first yarn — spun from 2 oz of BFL in colorway Sadia from A Verb For Keeping Warm. It is a beautiful, complex gray. Here’s what it looked like when I took it off the spindles:

prewash

I then soaked it in a warm water bath, and weighted it as it hung to dry to straighten it out.  I waited all day yesterday for it to dry, and last night I wound it into a skein:

tada

And here’s the skein with a dime for scale:

tada-dime

This looks pretty thick-thin, but much of that has to do with switching spindles and making it over the drafting hurdle part of the way through this projct. I’d say most of the yarn is solidly dk weight, and none of it is thicker than a heavy worsted. I’ve begun a new spinning project already, and I can already see my own progress. This is seriously addicting.

Happy New Year! I’ll be back soon with (perhaps) a quick review of my knitting year, and some resolutions for 2009.