I’ve been really bad when it comes to keeping my blog up to date. I have been doing a lot of spinning, but I haven’t been sharing it with you. And I’ve also been lax about taking pictures. So it is with both joy and sadness that I share with you one of my recent spinning projects. I think this yarn is the best I’ve made so far.
I started with some lovely pin-drafted BFL from Sunset Fibers. It is the November 2013 Fiber of the Month. Unfortunately, I failed to take any pictures of the fiber before I started spinning it. I really have no excuse except that I forgot. I’m trying to remember to take pictures of fiber when it arrives, but my rememberer doesn’t work as well as it used to. The joys of approaching The Golden Years!
Anyway, I decided to try doing a fractal spin. This is just a way of dividing up the yarn so that when it is spun, plied, and knitted, it produces a subtle striping effect even though the different colors are plied together.
I started by unrolling the fiber and dividing it in half lengthwise. I spun one of the halves from end to end to make one bobbin of singles. The other half of the fiber was itself split in half lengthwise, and I spun each of those strips onto another bobbin, keeping the colors in the same order from end to end as I did with the first half. Then I plied the two singles together.
I used my Ashford Traveller spinning wheel in double drive with the regular flyer for both the spinning and the plying, and I ended up with nearly 700 yards of lovely, 2-ply lace weight yarn. I think this is my most consistent yarn yet.
I haven’t chosen a project for this yarn yet, but I’m thinking there may be a Martina Behm design in its future.
This is truly beautiful! So even – and I love the colours, they are so magnificent … Subtle, but still shining … Good work. 😀
Thanks, Julia. You are very kind.
Very pretty!
Thank you!
Q- stunning. Cannot wait to see how the fractal pattern shows when knitted.
Yes, that will be the real test. Sometimes yarn looks beautiful in the skein but when knitted up it looks awful. And vice versa. But I’m thinking this yarn will be perfect knitted up as Brickless.
Pingback: Fractal And Friends | All Kinds Of Knitting