Good things come in threes
In spinning, as in life.
Alpine Romney,
Changes Falklands,
Tartan superwash Corriedale.
Christmas spinning
The loom did not come as any sort of surprise, and I was so excited by the mere prospect of weaving that three days before Christmas I had the girls pick out some fiber from the stash that I could spin up for scarves for them.
Dev chose some Hello Yarn Shetland fiber that I got from my 4 Oz Challenge prize in 2010, in the colorway "Happy Dance". It ended up like this:
212 yds/4 oz, 10-14 wpi. I spun this using a point-of-contract draw (i.e. using the twist to pull fibers out from the drafting zone). I ended up with something very squooshy and soft and lovely. After I spun this up I got a bit concerned that it wouldn't hold up to being warp, so I did a little research on how to spin strong warp yarns, which I applied to Boo's scarf yarn.
Boo chose HY Merino in "Overfond".
256 yds/4 oz, 8-10 wpi. I spun this worsted (inchworm drafting), with lots of twist, and I'm much more confident in its ability to hold up to weaving strain.
At that point, I was so hopped up on the spinning-for-weaving idea that I jumped into 100 grams of wool/silk blend that I got in a trip down to Guilford to George Weil.
95 yds/100 grams. Very smooth and dense and gorgeously shiny. I can't wait to weave this up! But I need to do some stash diving to find the right weft yarn for it. Hmmm...
I've also been working on the River Run Pullover again, now that I've got a firm, final, finish-or-be-damned! deadline on it (aka Himself's birthday). I spent yesterday on the couch, recovering from my wicked plague, and working one repeat of the sleeve.
Ooof. I'm not sure it will ever be done!
The importance of rinsing
Yesterday I took a break from all the knitting that is ongoing, and did a wee bit of spinning instead. I tried another new-to-me wool, some mixed English wool that Boo dyed a few months back - same color scheme as her Cheviot socks, but slightly darker colors. However...I discovered that the fiber didn't get rinsed out quite enough, because my fingers turned blue. Oops!
That's after an hour of plying this morning - last night after a couple hours of spinning the singles, my fingertips were bright blue! I gave the finished yarn a good soak, so hopefully all the other excess dye is now gone. I guess I'll know for sure when I start knitting with it.
This wool reminded me of the Cheviot in that it was not terrifically soft, but had a nice grippy feel when spinning the singles. The finished yarn reminds me a bit of the Bartlett yarn I'm using for my MIL's sweater, although not as lofty. It's a very rustic yarn. I'm thinking lined mittens for Boo, to match her socks.
In other spinning/handspun news, I've almost finished off Dev's Sprout sweater.
We went to York last weekend, and my yarn-dar did not let me down. While wandering around the city streets, we happened upon a yarn store. Dev and I went in while Himself and Boo continued on. The yarns were lovely, but nothing I needed to snatch up and take home with me. They also had a nice selection of buttons, so after much hemming and hawing, we brought home these.
Perfect buttons for my little English schoolgirl. Hopefully she'll be wearing it by next weekend.
This week's to-do list
1) Order approximately 10 lbs of undyed fiber
2) Hit up a wine supply place for citric acid
3) File with Her Majesty's Customs and Revenue Service so I don't get in trouble with the po-po
4) Harass my property manager into fixing the electricity in the part of the house where I plan to do this silly dyeing thing
5) Release a pattern (dependent on a) my brother having received the darn thing and b) my getting some photos of him doing his best ANTM imitation).
However, before I get too overwhelmed by that list, I can pat myself on the back for having knit a hat today. Out of this lovely yarn, which is a potential colorway for the store.
Candy Cane yarn, appropriate for the upcoming holiday season I think. The very cute hat (for Boo, but it fits me too!) is currently blocking, so I'll try to get an FO picture later this week.
We have managed to return from our half-term trip to Houston where we roasted in ludicrous October weather, saw lots of good friends, ate some really exquisite steak, and scored some yarny goodies, in both knitted and unknitted forms. Well, technically I scored the yarny goodies, cause the rest of the family isn't so keen on the yarn stuff. Philistines...
Rainbow Icelandic singles
From the gradient fiber I posted earlier this week, I ended up with this:
163 yds of singles (out of ~3.5 oz). I spun these at a low ratio (7.5:1) so that I didn't end up with wire instead of yarn. I hadn't spun Icelandic before, and it wasn't the smoothest experience. I think this top had both fiber types (tog and thel, which is the outer and under coats respectively), so the staple length wasn't consistent. I kept getting points where the shorter undercoat made clumps and slubs in the singles. It was a bit of a frustrating experience, but the finished yarn is pretty nice anyway.
I couldn't resist, so today, after I took the finished skeins pictures, I balled it up,
these colors are pretty true to life
and cast on for EZ's Pi shawl. 
I'm working the increase rows as invisible increases and doing yo, k2tog whenever the color shifts in the yarn. It's not going to be very big, but maybe the girls can use it for a stuffed animal or something.