Spinning Made Me a Loser!

Finally, after many months of a spinning "dry spell", I got back on my *ss (literally) and started spinning a little on my Ashford Joy. The fact that I owed my friend, Donna, a skein of handspun for over a year now was also very good motivation! (he he)

For those of you that spin, you might have had that "nah, don't really feel like spinning right now..." turn quickly into "omg, do I have enough fiber to keep spinning through the weekend?!!??" feeling. Yup, that's what happened to me.

I not only finished this large handspun skein for my friend, but I'm also very close to finishing 7 oz of a beautiful blend of Icelandic lamb/mohair in an off-white color. Sooo pretty. I always hope for a 2 ply laceweight (which I've come close to, but not actually achieved yet) and I think this one might be the one!! I have a beautiful lace scarf or shawl in mind for this yarn, depending on how many yards I can get out of it after plying.

Anyway, here are the details of the very vibrant handspun I just finished...

DETAILS of HANDSPUN

Fiber: Sereknity's BFL (blue faced leicester, 100%) in colorway, "Blue Hawaii)
Weight: 4 ounces
WPI: (wraps per inch) 20-21, fingering weight yarn
Ply: 2 ply (singles spun with Z twist, plied with S twist)
Ratios: Singles (8:1), Plying (11:1)
Yardage: After plying, 355 yards
Fun Level: Absolutely awesome - not just because the fiber was a good quality, which it was, but also because the colorway was so interesting to look at and see how it transitioned from the bright blues to the turquoise to the purple. Lovely!

And, now, some more pics:

On the wraps per inch guide- (notice that I plied it loosely so that it would have extra softness and bounce- oh, it's SO soft!)


Finished yarn all wrapped up nicely-


I had a number of yards of singles left over from one of the bobbins, so I decided to use the navajo ply technique to make myself a little 3 ply to keep.



and, the wraps per inch for this was...about 14, which made it a DK weight-


I ended up getting only 9 yards of the 3 ply, but still enough to make a swatch!



I love this yarn so much that I'm having a hard time thinking I'll be giving it to Donna on Friday. But, she deserves it for waiting soo many months for it and I hope she likes it as much as I do! (if she doesn't, I can always keep it, right??!!??)

Now, how did spinning make me a loser?? Well, I did so much spinning this week (as well as my Wii fit, yoga and jogging some here and there), that I lost 4 pounds this week!!!! I can't tell you how happy I am about this!!!

So, now I'm up to 44 pounds in 16 weeks..woo-hoo!!! (I was wrong last week - I was only on my 15th week - I talked to the receptionist at WW today and I just finished my 16th)

I don't know if my back, shoulders, neck and wrists can keep up this level of knitting and spinning, but I'm going to try.

If you're a spinner, how is YOUR spinning coming along so far this year??