November on the Wheel

A few weeks ago I was brainstorming ways to get myself going on this blog again.  The WIP challenge was a big part of it, but I wanted to include some spinning as well.  My first idea was to do a weekly post on my current spins. Though when I thought more about that idea, it seemed rather boring.  Unfortunately I don't have unlimited spinning time so the posts would inevitably be something like "hey, here's the ounce I did this week on the same fiber I posted last week so it looks pretty much the same.  tune in next week for another identical picture".  Uh, yeah, lame.  So the weekly idea was pushed to monthly.  I'm not exactly off to a timely start since I'm posting my November spinning in December. Oh well.

A couple of months ago, I stumbled upon the  Completely Twisted and Arbitrary Spinning group on Ravelry.  The group is filled with some awesome spinners and fierce fiber enablers (let's just say, Etsy has jumped to the top of the list of websites I visit), but the main feature of the group is a bi-monthly spin-along (SAL).  Members nominate and vote on pictures inspired by a certain theme, and winning pictures are presented to a featured dyer who dyes fiber for the SAL.  I jumped into the group for the August/September SAL with Fiber Optic.  The fiber was awesome and I couldn't resist this brightly colored gradient.

It took several weeks, but I ended up producing a skein I was thrilled with.

What does this September spinning have to do with November?  Well not much except that I never posted that pretty skein, and spinning that fiber got me really enthused about participating in future SALs.  When the group's October/November round started up, I barely hesitated before buying two of the colorways, this time by Two if By Hand.

The two on the right occupied most of my November spinning time.  It took me some time to get started since I was being my typical indecisive self. How thick should I aim for?  Dunno.  How was I going to ply so I could divide evenly?  Couldn't decide.  I gave up on planning and just spun up 8 ounces of singles.

It took several more days of hemming and hawing over what to do next. I finally decided that the colors might come together really well as 3 ply.  I wound a third of the singles off each bobbin and set to plying.

I so love the end result.  So much so that one picture really isn't enough.  Here's a close up.

The only bummer is that I still spin really densely, so both skeins together are only about 325 yards of worsted weight yarn. I have yet to learn the magic by which spinners will get almost twice that yardage. Still, the 300+ yards should be enough for a scarf which is what I was planning on when I bought the fiber, and I'm officially hooked on SALs.  The December/January dyer is Julie Spins.  I've drooled over her shop for a long time but never purchased anything.  Doubt I'll be able to say that much longer.