Experimental swatching

I would really like to rant about the day I had, but seeing as its is still today and time heals all wounds (or at least takes the sting out of them) and attempts at self preservation in this 24hr period seem to be backfiring on me...

I will not rant. I won't even save it for another day.

That does mean that I cannot talk about knitting, but this is OK since I've been in a mad spinning frenzy this evening. Partly coping mechanism, partly wanna finish stuff that I've been working on forever.

First to be finished - my polwarth samples. I picked up 4 oz of polwarth dyed locks at Yarnorama at the last spin in and tried spinning them with different hand preps.

I started out with hand cards and spun about 2/3rds of the fiber with a woolen long draw from rolags. I plied half of it back on itself to see how it changed with plying. I like how lofty the finished yarn is, but the carded prep has a lot of nepps and is fairly uneven. This is typical of woolen yarns to a point but I have spun much more consistent woolen singles than this before.

Part of the problem may have been my cards. Polwarth is a fairly fine wool and I have coarse cloth cards. Part of the problem may also have been the amount of lanolin left on the locks - it was enough to make them somewhat sticky and in hindsight I might have been happier if I had washed the locks before carding & spinning.

I put aside the locks that had the best structure left to them while I was doing this and so for the last third of the fiber I simply flicked them open on both ends and spun them worsted like I would a commercial top. The result is very different from the woolen. Smooth and fairly consistent and it seems to have notably more drape. I enjoyed the spinning this way much more as well. The lanolin effect was vastly reduced when spinning from fibers that were lined up.

The results left to right:

Woolen 2-ply, 176yds & 1.2 oz
Woolen singles, 282yds & 1.1oz
Worsted singles, 420yds & 1.3oz

My missing ~half ounce seems to have gone to a combination of waste/short cuts, VM and lanolin which I did scour out mostly when I washed the finished yarn (I don't like knitting with greasy wool any more than I like spinning it) and this is something I'll take into account in the future when working with locks and fleece vs. roving or top.

One thing I didn't like about these particular locks is the perfume the dyer put on them. It took me a lot more washing than I would normally do to get it mostly out and even now there is a faint scent on them that as one of my knitting friends mentioned smells rather like "Old Lady Perfume". I can only assume this was done to cover up the sheepy smell but I would much have preferred Au de Sweaty Ewe.

I also finally(!) finished the last of my 2oz of 50/50 Yak/Merino.

The finished yarn is lovely and soft. It is still drying at the moment so better photos will follow. I am estimating it at 360yds, but I need to measure the dry hank to be sure of any shrinkage.

This was a complete nuisance to spin and the finished yarn feels like a real accomplishment. The blend was not very homogeneous so I pulled off bits by the "lock" fluffed them and rolled them into mini-faux rolags and then spun them semi-woolen. This mostly limited the tendency to spin out all the merino but there are still sections that are just yak or merino despite all my best efforts. The final yarn is more consistent than I expected considering. There are some thick & thin bits, especially where the first lengths of yarn I spun are, but its a pretty nice heavy lace/light fingering.

Although I really love the brown marl I am considering over dyeing it. I just tend to prefer color to neutrals.

Finally, I spun this much merino:

Its much heavier than all this lace weight I've been doing lately and a nice change of pace. I'm hoping for a 3-ply worsted. Maybe plied with something variegated.

I have a whole pound of the solid so it will be sweater yarn (Or vest yarn if it doesn't get a third alternate color ply).

Mmm... sweater yarn.