Spinning some John Arbon fibre - Wooden Bobbin - multicoloured version

As I mentioned in my last post I had bought some fibre in May 2022 from another spinner that was de-stashing.  

This is an interesting blend, both in in terms of fibre content and colour combination.  The fibre content is 40% Corriedale, 30% Merino, 10% Exmoor Blueface, 10% Zwartbles, 5% Bluefaced Leicester, 5% Wensleydale.

Having spun up the first braid and whilst being happy with that yarn I decided that I would spin up the second braid in a completely different way.  There are a few options available to me. 1) Pull apart the colours and create some kind of gradient yarn but I can't see this working as I can probably isolate the green and the white but the rest, nope. 2) Fibonacci Spin, this has potential as I can isolate the green and the white and then the rest would probably have to be blended together to make one browny-grey shade.  I don't think I want to make a Fibonacci Yarn. 3) Pull off chunks and spin-over-the-fold to keep the colours together and then I have two options: a) spin two singles like this and ply them together for a barber-pole yarn or b) spin one long single and then chain ply to make a 3 ply yarn but pay attention to the colours coming through and adjust the loop lengths each time to try and keep the colours clean and together. 

For this braid I decided to spin it over-the-fold, as per option 3, but I didn't initially decide on which option to take for the plying so I halved the braid in length to give me options and started with the first smaller length.  Once I saw how it spun up I was able to make a decision on the next step.

I liked the way the colours were isolating and into various shades of the brown so I decided to continue and spin one long single and then chain ply it.  I spun it quite finely, like the first yarn, but as I was making a chain ply 3ply this yarn was going to spin up thicker than the first yarn.  I had to adjust the length of the loops when plying to accommodate the colour changes as best as I could.

The finished yarn is double knit weight, 106g/262m, and it's nice and soft.  It has turned out really nice and interesting with lots of colour blocks but there are also some sections that are a bit barber-poled but this couldn't be helped and I don't mind it.  I am glad I went this way and not with the option of spinning it over-the-fold and then making a 2ply barber-pole yarn.

Spinning some Faux Cashmere

If I can spin 100% Silk yarns then spinning another braid of Faux Cashmere should be a breeze.  I've tackled a braid before, back in 2022 for the TDF, where I spun that as a 2ply yarn and just pre-drafted and spun from the end and plied. Faux Cashmere is actually 100% Nylon

This time I decided to try something different with my new found confidence in different spinning techniques that I have been trying out in more recent times.

I'm working on spinning my way through some of my older braids of fibre and this one I got from Yummy Yarns UK back in August 2018, 6 years ago!  The colour of this is called Pebble.

What I noticed when I undone the braid is that the dye didn't go all the way through the thickness of the braid in most places.  A lot of it was just on the surface which means that there is way more white fibres than anticipated.  I decided that I would probably be best to pull off small chunks and spin over the fold to try and keep the splodges of colour together in one long single and then to chain ply to keep the colours together even more.  For this to work effectively and give me a decent amount of meterage to knit with I will have to spin as fine as I can.

As you can see from the spinning on the bobbin, this method is working pretty well, producing lengths of different colours/shades.  I like the way this is spinning up, it's really pretty.

I think this has spun up much better than the braid I spun back in 2022.  It has a different feel to it.  The first skein feels "heavy, dense" whilst this one feels light, airy and soft and that has to be to do with spinning it over-the-fold which traps more air between the fibres.  Maybe I should spin over-the-fold more often.  Choosing to chain ply has helped keep the colours together but I think this could have been improved on further had I been more selective and flexible in the lengths of my chain loops to keep like for like colours even more together. This yarn is still gorgeous and is 97g/244m and comes in at a light fingering weight.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2023 Stage 2

The Cycling: Stage 2 is 209km of a hilly route that starts in Vitoria-Gasteiz and ends in San Sebastian, in Basque Country, Northern Spain.

The Daily Challenge: Finish something!  If you bit off more than you can chew yesterday, get stuck in and complete that spin.  Or, if you put down a project to start TdF, pick it back up.

Suggested Fibre: Anything

What I did

I chain plied yesterday's spun single to keep the colours together.  The finished yarn is perfect for working garments, such as a shawl, where you start with a few stitches at the neck edge and progressively increase the number of stitches as you work the rows.  The progressively increasing colour lengths will match that increasing stitches and the resulting stripes should be pretty even in depth as you work.  If you were to use this type of yarn to knit something that is a straight knit or square or rectangular in shape then the stripes would start off thin and get deeper and deeper as you knit.

The finished yarn is 100% Merino sport weight and 201m/100g.