I’ve been spending a lot of time in hospitals and waiting rooms over the past few months, so my spinning wheel has sat neglected. Since I can get bored with knitting for that many hours, I decided to start a new spindle spinning project. (Also, to avoid being tempted to buy all the pretty new fiber, I decided to spin some fiber I already had in the colors I was craving.) And since I’m lousy at keeping project notes any other way, you, dear reader, get to follow along.
I’m spinning a special sock blend from Hipstrings, which is a blend of 50% Southdown, 25% Dorset Horn, and 25% bio-nylon, in the colorway Sky Above, Ground Below. This blend is non-superwash, but the fiber content means it should be machine-washable without any treatment.
Spinning Down-type breeds
I’ve spun Dorset Horn before, and other Down-type breeds, but Southdown is new to me. Southdown is a true Down breed and is on my Shave ‘Em to Save ‘Em list, so I hope to have a pure Southdown project to show off at some point. Meanwhile, this blend is spinning up very similarly to the Clun Forest I’ve spun in the past (Clun Forest is considered a Down-type breed). The tricky thing I find with Down and Down-type breeds is that it’s difficult to know when you have enough twist. You think you have enough twist under tension (from either gravity or your spinning wheel), then you release the tension to wind on and it springs back and looks almost like unspun fiber. To compensate, I’m checking a plyback frequently to make sure I have enough twists per inch for a sturdy yarn.
Preparing my sample
I’ve taken about 1/3 of the fiber for sampling, and split it into three for a 3-ply yarn, my preferred yarn for socks. I’m going to spin it all in the same color direction and then flip one section for plying. My hope is that this will break up the color so that it won’t be stripey, but will blend into shorter sections of browns and greens. If that doesn’t work, then I will break the rest up into smaller strips.
So far I’ve spun two out of three plies. I’ve decided to wind off onto my Alden Amos bobbins for plying – I’ve only got two storage bobbins I can wind onto with my drill, and I’m using those for another project. I’ve got three Alden Amos bobbins, and they will fit on my tensioned lazy kate, so perfect! I’ll spin all three plies in the same direction, then wind off two turtles from the outside and one from the center.
So far I’ve finished two of the plies and wound them off in opposite directions. I’ll post an update when I’ve finished the third and plied them!
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