Happy New Year!!

2017!!

First day of the new year and I'm off to a good start!!  It is said that whatever you are doing on New Year's Day is what you will be doing all year.  So I made sure I did some of my favorite things. 

First, my little family was together.  I watched football with my Heartbeat.  The Seahawk's and the Bronco's games were at the same time, so we flipped back and forth between the two during commercials.  Happily, both teams won. And I enjoyed my kids company throughout the day.  

Ahhh, I feel so blessed. 

While watching the games, I kept my hands busy with spinning!  The single-ply yarn on my spindle need just 10 more seeds to be ready for plying.  I've been aiming for 100 seeds per spindle full.

Then I couldn't resist plying it using my favorite plying method -Navajo plying with drop spindles. I learned this method several years ago at Renaissance Yarns, a LYS in Kent, WA (the shop is long since closed now 😢).  But if your curious about this plying method, I found a pretty good picture tutorial made by Handmade by Knottygal - Navajo plying.

I roll my single plies into center pull skeins...

The single ply is so thin I figured I could use a size 10.5 double pointed knitting needle I had handy instead of the usual nostepinne..... 😊 The knitting needle works wonderfully. 

Prince isn't as interested in my "yarn cakes" as he is wondering why I'm not petting him! But you can see how tiny these skeins are. 

My brother Chris used to work at a tree farm. When there was a tree that was being uprooted or trimmed he would keep the roots and branches that appealed to him and make interesting pieces of art out of them. He showed me walking canes, walking sticks, coat racks, and carvings he had made. I fell in love with the pieces he showed me and had to have some kind of his woodwork for my own. I tried to describe a nostepinne, but I didn't really understand the particular hand and balance needed...

He let me pick out the sticks from his collection that I liked. I think one of them is from an apple tree. One of the pieces already had a really cool face carved on the end.
 
Actually, the irregularities in these pieces make them difficult to use as nostepinnes but their story makes my heart warm and fuzzy. They will always be cherished by me.

Now, back to my spinning... As I said before, after I "caked" the single-ply I couldn't resist plying it. The first skein of 3-ply I made was from approximately 75 seeds resulting in about 17 yards of plied yarn.  I've spun five 100 seed spindle fulls since the first, leaving them to ply later.  This most recent 100 seeds resulted in about 25 yards of 3-ply yarn.  I think I'm maintaining a fairly even consistency.  I'm pleased.

And now I start thinking about what's next.  I'm eager to grab a crochet hook and start making a small lacy doily or something. But I am curious about dyeing the yarn too. And then thoughts about dipping the yarn in dye reminds me that with spun wool the twist has to be "set" by washing and hanging the hanks. Not setting the yarn could result in unfavorable surprises, like shrinkage, in knitted items.
I don't know if cotton has to be treated the same as wool. Time to Google: "does hand spun cotton need to be set".
Knitty.com has a wonderful write up about finishing yarn written by Lee Juvan.  In the "Finishing your yarn" article it says:

"Plant fibers such as linen and cotton are best finished by simmering the skeins in dish detergent in a pot of water on the stove for 40 minutes or more. If you plan to dye cotton yarn, you’ll need to simmer it in a pot of water and detergent to which you’ve added two tablespoons of washing soda (also called soda ash) to remove the natural waxes that will prevent even dye absorption. Because I knit with my linen and cotton yarns, they are plied and I boil them in skein form (tied in several places to prevent tangling); those who are finishing linen or cotton singles for weaving may want to boil them on plastic cores (see Olive and Harry Linder’s classic books, Handspinning Cotton and Handspinning Flax, for more information on making your own boiling bobbins or try Stephanie Gaustad’s wonderful new video, Spinning Cotton).

Remove your clean skein from the rinse water, gently squeeze out any excess water, and lay the skein flat on a towel. Roll the towel up and press out as much remaining moisture as you can. I hang my skeins to dry without tension because I generally knit with my handspun and prefer to retain any natural elasticity. If you want your skeins to dry with a weight, try Maggie Casey’s clever trick of hanging a plant mister on the bottom loop."

Lol, setting the twist is complicated!!  And I had no idea that setting could be different if you wanted to use your yarn for weaving than for knitting!! There's quite a bit to consider here! It often amazes me how much "behind the scenes" we don't know until we want to know. Craziness!!

OK. Back to my check list of things to do on the first day of the year... 

1. Time with family -  √
2. Watch football with my Heartbeat and our teams win- √
3. Spin - √ (I have two bags full that I want to get spun this year!)
4. Make it into a 3-ply yarn - √ (that's practically a finished item... Well it was until I Googled about finishing yarn...)
5. Learn something new to improve my skills - √

It's a pretty good list. But I have to get at least two more things on it... Quilting!! of course!!!

My quilting guild will be participating in another guild challenge. The theme is "black and white and one other color." I have a few ideas but I haven't quite decided what I want to do yet. I think the deadline is in February. Part of my personal challenge is that I will free motion quilt it myself. So.... while I'm deciding on the quilt top design I might as well practice free motion quilting!

I stitched the left and right pieces yesterday. (I missed a couple of spots. I might go back and fill them in... Or just leave them, idk.)  The one in the middle was stitched today.  

I love the recent surge of graffiti quilting. Karlee Porte has several books on the subject. It is actually doodling with needle and thread instead of pencil and paper. Lol, ya, it sounds easy but it isn't for me. I was never really a doodler, not even in school. Those brown paper book covers we used to protect our text books remained fairly plain on my books. I guess I preferred writing letters in other people's notebooks over doodling in mine 😉.

Anyway... The black thread on white fabric shows every imperfection! Lol, I both love it and hate it. I love that it shows the perfectionist in me is letting go. But omg those imperfections 😵!!! Lol.... Good thing is I do see improvement. 😀

#6 was quilting. And finally #7 - the last thing I needed to add to my check list was blogging. Although this post will be dated Jan 2, I did start composing it on the 1st, so that counts for me!!

Happy New Year to you and yours.  I'm wishing for you all the best that 2017 has to offer.