Spinning for the SPAKAL

If you listen to the Knitmore Girls podcast, then you've no doubt heard about their SPAKAL -- or spinalong/knitalong. The idea was that, over the course of the year, the podcasters and any listeners who were interested would spin a sweater's worth of yarn and then knit it into a sweater. The really hard-core way of doing this would be to start with a fleece, wash and process it, and then spin it. I'd hoped to be able to do that with at least one of my fleeces from MDSW, but alas, I've been less productive on that front that I'd hoped to be. I'm still working on washing the first fleece, and I've combed only a tiny amount of it.

I still wanted to participate, though, so I decided to go to the stash and work with what I already have. I discovered that I have a total of a pound of superwash merino from Crown Mountain Farms (two 8 oz. bundles) in two very similar colorways. I'm splitting each bundle in half and then each half into three roughly equal pieces. I'll be spinning up three plies and mixing the two colorways so that each strand of yarn will have two plies of one colorway and one of the other. I'm starting with Whole Lotta Love.

I'm on my third section now, so if I can get in some decent spinning time this week, I should be able to finish all six sections fairly soon and get started in on the other color. I'm aiming for a sportweight yarn, and if I can achieve that (and get enough yardage), my plan is to use it for Goodale.

Of course, the hard-core SPAKAL might still happen if I can get my butt in gear and finish washing the fleeces. Processing might not be as time-consuming as I thought thanks to a new-to-me toy that arrived last week and got assembled yesterday:

This is a Howard Brush Company triple drum carder. I wasn't necessarily planning to buy a drum carder but I got offered this one at a great price, so I figured I should take advantage of the deal. I washed up a batch of my merino X fleece today that had, on average, a shorter staple length that most of the rest of the fleece, so once it's dry I'll be using it to test drive this baby!