Putting on the Glitz

I am so thrilled with this finished skein of handspun!

This is a HipStrings custom blend of merino, Tusssah silk, and Stellina called the Legend of Squee. I spun it into a traditional three ply, and I used pretty much every last bit of the singles -- when the first bobbin ran out, I wound off what was left on the bobbin with the most singles and plied from the inside and outside of the resulting ball as well as the other bobbin, and when the second bobbin ran out, I chain plied what was left in my hand. The finished skein is fingering weight and approximately 408 yards. I love how the yarn shimmers thanks to the multiple colors of Stellina (which is frustratingly difficult to capture with the camera), and while the colors definitely blended a great deal when spun, there's a lot of dimension to the color and an occasional small slub of silk for texture.

I cannot emphasize enough how wonderful this blended top was to spin. If I did not have several bins worth of fiber waiting to be spun, I would be ordering a ton of it. The fiber is extremely well prepped and drafts almost effortlessly. On top of that, there are so many wonderful fiber combinations and colors -- seriously, take a look (and I dare you not to drool).

I spun all the singles for this yarn on my Lendrum (using my WooLee Winder) and plied them on my Hansen miniSpinner. It was a fairly quick spin for me, which is not surprising given how pleasurable I found it to be. I'm a little sad that I'm done, to be honest. But now I'll get to knit with the yarn! I'll be pairing it with the cream Corriedale I spun last month for a new shawl design, once I do some swatching and figure out which of several options will work best for the stitch pattern I'm going to be using.

Now that the sparkly stuff is done, I am trying to get caught up on my FatCatKnits club shipments. I started with November's superwash BFL and silk, and I decided to spin two separate skeins of two ply for the two colorways included. I simply split the top roughly in half vertically and am spinning each half onto a bobbin. I think the end result will be colors that match up in some spots and barberpole in others.

I started with Twister, the pink/purple/black colorway, and I actually spun up the first bobbin last Sunday after I had finished the last bobbin of Squee singles -- it took me probably an hour or less. The second one was spun up Friday night, and I plied everything yesterday. It was clear when the skein was dry this morning that there was too much plying twist, so I wound it into a center-pull ball and ran it back through the wheel quickly.

The skein is now in for its second soak, but it was balanced coming off the niddy noddy, so I feel much better about it. And the singles for the other color in the shipment have been started!