The Twisting

I'm one of those bloggers who's always thinking "ooh! i have to remember this detail so i can include it in a post!". The unfortunate thing is, i do this so frequently i forget a lot of details here and there.

I'm also one of those bloggers who tries really hard to keep track of yarn labels so i can tell you exactly which colorway i used for something, or what the yardage is, or any of those things. Which means i have a million labels everywhere which doesn't really help anything.

The point is, I'm going to show you something and all i can tell you is that it is Blue Faced Leicester from Fleece Artist, and i bought it at Knit/Purl in Portland.

Isn't it pretty? Now you can understand my dismay at losing the label and having no recollection of it's name. Point is - BFL, Fleece Artist, Knit/purl.

Now, this little piece of lovely comes with a confession: I am burned out. I just met my spring 2011 deadline with Universal Yarn, ever so barely, and for some reason the patterns i turned in really took it out of me. I even had to cancel plans for finishing one of the patterns for this go around (don't worry, i'm still working on it and planning to release it). I'm just a little tired of knitting and designing right now. That doesn't mean i haven't plotted out 2-3 sweater sketches in my design notebook recently. Or that i didn't just case on a new men's sweater design. Or that i'm not carrying it with me everywhere... But yeah.

I'm giving myself permission to take a rest. I'm working at putting out a booklet of men's patterns within the next year, so that's a big undertaking and i'm a little afraid of it, and i really just need to get my mojo back, you know? I find mojo returns when you take a break when you need one. So i'm just letting that happen.

In the meantime, my hands still itch for something to do, so I picked up my drop spindle and this lovely chunk of fiber i've had waiting around for the right moment and began practicing my spindling.

It looks predominantly blue here, and more has been spun since then (Almost twice as much!) but i assure you, there's a nice bit of subtle variation in the color!

It was slow going at first because i have never seriously spun with anything that wasn't pencil roving. Meaning i've never drafted as i spun with a drop spindle (i have very limited spinning wheel experience, but i got the hang of drafting in that case for the most part). It was an interesting experience and i had to figure out what worked best for my hands and whatnot. It's been very enjoyable though.

I even found this cute little tote at target for $2.50, and it's now where i'm keeping spinning stuff i'm working on. This way as i pull of pieces of the roving i don't lose track of it, and can keep it close at hand.

I'm sure i'll be back to knitting up a storm soon, but for right now i'm enjoying this diversion :)