a little spinning

I'm still on the crazy meds, so the weekend was kind of like a line from a John Denver song: "didn't get much sleep but we had a lot of fun." I dyed my first batch of sock yarn, which totally rocks. (But did any of the pictures come out? No. Hopefully I'll have something for you tomorrow.) I also had lunch with a good friend from Pennsylvania and his family. This was a rare chance--I met them in Decatur on their way to visit family farther south. It was so great to see them. Man, what's better than old friends?
Also, I reunited with my spinning wheel this weekend. I've been so spazzed out lately, I just haven't been making time for it. That can't go on.
Since it's been a while and I figured I'd be out of practice, I didn't want to jump into the fiber from the Tennessee thing a few weeks ago--that stuff is so gorgeous, I want to spin it when I'm on top of my game. Instead, I broke out a little bundle of roving that I bought at Little Barn.


It's Wild Thing custom dyed for Little Barn. It was such a steal, I just couldn't resist--the price was about half of my idea of what four ounces of hand-dyed roving costs. Obviously I don't believe in "you get what you pay for." Well, in some cases you do, and this is one of them. Don't get me wrong, it was still worth what I paid for it, but it was felted and messy inside and very difficult to spin. I was making all this crazy slub thick-and-thin mess, even after an intensive three-phase predraft attack on it. I actually ended up doing it in two different sessions (not that I spun the whole roving, just the piece I broke off as one usual session's worth) because it was so difficult. But I was enjoying myself, and I started getting into the novelty yarn thing. I just read within the past few days that you can never again make yarn as crazy as the first yarn you make when you're a beginner. "Aha!" I thought. "These people must not know about buying cheap fiber! I can so make screwed up yarn! Look at this stuff!"
But wouldn't you know, just when I got all excited about seeing what crazy yarn I'd end up producing and what wild thing I'd do with it, plying evened a lot of it out.


It's certainly nothing like that shetland I was so proud of a few days ago, but it's not really all that crazy, either. Dang it. Oh well, I guess it will make a nice normal something. I do love the colors. The roving was a bit garish--this is the only one I've bought that my husband didn't like when he saw it--but the white parts really tone it down. It will make a pretty something.