Good Morning and Happy Sunday, Easter, Ostara and/or Spring! Whichever you happen to be celebrating if any of them today. Colorado is wearing her typical Spring finery for this time of year, new tree buds with a hint of snow. Yes it's April and it's snowing in my little corner of the Fort. I don't think we are supposed to get that much but I've already started a pot of soup for dinner tonight.
How are we in our Quarantineland? This week was better than last. Amanda and I took advantage of some sales happening to get her ready for this fall and Serra scored with getting a big box to play in. We truly believe she was a cat in a past life. I'm either very lucky or we do actually like each other. We've been home together for four weeks now and haven't had any meltdowns with each other. They are doing much better at keeping up with schoolwork than I am with getting studio time in because I like hanging out with them! At least it got the finishing pile taken care of but next week I need to do better.
One of the things I've been enjoying possibly too much is time with my spinning wheel. I must have had some kind of instinct take over before the lockdown because I purchased two braids of Malabrigo Nube from Your Daily Fiber and two braids of Merino/Silk that is dyed in house at Lambspun along with placing the order for Schacht's Spring Quarantine Spinalong! This weeks saw the Merino/silk/bamboo blend from Greenwood Fiberworks getting plyed with some Merino/Silk from Lambspun that I had just finished.
So a bit of explaining...spinning twists the fibers in one direction, in this case clockwise or with a Z-twist. To create a 2-ply yarn as I did here two singles are spun together in the opposite direction so they twist around each other.
Here's my skein after coming off the niddy noddy and before washing. To wash my yarn I put it in the washer on the soak setting along with some Soak Wash. Once the yarn has soaked for about 20 minutes I switch my washer to the drain and spin setting which gets out the bulk of the water and hang to finish drying.
Finished product! The skein weighs 8.5 ounces and I don't know what the yardage on it is yet. Typically I borrow the yardage counter at Lambspun so at this point it's wait until we get to play again to find out or go ahead a purchase my own. After I measure it and have an idea of how much I'm working with I plan on writing a pattern for it. Currently thinking a simple summer shawl to show off the long color sections.
As for me it's a fine balance between enjoying this slower pace to life right now and not beating myself up for not meeting my own expectations. I've always been told that I'm too hard on myself. I failed miserably at getting up and keeping my normal routine this week, but maybe that means it needs to change instead of punishing myself for not holding to it. Maybe the world is trying to get each of us to slow down and reevaluate what our own personal priorities are and living true to ourselves. Spring is the time of rebirth but how often do we stop to witness it or create it in ourselves?
Take care of you this week. Next time there will be a website update and sharing what the looms are up to :)
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