Spin it, Sister!

I'm really digging this making my own yarn business. I can't stop. I'm obsessed.

I think about it at work. I dream about it at night. I even daydream about it while knitting.

Though I don't knit that much anymore. Mostly when I have time to do something other than work, parent, or wife (can I use wife as a verb? It sure feels like a verb!!), I am spinning yarn. Much to the husband's chagrin. Oh, well... go stare at your fantasy football thingy some more.

It relaxes me. It makes me happy. And a relaxed, happy mama is a good thing. Right!?

Back in October, I went to the NYS Sheep & Wool Festival in Rhinebeck. It is the mecca for fiber fanatics of all sorts. People make pilgrimages from all over. Including Canada!?! It is a little puzzling to me, but I'm lucky that I live so close to this treasure trove of fiber goodness.

I even saw a few knitting celebrities this year. I may have sort of stalked one of them for a short period through the stalls of vendors, but if you try to make me own up to it I won't!

I left the boys at home this year. It was out of kindness to all of us... or at least that is the excuse I used and I'm sticking to it. I got to the fairgrounds around 10:30 (hit a wall of traffic about a mile before I got there) and 4 hours later left with a bag filled with fabulous goodness.

Happy and sated, I drove home listening to my favorite NPR shows and dreaming of the delicious colors and textures waiting to be made into glorious yarns.

I procured a large amount of roving and other fiber goodies this year. I was so excited when I got home I didn't even know where to start. I was exhausted, but I did end up spinning up some of the hand dyed Alpaca and merino bat that I got from a farm about an hour from where we live.

I still have a bunch of fiber I haven't even touched yet, but I did dig out the hand painted Tussah silk and started to spin it. It looks awesome if I do say so myself. My hope to is to ply the singles so I can make a hat and mitt set out of it in time for holiday gifting. I have a specific person in mind, but I'm not going to say in case they read this and also in case I pull my usual procrastination routine and don't get it done in time.

Currently on my needles is a hat from "Designer One-Skein Wonders". I'm using yarn that I spun that is a 50/50 merino and silk blend in a dark heathery purple color. It's the first project I have knitted from yarn I've spun.

It has been a pretty awesome experience to be able to see something go from fiber to yarn to knitted object from start to finish. Well, kind of anyway. I haven't finished the hat yet, but the fabric it is knitting into is so pretty... if I do say so myself.