Finished Yarns- Kiss My 80's Lips + Amy's First Supercoil

I bought a couple of Crafty Scientist Lab Batts at Stitches West 2009. That brings me to 4/7 of 2009's fiber purchases used up and 2/5 of 2010's. I was inspired to spin these batts last week by my newfound love for supercoils (more on that in a moment). I figured the chunky batts would force me to spin a thick-and-thin yarn. I hadn't done anything except sock or lace yarn for years! The resulting yarn was a great weight and consistency for coils, but the fiber content made it a bit too hairy for defined coils. I'm going to use it as a single and knit it into something decorative like a pillowcase (or more likely just a front panel). I'm thinking I'll knit it on the bias to make it as large as possible. The yarn is 6oz total and I forgot the yardage, but it was around 150 or 200.

The colorway is Kiss My 80's Lips and the fiber content is-
banana fiber, sari silk, horsehair silk, silk noil, silk hankie, Merino, Cotswold locks, Corriedale, border Leicester cross, alpaca, llama, angelina

So, I have been in awe of the gorgeous supercoil yarns spun by fellow Phat Fiber contributor Jessie, aka StashEnhancement. She makes fiber tools, buttons, and jewelry from coins.


I took this 34 yard skein of think and thin singles yarn, which was one of my very first handspun yarns (Nov 2006!) and turned it into this-



4 yards of supercoil yarn with crochet cotton as the core. I am thrilled that it looks anything like what I was trying to accomplish. It's definitely not anywhere close to a balanced skein, though. I attempted to do the wrap and roll method, where you load the core onto a spindle and twist it in the opposite direction of plying during plying. This should leave the core with the same amount of twist it had to begin with. I I had trouble with having to stop and start the spindle to wind off more core to use and the amount of tension put on the core by my heavy spindle. It seemed that there was so much weight on the core that I just kept adding more and more plying twist and more and more coils to the same length of core. I bought myself a spindle from fellow Phat Fiber contributor Galia of Spindle Designs. This one she just listed is to die for!

I'm a little confused about how much twist to put in the singles, but I'll save that for the next post.

Comments

spinnity said…
Totally amazing super coil! Will you knit with that, or just save it as a work of art in its own right?
SpinalCat said…
That green and yellow one is really over plied and 4 yards, so I'm not sure if I'll do anything with it. When I make longer, better skeins, I may "make" necklaces. You can just wear the yarn around your neck more or less as is, but I'd probably put a clasp in there somewhere.

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