A couple of weeks after I learned to spin, I started checking Craigslist to see if I could find a used wheel to call my own. In my search, I came across someone who was selling raw fleece. I went to take a look, and fell in love with the colours. There was a natural white and a natural brown and together I thought they would make a beautiful sweater!
It was an estate sale, and the woman selling knew nothing about the fibre, except that her friend had brought it back from New Zealand. I walked out with about 5.5 lbs of fiber, but not knowing anything about what it should look like, I took it to a friend. Turns out, the brown was not in good shape and was actually quite felted. I also knew nothing about processing a fleece, so I sent it off to Salt Spring Island and had it prepped there.
A few months later, I got back my pin drafted rovings. I’d been doing lots of reading and had decided that I would make cabled yarn. I was pleasantly surprised that the brown turned out okay, but did have quite a few neps in it. I spun the white up right away and it looks like this.
But the brown has mostly sat… I’ll spin a bobbin and then get “bored” of the colour, so I’ll spin some dyed braids. I’ll spin another bobbin… and then back to colour. At the moment, I have five of sixteen 125g bundles spun. I plan to ply when I get half way through, but the motivation just hasn’t been there. I think I’m worried a little that it won’t turn out the way I’ve envisioned it. That I will have spent all this time working on something and it not being “right”.
One of the bundles… isn’t it a beautiful colour?
Two bobbins, just waiting for me to be finished another three. I plan to ply my first and last bobbin together, then the 2nd and 7th… and so on down the line. I’m hoping that this will even out any inconsistencies in my spinning and help off set the changes in my spinning from the start of this project to now!
At the beginning of this year, I joined a “Spin the Bin” challenge on Ravelry. This is one of the projects in my bin. It’s been a big motivator for getting things done. 3 of the 5 bobbins that are currently finsihed have been spun in the last couple of months. Honestly, I think I just need to do a marathon spin and sit down at my wheel until my singles are done!!!
How do you stay motivated when you’re doing big spins? Do you just plug through it or do you do bits and pieces at a time? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Happy Spinning!
~Katrina
