January Spinning

On my Make Nine list of goals, I had "Spin at least an hour per week". In January  I had a goal to spin 4.5 hours; I was able to spin 14.07 hours. Wowza!

I made a nifty little spreadsheet to put my spinning time in. It adds up all the minutes for me, so it's easy.

Spinning is my meditation. I spin mostly in the morning to get my head and my body to align and get used to the day. Although, my days are pretty stress free and I only have half a brain left, so there is that.

Spinning uses a lot of physics. I'm not talking about speed of the wheel or ratios, no, I'm talking about inertia. See, when I sit down to spin, I plan on spinning about 20 minutes ... but I find that I actually spin about 40 minutes on average. Once I start, it is hard to stop! Inertia takes over! But on the other side, once I stop, it is very hard to start. Previously, I stopped spinning, and it took me about two years to overcome the inertia. When I take one day off, that day tries to inveigle itself into three days or a week. After I took several days off for a knitting weekend recently, it was hard to make myself spin again, but I'm glad I did! It is hard to overcome inertia.

That fiber is from On the Round that I got three or four years ago when they had some one-of-a-kind merino on sale. It may be superwash, not sure. I got eight ounces. I've already spun the bits on the side; only the big bit on the top to be spun, and then it will be plied and washed and then the knitting will begin! I can't believe this has been waiting to be spun for two years. That is just criminal.

At first my yarn was about DK weight (the part I spun two years ago) but now I spin a two-ply heavy fingering weight naturally. I think most people do, but I haven't fact checked it. If I want a thicker yarn, I'll just ply more than two plies together, for hats and mittens and the like.

I'm a weird spinner, because as soon as my spinning is done, I knit something out of it. I never have yarn spun up that I haven't knit. But, as far as I can tell, that is unusual. Most spinners never seem to use their yarn, or do so rarely. This I also haven't fact checked, it's just a  feeling I have. Do let me know if I am right or not. I'd love to see what you have made from your handspun yarn!