Acrobatics

I'm on Spring break.

Yeah, I found that humorous, too.  I do wish that the weather would make up its mind.  I don't like getting my hopes up only to be let down time and time again.

A few days ago there were daffodils poking out of the snowless ground.  (That's The Composer's shoe.  He seemed amused by how excited I was about "the first signs of Spring!" while dancing around and taking pictures.)

 

And today, well, look at that first picture.  Spring break, indeed.  All of my friends (including The Composer) have left me to fend for myself all week, which means I can spend each and every day knitting spinning watching movies and eating chocolate while not cleaning my apartment or putting on real clothes practicing for as long as I want.

I picked up my spindle again yesterday and spun for a while.  I was lulled into that peaceful zen state that spinning tends to create.  The soft merino sliding through my fingers, the mesmerizing spin of the spindle, the way that the repeated motions allow you to lose yourself in your thoughts, the spindle whorl doing graceful acrobatics as it flies across the room...

I guess I got a little too excited with my thigh roll.  It was cool to see what the copp (spun fiber wrapped around spindle shaft) looked like without the whorl on the spindle, though.

 

I was able to stick the whorl back on and keep spinning for a bit, but eventually it fell off almost every time I went to spin the spindle and my stream of expletives kept getting longer and longer...  I eventually just laid some unspun fiber over the hole before sticking the shaft in to tighten things up and it worked like a charm.

I had forgotten how much I used to enjoy spinning.

Did you know I've never actually knit with my handspun?  I mean, it's not like I've produced very much of it, but I've always given it away when I finish it.  I should probably keep some for myself at some point...  if I ever finish what I'm spinning, that is.  Honestly, as much as I enjoy the process of making this yarn, I gotta tell you, I don't think I'm a spindle kinda guy.  I'm still waiting for the day that I have a spinning wheel.  I have all these ideas of myself spinning yarn for sweaters and hats and mittens and wonderful woolly, warm things and, well, that's just not going to happen with me and a spindle.  I get the portability thing, but I don't take my spindle anywhere and I know a wheel would suit my needs much better.

And when I get one (note I said "when" and not "if".  It may be ten years from now, but I'm determined to have a spinning wheel before I die) I will spin up this fluff that I got for Christmas this past December from my mother.

I know a picture doesn't show you much, but it's a blend (well, handfuls really) of a bunch of different fibers - mohair, leicester, corriedale, ...something else... I can't remember.  Anyway, this is my wheel fiber.  It may have to wait a while.

And just so you don't think I've stopped knitting, I give you the beginnings of a lace shawl (by the way, that blue one from before?  Ripped.  Thanks to all of you for being so incredibly eager to tell me that my knitting looks like crap and that I was out of my mind.  You didn't say it quite like that, but I got what you were thinking.  I appreciate the support.)

And a hat that I started this past August.

Please don't say anything about the crappiness of my stranded knitting.  I function under the delusion that once I block this hat my stitches will be the image of perfect.  Blocking, in this delusion, will also get rid of all those ends.  That's the only way this hat will ever be finished.  Those ends intimidate me.

And hey, if you know anyone desperately trying to give away a spinning wheel, I'm your man.