Spinning!

So! (been insanely busy with work, and then a vacation, and now back to insanely busy at work--been neglecting the interwebs)

I went to the Common Ground Fair this past week, and had a blast--soo many hippies! So much cool stuff! My boyfriend/fiance/thing bought a giant jar of pure organic unfiltered honey, and he's been plotting what to do with it. It's the most honey I've ever seen in my life, and we aren't really sure how much is there. Just that it is a lot of honey. And will probably be made into something delicious and alcoholic.

I meanwhile got to coo at some alpacas (they were very cute, but shy), petted a fuzzy goat--i think it was an angora, based on the curliness of the hair, and the softness of it's coat in general--and he looks like a picture of an angora. Tooled through the Maine Market, the various animal pens (saw some huge oxen, lovely horses, and some really funny-looking poultry), and of course, the Fiber Tent.

I wanted, but did not find any lace weight while tooling around (it likely was there, but i was just so overwhelmed with the soft yummy yarns i didn't spot it), and while i was sorely tempted by some angora-blend bunny-yarn, i actually did not buy any yarn. Instead, i announced my desires to learn how to spin, and bought a spindle (a Tom Forrester top-whorl), and 9.5 ounces of roving total. Right around two ounces of 100% Romney wool in a hand-dyed red, and 7 and a half ounces of a 70%-30% blend of Romney and mohair. The larger ball of roving was the most god-awful, hideous shade of Mountain Dew green imaginable (and it is named Mountain Dew), so of course, i had to buy it. *lol*

Meanwhile, the boyfriend managed to mortify and clear the fiber tent in about 5 minutes flat--we were looking at some yarn, and he was complaining about being hungry. He noticed that one of the farms had pictures of the sheep that the yarn came from, along with the animal's name. Fiber art stuff isn't really his idea of a fun time anyway, so in addition to being hungry, he was bored. So, he looks at a picture of one of the sheep, and says very loudly, "hmm, Herbert here is looking mighty tasty--i think he'll be my lunch." Another shopper immediately turned to us, aghast, "You shouldn't say stuff like that! I'm a vegetarian!" which just left a huge opening for him to continue. He grabbed a hold of a friend who was with us (and who happens to be short), and proclaimed her his twin sister, who is a vegetarian, and "look what happened to her!" Vegetarian shopper's jaw dropped, and we moved on to the next fiber layout, laughing.

Then he asks if cat hair can be spun as I'm looking at spindles--and immediately everyone within earshot turned and said, quite loudly, "YES!"--we were all amused, and he decided a cat-yarn sweater is probably a bad idea. Particularly since he has a mild allergy to cats.

Heh. So, spinning. I started with the red roving, and as i had absolutely no clue what i was doing, i started spinning the roving straight, without drafting at all, so i wound up with a single that was very thick, slubby, and loose. Then, thanks to YouTube, i learned about drafting, and also an article i found about hand-spinning with a top-whorl spindle, I've been creating thinner, more even, more finely twisted (but still full of slubs) singles.

At any rate, I've been enjoying myself, and hopefully will have some pictures to show soon.