Osborn Fiber Studio

I completely forget how many times I have shared this exact picture.

Well, now I finally get to share this picture.

I did not, in the end, achieve the fine control I was hoping for to get a DK-weight yarn rather than a heavy-fingering. But because I had sampled so much, when it came to spinning it, I just relaxed into the process. I didn’t micromanage my singles. I’d spun enough of them that I knew what I would get. These yarns are persistently 14 WPI. I was very intentional not to add too much ply twist, so they are light and airy as well. After washing, they came in at a plump 40-50 degrees of twist, despite being more like 30 beforehand. That’s the bounce of Merino for you.

I gave up my plans to make the twisted-stitch cabled cowl I was swatching for in the two lower swatches, and settled on something two-colour, since I loved the checkerboard swatch you see on the right. I’m leaning towards making the Shift cowl, which would leave plenty of leftovers to make a coordinating hat and mitts. (Yes, it’s the perfect amount of yarn to make a Nightshift shawl, but I don’t use that many shawls these days.)

I imagine bringing the yarn with me to Vancouver to be my travel knit. Less than a month now, not that I’m counting down the days. It’s been a very long month, so I’m glad to have a trip to look forward to, and a squishy knit might be just the ticket to bring with me.

This spin was a long process. Those braids, so beautiful and intimidating, had a long sit in the stash. When I finally pulled them out, they had a long sampling process, and it was a long spin. It didn’t take me that long, not compared to some of the spins I have really dragged my feet on, but compared to all the colour sampling I’ve been doing, this seemed to take quite a while. The knitting, I hope, will not take so long.

I’m so thankful and proud of this spin. I learned a lot, and was humbled too. It’s exciting to think that it’s finally going to become something I get to wear.