This month’s yarn, designed by Misti who I interact with regularly in the studio, was a wonder to create. I loved every minute of it! Felicia had written about the idea of creating coils in the yarn to highlight hits of colour in the skein, creating interest and texture. While coils have not been traditionally my favourite thing to spin as I have had some disasters, I knew the thick n thin (slub) yarn would be fun to spin none-the-less.
In the end, the most enjoyable part of this spin was the photography! I could have taken about 100 photos … or maybe more! As I turned it over and found a new angle to shoot from, I was again reminded that textured yarns have so much to teach us about being open to new, sometimes alien, things. Often, my students cringe when I mention our ‘textured yarns’ lesson. I remember myself saying to others that I wasn’t interested in ‘art’ yarns or anything that would create texture in my yarns because then it wouldn’t be ‘useful’ and it could hardly be consistent. And yet, here I am three years later singing the praises of textured yarns – if nothing else, they are incredibly fun to make! Freeing, in fact!
© Rachel Smith / SweetGeorgia Yarns 2017
For this yarn, I used a commercial grey yarn as the binder. While I thought about spinning for the binder, I wanted to maximize the amount of fibre tht made the coils. For learning purposes, mostly for my students, I made sure I wasn’t consistent while making my slubs (or thick parts) of the singles. I placed a lot more twist into it than I normally would and soon fell into an easy rhythm. Almost within a couple of hours I had finished the yarn!
© Rachel Smith / SweetGeorgia Yarns 2017
For coils, be sure to anchor them both above and below to keep them from moving. Some of my larger coils did not withstand finishing (I steamed the yarn for about 4 minutes then hung to dry) – they became ‘deflated’ and flat looking. The little tiny long coils stood up really well to finishing and the medium coils were the most interesting. The technique certainly highlighted the various colours in the braid and created an interesting yarn. I’m curious to see this woven!
© Rachel Smith / SweetGeorgia Yarns 2017
Have you ever made coils in your yarn? What did you think about the colour management?
Have you dived into April club yet? How did you decide to spin it? Please share over on the Ravelry group or on Instagram and tag your projects #sgyclub and #sweetgeorgiayarns.
Happy Spinning,
Rachel
