March snow, ugh.
Mar. 17th, 2026 08:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickIt snowed last night, enough to cover the ground. I'm not a huge fan of snow in March, but this post is not actually about the weather.
Look, when I'm red hot and interested in a thing, I obsess about it. Is this healthy? Probably not. Am I going to stop? Lol, you sweet summer child.
So, the spinning. I've mentioned in passing about how my yarn does not have enough twist in it during the plying step. This makes limp (but usable) yarn. You can totally make shit with limp yarn and as long as the yarn doesn't immediately pull apart, it'll be fine. The yarn will knit and the item will be wearable and no lives will be lost. It won't be as durable as yarn with more twist (but obviously the closer you get to "cordage" the less delightful the item is to wear) and it will likely pill more and wear more easily than a well-spun yarn, but it will be wearable.
I have made lots of things with limp yarn and it's been OK. They work and I wear them and they've held up pretty well.
Here is a picture of limp yarn that I made and have subsequently knitted into afghan squares:
Here is a picture of non-limp yarn that I just recently made which is going to be afghan squares:
The non-limp yarn has more body, more spring back. It's got a whole different character to it than the limp yarn but without being overtwisted like I thought might happen. For what it's worth, I really like this more... bouncy kind of yarn and I am going to try to make it going forward even though plying is really, really fucking boring.
Are you going to knit afghan squares for The Afghan with this completely different yarn?
Yep.
Won't that make them different from the squares you have already done?
Probably? I'm hoping it won't matter that much but also blocking is a thing. Wool is fairly forgiving and can be blocked to a variety of dimensions.
But surely you're using all the same breed of sheep, with comparable fiber, right?
Hahahahaha. Don't call me Shirley.
There are already about five different sheeps of yarn here.
Sheep 1 is the brown 2 ply handspun that I didn't make but inherited. (It is also limp, new-spinner yarn. Usable but not amazing.)
Sheep 2 is the whole box of warm medium brown fine fleece. Damn, it's a nice fleece.
Sheep 3 (and possibly 4) is the slightly coarser darker brown and/or greyish brown fleece in gallon ziplocks. This could be different parts of the same sheep or it could be two different sheep, I have no idea.
Sheep 4 (ish) is commercially produced roving in white that I inherited.
Sheep 5 will be the white fleece in the Fiber Arts Closet that I'm going to use for the white singles once I run out of the white roving. It is slightly coarser than the white roving but in between the two (or three) browns that I have as fleece. It'll fit in just fine.
I for sure have enough raw material to get this done without purchasing anything new, something I have a better handle on now that I have some idea of how much wool it takes to fill bobbins and how much waste (not much) there is in processing the fleece locks into spinnable fluff.
Also, the finer brown fleece is super nice and I've got a ton of it. I should make something for me to wear when I'm done with The Afghan. Maybe I need a different winter hat. (My current winter hat is a hard-wearing but kind of prickly wool that I spun. I don't remember what kind of sheep it was, probably something marketed towards beginner spinners. I should probably pay more attention to kinds of sheep. Anyway, the current winter hat is warm AF and has held up well over multiple winters but it's prickly. Maybe I would like a softer hat.)
At the end of the day, this is an afghan for being on my couch and keeping my feet and legs warm and also being big enough to cover all of me if I'm sick and want to be on the couch in front of the fire. It will be functional no matter how many different sheep are involved or how not-exactly-the-same their wools are.
None of the wool is horrific (okay, the second batch of white roving that I inherited from NYR's mom, that was horrific and super scratchy and gross and I burned it because I just couldn't stand touching it enough to spin or knit with it and yo, I tolerate mohair fairly well) and while some is finer and some is coarser, it's all reasonably OK for me to be fiber artsing with. It'll be fine.
I think you just half ass everything and tell yourself it'll be fine.
A lot of the time, good enough really is good enough. The Afghan does not have to be perfect to do a lot of good things.
The project is clearing out a bunch of stuff from the Fiber Arts closet. If there's room in the closet, I can buy more stuff. Heck, I could go down to MD Sheep and Wool and buy shit.
It's buffing up my spinning speed and consistency by getting me to do enough of it that I will improve through practice. Time spent doing a thing is ridiculously useful for generating improvement.
It's replacing the static-y, plastic, falling-apart piece of shit couch afghan that I'm currently using with something that will likely last me the rest of my life.
And it's keeping my hands busy so that I don't doomscroll Current Events all the damn time.
Look, when I'm red hot and interested in a thing, I obsess about it. Is this healthy? Probably not. Am I going to stop? Lol, you sweet summer child.
So, the spinning. I've mentioned in passing about how my yarn does not have enough twist in it during the plying step. This makes limp (but usable) yarn. You can totally make shit with limp yarn and as long as the yarn doesn't immediately pull apart, it'll be fine. The yarn will knit and the item will be wearable and no lives will be lost. It won't be as durable as yarn with more twist (but obviously the closer you get to "cordage" the less delightful the item is to wear) and it will likely pill more and wear more easily than a well-spun yarn, but it will be wearable.
I have made lots of things with limp yarn and it's been OK. They work and I wear them and they've held up pretty well.
Here is a picture of limp yarn that I made and have subsequently knitted into afghan squares:
Here is a picture of non-limp yarn that I just recently made which is going to be afghan squares:
The non-limp yarn has more body, more spring back. It's got a whole different character to it than the limp yarn but without being overtwisted like I thought might happen. For what it's worth, I really like this more... bouncy kind of yarn and I am going to try to make it going forward even though plying is really, really fucking boring.
Are you going to knit afghan squares for The Afghan with this completely different yarn?
Yep.
Won't that make them different from the squares you have already done?
Probably? I'm hoping it won't matter that much but also blocking is a thing. Wool is fairly forgiving and can be blocked to a variety of dimensions.
But surely you're using all the same breed of sheep, with comparable fiber, right?
Hahahahaha. Don't call me Shirley.
There are already about five different sheeps of yarn here.
Sheep 1 is the brown 2 ply handspun that I didn't make but inherited. (It is also limp, new-spinner yarn. Usable but not amazing.)
Sheep 2 is the whole box of warm medium brown fine fleece. Damn, it's a nice fleece.
Sheep 3 (and possibly 4) is the slightly coarser darker brown and/or greyish brown fleece in gallon ziplocks. This could be different parts of the same sheep or it could be two different sheep, I have no idea.
Sheep 4 (ish) is commercially produced roving in white that I inherited.
Sheep 5 will be the white fleece in the Fiber Arts Closet that I'm going to use for the white singles once I run out of the white roving. It is slightly coarser than the white roving but in between the two (or three) browns that I have as fleece. It'll fit in just fine.
I for sure have enough raw material to get this done without purchasing anything new, something I have a better handle on now that I have some idea of how much wool it takes to fill bobbins and how much waste (not much) there is in processing the fleece locks into spinnable fluff.
Also, the finer brown fleece is super nice and I've got a ton of it. I should make something for me to wear when I'm done with The Afghan. Maybe I need a different winter hat. (My current winter hat is a hard-wearing but kind of prickly wool that I spun. I don't remember what kind of sheep it was, probably something marketed towards beginner spinners. I should probably pay more attention to kinds of sheep. Anyway, the current winter hat is warm AF and has held up well over multiple winters but it's prickly. Maybe I would like a softer hat.)
At the end of the day, this is an afghan for being on my couch and keeping my feet and legs warm and also being big enough to cover all of me if I'm sick and want to be on the couch in front of the fire. It will be functional no matter how many different sheep are involved or how not-exactly-the-same their wools are.
None of the wool is horrific (okay, the second batch of white roving that I inherited from NYR's mom, that was horrific and super scratchy and gross and I burned it because I just couldn't stand touching it enough to spin or knit with it and yo, I tolerate mohair fairly well) and while some is finer and some is coarser, it's all reasonably OK for me to be fiber artsing with. It'll be fine.
I think you just half ass everything and tell yourself it'll be fine.
A lot of the time, good enough really is good enough. The Afghan does not have to be perfect to do a lot of good things.
The project is clearing out a bunch of stuff from the Fiber Arts closet. If there's room in the closet, I can buy more stuff. Heck, I could go down to MD Sheep and Wool and buy shit.
It's buffing up my spinning speed and consistency by getting me to do enough of it that I will improve through practice. Time spent doing a thing is ridiculously useful for generating improvement.
It's replacing the static-y, plastic, falling-apart piece of shit couch afghan that I'm currently using with something that will likely last me the rest of my life.
And it's keeping my hands busy so that I don't doomscroll Current Events all the damn time.
