Wednesday, June 09, 2010

Bathing Beauties

WARNING!!
This is to warn you that you will encounter some scenes that were shot in the bathtub, and some readers may find the following discussion shocking! Proceed at your own risk.

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From my last post, you would have seen some skeins of yarn that I have spun and plied on my truly remarkable CD spindle. The skeins were all wound on my wooden blocker, and are all the same size. They are just hanging there awaiting the next step in the processing.

I was enjoying the plying and didn't feel like doing the rest of the work. So I plied more. And more.

You may have noticed that they were a bit twisted, kinky, over-plied. Well, that is the way I like my yarns! Okay, not so kinked up, but I like the twist in the plied yarn, and that is how I did them.

I tried to spin the singles with a lot of twist, knowing that I would be plying with a lot of twist as well. In the past, while I got a pleasing single, when plied, I found them to be rather weak, and softly plied. But according to my spinning instructor, we were to aim for a "balanced yarn" which means that the twist in the single is balanced against the twist in the ply resulting in a truly relaxed stable complacent yarn. Well... okay.

So when I plied my yarns, they were too weak for my tastes. So I put a lot of extra twist in the plying process to give me the yarn I like ... resulting in an over-plied yarn. Not good.

The result was what you saw last time. Today, I show you those beauties in the bath!
I ran a couple inches of the hottest water I can get in my tub. I added some soap and a dash of salt. Then I threw the skeins in, one by one. I didn't count them... there were quite a few!

And then I walked away. I never touch them, I leave them alone, to do their soaking and whatever else they want to do when I am not looking! I watched a movie, chatted with my brother about computer problems, and then remembered my poor skeins!

Here you see them laying quietly, peacefully, comfortably in the now-cooled water.

I drained the water, and refilled with warm water and let them soak a bit more. They are soaking now... I will go check on them in a moment, and then squeeze out the water, and hang them up to dry.

Now, where will I be able to hang them so they don't drip all over my floor? A final look at the skeins in the next post.

1 comment:

Alwen said...

(peeks through fingers) Wet naked yarn!