This last week or so, I’ve picked up my hand spinning game.
First, I finished plying my Pollen Gold yarn on Monday:
It looks really lovely in the sunshine in particular. I still need to give it a bath to set the twist and see what characteristics the finished yarn has. But so far, I think it’s going to be pretty nice.
I’ve also been working more on my rainbow gradient:
I’m 1/3 of the way through the singles and on turtle #3 which will be magenta and deep blue. Once these first three turtles are done, I can begin chain plying the first half of the singles (blue – magenta – pink – orange – peach) on my larger plying spindle while I work on the 2nd half of the singles (peach – brown – yellow – green – turquoise). I still love how nicely the spindle spins, and the fiber is fairly easy to work with as well. It’s the perfect level of meditative and relaxing for what has been a stressful couple of weeks.
Also, all the colors just look so bright and cheerful in the sunlight, so you get an extra gratuitous photo of my spinning bag, fluff, and spindle against the spring grass:
Spring does feel like it’s on it’s way. We’ve had a mix of warmer days in with some cooler ones, and of course the days are longer. While the “spring forward” to daylight savings time is never going to be my favorite transition, it is much easier here in Germany than in the US. We do it two weeks later when the days are already a bit longer, and being further north, the sun rises much earlier in the summer. Thus, the “spring forward” doesn’t suddenly throw me into getting up in the dark again, as it did in North Carolina. So, while we’ve had some groggy mornings, it just isn’t nearly as bad.
Right now I’m enjoying a long Easter weekend (we get Friday and Monday off as holidays here) and a chance to catch up on rest and relax a bit.