#spinzilla

2017 Spinzilla results! I broke a mile, with drop spindles, which makes me happy. Sore (oof), but happy. In the above pics, the spindle is 10.5″ long, for scale. Same display basket as last year, for easier comparison of results, too.

I’m spinning a fairly fine, tight 2-ply, because I intend for all of it to go to tablet weaving, examples of which are shown in the last pic. Some of my 2016 yarn is in those three bands, in fact!

White skein #1: 174 yd

White skein #2: 150 yd

White skein #3: 166 yd

White skein #4: 62 yd

Comfrey-dyed (off-white): 40 yd

Madder-dyed (pink): 42 yd

Comfrey plying leftovers (on the spindle): 4 yd

SUBTOTAL: 638 yd of 2-ply, x3 for plying credit: 1914 yd

+ white plying leftovers (singles, on the spindle): 9 yd

FINAL TOTAL: 1923 yd

Whew! I broke a mile (1760 yd) with a lot to spare - partly because I was getting so goofy by the end I’d forgotten I had 4 skeins of white instead of 3. :P :) One of my goals was to run through all the white wool I had prepped and combed from the current batch of fleece, and I did it - that’s why the last skein is so short. Then I started in on the dyed combed fleece. The plying leftover for the madder pink was less than half a yard, so I didn’t count it. The leftover white singles will stay on the spindle and will be used to start spinning again when I have more white wool combed, which is why I didn’t bother plying them at the end.

Late to post, but here are my Spinzilla 2018 pics. I had a 1-lb ball of Dharma Trading’s generic “wool” roving sitting around, and I decided I’d better start to put a dent in that (it’s actually lovely stuff - you wouldn’t think so, but it’s very soft, and more like combed top than roving). Progress was monitored by Dex (on the chair) and Mo (outdoors). I managed 1,974 yards of 2-ply, entirely done on drop spindles, so I’m pretty happy with that (broke a mile again!). My team got 7th place in the totals, so yay, us.