And the verdict is....

Yes, that's right, this was spun this evening! The Violin Rosin was what put us over the edge. I did tighten the tension a bit, loosened, then tightened the leather straps on the spindle, oiled the leather. (Took your advice and sanded and oiled it, Can you see the shine on the spindle?) I actually had to apply the rosin 5 or 6 times...I think it needed to build up a bit on the drive band. We'll see what it does the next time I sit down to it. Oh, and I think the wool makes a pretty big difference too. The wool I started with is wool that we use for new spinner drop spindle kits... It's kinda sticky and dense. The wool I switched to is a sample that some vendor sent me a couple of years ago with my order. It was much lighter, less sticky, easier to draft, and helped with the spindle issue.

It's definitely a learning process, and it'll be interesting to see how she behaves the next time I stand up to her, since she will have had some time to sit.

I mentioned that K and I spent the day dyeing last Sunday. We had a variety of dyes - some Jacquard dyes that she had, some acid dyes that I had. Everything was hand-painted/space dyed. We laid all of our fiber and yarn out on saran wrap, painted it with foam brushes and/or condiment bottles, rolled up the saran wrap and fiber, nuked for about 4 minutes, rinsed in cold water several times, rinsed in a bit of vinegar, then clear water.

My first attempt was this fiber. It's a Merino/Tencel blend. I found once again that Merino/Tencel is VERY difficult to handle when wet. The fibers will completely pull apart when wet. As you see, it's a little messy...not a nice neat tidy roving, but gorgeous colors!!

A close up! Look how soft that fiber is!!

After the fiber, I moved on to some KnitPicks SW Merino/Nylon sock yarn. Here are my two skeins. The first was Ravenclaw colors, the second used all of the different colors we had mixed. I CAN'T WAIT to see how this knits up into socks!! Yum!

The Ravenclaw yarn is actually a preview...of what I'll be sending to my HSKS4 downstream! It'll be a little while before I send it out (still need to make some stitch markers!), so all of you who are drooling and wondering if it's yours will just have to keep wondering ;) Below, your yarn and bag.