Evening Star

As we have continued to get clammy, wet days, I am still spinning. Doing this much spinning back to back has been really great for improving my spinning skills. This is probably my most even single while still getting a fairly lofty yarn.

Yardage: 210 yards/192 meters (4 oz/110 g)
Weight: worsted
Fibers: merino and tussah silk plied with metallic polyester thread
Roving Supplier: Mind's Eye Yarns

I loved the purple-charcoal of the original, which reminded me of the evening sky. To emphasize that impression, I wanted to try including a strand of metallic thread, similar to the last yarn I spun, but this time with the thread included with two singles instead of one.

That is where I ran into a little bit of unexpected difficulty. Since the thread was so much thinner than the single, it tended to move towards the core of the yarn when I used an even amount of tension on each of the strands. Sample, sample, sample! (The spinners equivalent of swatching.)

There is still a fair amount of variation of tension in the thread as I learned, but what I ended up doing was let the two singles begin to get a little twist around each other just before (maybe half an inch/a centimeter) the thread was plied in. This worked ok, but if anyone knows of a better technique I would love to hear about it.