New Project: Yoga Socks

When our good friend and fellow spinner Fibre Piratess visited with us last week, she gave Twisted some hand knitted yoga socks. I was instantly taken with the idea, and I knew I had to knit a pair, too. I wanted to spin the yarn myself, rather than buying sock yarn (I always HAVE to spin the yarn, since I enjoy spinning even more than knitting), though I knew from the start this would be tedious work and I'd probably hate it in the end. The thing is, sock yarn should be far sturdier than any yarn you'd use for a scarf of a hat or things like that. One thing to ensure that is to use synthetic fibre, so I did - but I blended them with wool, silk, and bamboo. The next thing to ensure robustness is to ply the yarn instead of using it as a single. I decided on spinning really, really thin yarn and then trying the Navajo plying technique, which I never tried on the wheel before, though I practiced on the spindle some years ago. It went astonishingly well, I came to enjoy the plying more than the spinning, and I thought it to be quite meditative. The outcome: more than 150 m of threeply yarn, more than 80 g, still about fingering weight (15 wpi). It took me very, very long, but I finished it...

...and I also started knitting

I usually don't like synthetic fibre, but mixed with other fibres they're not so bad, and the yarn does feel quite good, stury yet still soft enough.

I think the first picture shows the colours best, at least on my monitor. I still haven't finished the first sock since I didn't really have much time this past week, but I am in no hurry :-) I modified the pattern I found on FibrePiratess's blog (which was in German, anyway), but I might try to post it when I'm done.