Two for one

I've got two finished yarns for show and tell today. Let's start with some good old superwash merino.

Fiber: Spunky Eclectic superwash merino, "Toronto" colorway
2 ply
420 yards
111 grams

The fiber seemed to have an alarming amount of white, the full extent of which is not really visible in this photograph. Since I'm generally not a fan of white, I was a bit skeptical about how it would spin up. At the same time, however, I know that those stretches of white tend to look less white in the finished yarn.

Meh. I don't love it, and I don't despise it. The color sequences ended up being a lot longer than I had anticipated. Even though I did make some attempt at planning how the colors would come together, in the end it was all for naught. There are some particularly long stretches of—you guessed it—white.

Moving on to a yarn that exceeded my expectations in almost every way...

Fiber: The Arts at Eagle's Find 100% merino, "Tropical Fish" colorway
3 ply (Navajo/chain plied)
500 yards
118 grams

This yarn is just plain fun. Look at those colors! The childlike side of me is clapping with delight. The fiber itself was a joy to spin, and it was really reasonably priced to boot.

This was my first full-skein attempt at Navajo plying, and all in all, it came out quite well. I think it's ever-so-slightly underplied, but not enough to make me want to do anything about it. Interestingly, my natural tendency is to overply conventionally plied yarns. Go figure.

Final verdict: I love Navajo plying! The process did seem to take forever compared to my normal 2 ply, what with spinning the extra-long single (1500+ yards) and then making the big loops during plying. However, the end result is totally worth it. Yay!