Spinnery

This weekend has been extremely productive as far as yarn goes, but I blush to say I haven't done much else since I finished the bulk of a recently placed order. Since I'm actually going to get some proper hand cards, I'm letting the alpaca sit in its bags until they arrive. I'm so spoiled now! The alpaca fiber is so soft even in its unwashed, uncarded, unpicked state that even that gorgeous blue corriedale wool seems coarse by comparison. It's a shame to use the dog brushes on it, which is why I'm putting it on the back burner until I get my cards.
In the meantime, I've been spinning some of Stacey's blue corriedale and the black (so-called gray) from the Sheep Shed. Brown Sheep Co. Yarn is extremely yummy to knit with; I've used their NatureSpun and some Lamb's Pride for several different projects, and I've enjoyed it very much. Now, imagine the wool that yarn is spun from.
The Sheep Shed studio sells what's called mill end wool. Basically wool where the dye didn't turn out right or there wasn't enough of it left over for them to spin without going to more expense or trouble than was economical. Earlier in the autumn, I ordered two pounds of wool from them: a pound of white and a pound of "gray". The white is.. well.. white and I've used some of it to dye. The gray is mostly black with strips of charcoal and lighter gray running through it at intervals. Doesn't matter what color it is.. it's just as yummy as the yarn Brown Sheep Co. makes! It spins up beautifully, and is a pleasure to work with. I'm still no expert at spinning, but I'm getting better for all the practice I've been getting lately. My yarn is also getting a bit more uniform in thickness, but I'm sure that's something which will even out the better at it I get.
Anyway, the gray was what I worked with yesterday. I plied some of it with the blue corriedale. There's enough to make SOMETHING with, but since I don't have a yarn meter, I couldn't say how much it is in yards, but I'd say it's probably a good four ounces or so. It needs a name, and I'm thinking either Nox or Nut (if you know anything about Egyptian mythology, this has NOTHING to do with what comes in a can and is crunchy) because of how the blue and dark gray/black work together. My other spinning project yesterday was to ply some of the gray with itself; it's mostly black and also very soft. That Brown Sheep wool is just.. yummy. I think I'll keep the black yarn for personal use, but the other stuff might just go off to be sold when we go to the Hillsboro Christmas show. I have yet to take pictures of anything but Demeter (the green/white yarn from my goldenrod experiment), which leaves the Rhubarb Crumble and a couple other things. And of course I still have much knitting to do for those felted bags. I'll never get them all finished by December 8th! I still haven't finished the first one yet, but I'm almost done. Just have the handles to do, and then I can start the second one. Pictures will be forthcoming, as usual.