Yarn Love

There is something totally inseparable between the knitter and the love of yarn.  I say that because I have been knitting almost my entire life, and I can't recall a time when I have been able to pass by a rack of yarn, even in say Walmart or, when I was a kid, ShopKo and Woolworths, and not stop just to check out what they had.  I have so much acrylic Red Heart yarn, and I don't even really like to knit with acrylic, that I could make chihuahua sweaters for the next 20 years.  I have so much sock yarn that I am going to have to put myself on a 12-step program.  And now, I spin.  And if you spin, you know what comes next in the stash … all that gorgeous fiber.  And it isn't even a matter of being attracted to color.  I like natural, undyed wool, too. Fisherman's wool is one of my favorites.  I think knitting is a bi-product of being totally in love with yarn.  I think it's inescapable, and I think that I knit because I love the yarn and want to see what I can make with it.  Oh boy, and I knit compulsively!  Which falls right in line with my tendency to buy yarn compulsively.  I was out alone yesterday, running an errand to a town a bit of a drive away from my house, and between here and there is the best LYS we have, and they were open, and I had to literally give myself a pep talk the whole time I was out to keep me from just stopping by to look, even though I had been there the week before and I can't wait for Christmas to show off the oh-my-God-it's-so-gorgeous yarn that Honey bought me as a Christmas present!

Ok, so I thought that I shouldn't go on and on about the love of yarn without showing you the yarn that I spun up on Saturday from 100% Romney wool.  I hand-painted the wool at school in the art room while my super-awesome art teacher friend and a few students watched and learned.  Here's what we have as a result:

I call this one "Sunset Strip", and it's a single-ply, self-striping yarn--about 136 yards total.  I LOVE this yarn, and I put it in the Etsy shop with great hesitancy because I want to keep it for myself; but I already have such a huge stash that maybe someone else will love it just as much as I do.  Isn't it just gorgeous?!  I don't normally like anything that is bright yellow, but the lemon yellow color of this yarn is so striking that I love everything about it.  It took me about an hour to spin this up on the electric spinning wheel that Honey made for me.

And in the spirit of Yarn Love, I put together a Yarn Love treasury of handmade, hand-dyed, hand-spun, and hand-painted yarns available on Etsy.  None of these are mine, and they are all addictively beautiful.  Check it out.