Darn socks & Blend-a-long part 1 -- Ply blends

More things off the table today. 8 socks darned - yes I darn handspun, handknit socks. Usually though, I will replace heels instead of darning. This is not really picture worthy as they just look like really old socks and sometimes have heels of different colors.

Two second mousing gauntlets done. Again, no pics as you have seen these. Like second sock syndrome, SSS, I have problems with glove pairs. But I am all done but one.

The wonderful Habetrot has put up my humble little sheep on her famous site. Gee, I feel honored. It's like making the cover of Time Magazine for sheep paintings. I have been enjoying her many knitting and sheep graphics since she started her site. But she really blew my mind when she brought my attention to the Latvian mitten collection. Full of knowledge, fiber-oriented and a wicked sense of humor - any wonder why I love this woman?

Ply Blends
I have been getting a lot of emails to slow down this blend-a-long until people without an enormous stash could get some fiber shipped. Fair enough. No photos of finished blends for a few days until everyone can catch up.

In the first part, we will determine a personal unit length, then spin 9 unit lengths of each of our 4 colors. We will create our two-ply blends. Then either cable these together or just hold 2 two-ply strands together for a swatch. We will repeat these steps for each of 4 colors as per the chart below.

This is ply blending only. All of our singles will be a solid color. In part II, we will get to using carded blends. This is a great exercise for spindles.

Here is the chart for this first part. A unit is whatever you define. For myself, A unit will be 3 armlengths as I go into the wheel or about 2.5-3 feet. Remember that for my colors, I chose Green and Purple, but you substitute your own colors here. You will need the black and white.

I will ply 3 units with like color (BB), and ply 3 units with opposite color (BW). Repeat for each of 2 colors and 2 neutrals as per chart.

It may sound a little confusing, but you are only making 9 total blends in this section, as per the middle chart.

Tips
Try to spin evenly so your sample shows color and not size variation.

Instead of a swatch, consider making socks, fingerless gloves, or some other small project with our samples. This way you will see your results and be able to show them off at guild meetings. If you plan this, you might need solid black to separate your rows. And since ply-blending is 4 ply but everything else will be two or three ply, you might want to spin thinner for the ply-blends.

In the carding sections, you could also comb. If you don't own cards or combs, consider a set of cat or dog brushes, or dog combs. I will be using the dog brushes for the carded section as I only want a short stripe of two rows.