Day 11 Creativity – A balanced hand spun plyed yarn

I have been spinning my Norfolk Fleece yarn each evening that I can. I have arranged it that each skein is approx 25 g. I am hand combing the yarn and spinning it mainly worsted. I say 'mainly' worsted as there are always a few fibres that will try and not 'obey'. I am trying to curb my perfectionist tendencies but to little avail.
I am aiming for completely balanced skeins as I know these knit well.

For those of you who are not spinners this means that the twist you put in when spinning completely balances the twist you put in when putting two yarns together , ie plying but turning the spinning wheel the other way. Once the skein is made you hold it up and it should hang exactly straight, not twist up.

If it does twist up, horror of horrors, then by looking at the twist you can tell if you turned the wheel more when you spun the original yarns or if you were too vigorous in your wheel tuning when plying.

It is possible to correct it at this stage once you know this......

The aim is to avoid this by making a balanced skein the first time!

I am an obsessive 'counter' when I spin. I measure the length ( roughly) when I ply and count the times I treddle. If the skein is not balanced it usually means there was something too interesting on the TV or I got distracted in some other way!

** Getting the number for the counts per length is established by experience and a sample piece for each yarn type I am making. This is what makes spinning such a joy. Each yarn type is unique and is something that is planned for.