Plodding along, or why being a Process Person isn't a Bad Thing...

As I write this, I haven't done any spinning yet today - which might put me behind schedule. You see, I made another decision that might end poorly - I opted for contiguous yardage over speed. Here's how far I've gotten, in 8 days.

(I might be halfway through this HALF of the braid... this is not ideal.)

What makes it worse, is that I need to spin some of the contrasting colour too - so that I can make the intended 4-ply. This braid will be chained, and I'll combine it with a similar-grist singles in a coordinating polwarth/silk.

It's a different ratio wool/silk, but getting a reasonable match should be do-able.

I'm fighting my own physical limitations and stamina on this, as much as anything else. There's just enough strain, even with Scotch Tension, that my hands are feeling the hours of drafting required to add a few new 'hills' to the bobbin. 

I'm trying to mix it up a bit, and do some exercises to help, but this is a BIG departure from the last few months' spindle spinning - and my body doesn't like all the 'sameness' as much as the variety of movements required for spindling. I can *definitely* marathon spindle better than wheel-spin.

This is a good thing to know - especially if I plan to work up to more spinning this year. I'll have to look at the decisions I make, and decide whether the result is worth the cost of admission. I think it mostly is - I'm certainly learning a few things about my body, and its limits.

Now, the GOOD part of being a process person, is that I'm not finding ALL this time 'boring'. I'm reveling in the look and feel of this colourway, and it's a very bright spot in a dreary 'January grey' existence. I'm hoping the same will be true - eventually - when I get to cast this on, and start knitting the planned shawl.

The current plan is to get through this half of the fibre, and see how long THAT takes... if it's past the 15th, then I'll *have* to ply the first half, so I can start knitting the shawl. I think that's a good tradeoff - because I can't spin full-time, so it'll be nice to have the option of switching gears.

I've also committed to tracking for the #15forSCA challenge - so every day I work on an SCA-related project, I can count it... Apparently there are going to be coins minted for participants who get over 30 days tracked.

It's a good way to get a couple motifs done on the purple tape. Here's the one session I got done this past week.

I may be eating some elephants, but at least they're pygmy elephants - so the 'one bite at a time' stretches a bit further.