Spin to Knit: The Knitter's Guide to Making Yarn
by Shannon Okey is a book that tempted me right away just based on the
title. I've spun some beautiful yarn, but it is much harder to get
myself to actually use the yarn that I've created. It looks so
beautiful in a hank that I don't want to "ruin" it on the wrong
project.
The spinning section is 50 great pages of
tools, how to pictures and tips. There are tips on carding, fiber
types, spindle spinning and wheel spinning. I've been using YouTube a
lot to help me learn, but I find the pictures in this book to be really
excellent. The sections aren't in depth enough to use as your only
source to learn to spin, but it a handy overview so you can get a sense
of where to start looking for more information. While the book does a
nice job explaining the WHAT, it doesn't do as good a job explaining
WHY. Different types of drafting are explored, but there is no real
discussion on why you might choose one over the other or how it would
make a different type of yarn.
This book focuses on
spinning for the first half, and then knitting on
the second half. The pattern section is titled "What to Do with All
That Yarn," so this is something that I could find helpful! None of the
patterns jumped out at me as something I'm dying to create, but there
is a good mix of items made out of thinner fingering/lace weight yarns
and thicker bulky weight yarns. Overall, the project you pick depends
on how much you want to show off the unique quality of the yarn.
The baby pod was the first handspun yarn I created with a specific knitting project in mind. I didn't have enough of the yarn I created specifically for this project, but I was able to complete it by combining two different handspun yarns.
I'm excited to create more items out of my handspun yarn. This isn't a
book that I would add to my library, but I am very glad I read it. I
didn't know about "spinning from the fold" until now and I'm about to look for more information on this technique!