Did you spin up your yarn, ply it, wash it, let it dry and then decide it just won't work?
Breathe in, breathe out, and take another look. What's wrong with it? overtwist, undertwist, too thick, too thin? I once rescued some too-thin two ply by unplying it into 2 strands, then re-plying two 2-strand balls together into a 4 strand yarn. So now it's a lovely 4-ply worsted weight, perfect for the sweater I want to knit. After all, with purple merino, you can hardly go wrong!
Here are some things you can do with a finished skein of 2-ply:
- add twist then turn it into a cable yarn by plying it back on itself in the opposite direction (singles Z, 2-ply S, cable-ply Z, usually)
- add twist while plying on a thin outer yarn that wraps it, then take the twist back out while plying on another thin outer yarn in the opposite direction to make a "diamond" yarn. Ran across this in a plying workshop and just recently saw it written up in the new book Creative Spinning.
- cut it into 3-inch lengths, run it through your hand cards to turn it back into unspun rolags and respin it (ok, this is drastic!) -- this is alot of work!!
- unply it and then reply 2 balls into a 4 ply (ala my project)
- unply it and then with two ballwinders (or two skeiners) working in parallel, wind it into two separate balls (helps if you have 2 helpers each on a ballwinder or skeiner, you on the bobbin making sure it doesn't get all jumbly-messed up by getting ahead of the game) ((ask me how I know... LOL)) - then you can have singles, reply into a 3 ply, or whatever. -- also a lot of work!!
- overdye it to make it perfect for a different project
- if it's underplied or overplied, add ply twist or remove ply twist, then wash it again to reset the twist without weights
- repurpose it for a different project -- I just finished spinning a skein and it's too thick, so it'll not be socks, but a hat maybe. And a new project is also turning out thicker than desired, but I so want to Navajo 4-ply it that it'll be repurposed rather than just 2- or 3-plied. (Navajo 4-ply is when you Navajo 3-ply but carry along another strand, alternating which strand you do the chains with to get color shifts as you change strands).
I hope you find some interesting ideas in these to help spur solutions to your spinning "mishaps". Spinning's an adventure with alot of twists in it (ha ha).
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Related posts:
How do you make a good looking 2-ply yarn?
Why won't the twist go into the thick spots of my singles?
Why are my singles separating during plying?
How fine do I spin my singles to get a target WPI in my plied yarn?
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Questions on repurposing yarn? See the comments in this post for questions so far! I'd love to hear them! Contact me or post them on the blog. Thanks!
