I recently finished spinning a bunch of the roving that I had dyed with Greener Shades dyes back in February.  I was trying to work my way through a bin of older fiber before I allowed myself to play with my new goodies – thinking about it, it’s kind of weird that I create so many rules for myself while working on tasks that are supposed to be purely recreational.  

Anyway, I ended up pulling out several braids of dyed Merino that seemed the most fun, then spun them each into a lofty 2-ply bulky weight yarn.  I had split each braid in half and then predrafted the fiber without splitting it further, resulting in long color repeats for each single ply.  When I plied them together, I got a nice barberpole effect that should work up as subtly shifting stripes.

My big problem with my handspun yarn is that I have trouble coming up with project ideas.  I’d like to use these four colors together, and I have more than 250g of each to play with (although the weight of each skein varies by up to about 50g).  I swatched the pinkish-reddish one on size 11 needles and got a soft, bouncy fabric that I think would be perfect for a snuggly throw or baby blanket.  I’ve been playing around with the idea to make a chevron blanket (similar to my Missoni-inspired blanket) but with exaggerated chevrons, maybe only 3 zigs or zags across, with fat rainbow stripes.

Do you have any other ideas?  The colors are a little bright for a garment that I’d make for myself, so I’m thinking home decor items since most of my house is decorated in brighter colors.