Spinning Self Striping with Mini Roving Braids

how to spin yarn

Now I know that the whole mini skein thing was already all the rage. I mean what’s not to love, you get this cute little bundle of different little yarns that are all different but made to go together. I’d never really seen the spinner equivalent until one of our featured artist Ashley Walden dyed up these fabulous little mini BRAIDS.

I thought they just lended themselves so well to spinning up a self striping yarn while doing a chain ply. You can of course use a full size regular braid by just pulling the sections into color blocks and then spinning them in that color blocked order. I personally have made some really cool projects with self striping qualities these are especially good for beginner projects or if you are like me and like to knit while watching TV at night so not having to pay attention and change yarns for changing colors really appeals. I personally think this one would look cool mixed in with another solid color yarn in a natural white. The would also make super cute easy fingerless gloves. We have two patterns that this would work for a crochet and knit version of simple small fingerless gloves. You can grab these patterns free on our pattern page and you’ll be well on your way for cute tailgating parties or hayrides all fall!

I spun this yarn on my SpinOlution Echo Spinning Wheel by spinning each of these little mini braids one at a time. There was sort of a marbled soft blending in between sections which I though was really pretty. That’s one of the benefits of spinning your own is that if it was just dyed to be self striping you would get those cool soft blends. I spun my singles about sport weight and then chain plyed them and they turned out some where between bulky and chunky which I love to work with.