Lace and Spinning

You may be aware that I love lace.
I find there is great inconsistency in how lace yarns are 'listed' or categorized. I was curious to compare some of my favourite laces to see how they look, side by side.

L-R: 1) My handspun single. I am making this a 2 ply, but it's still a lace weight. (see below for plied photo)
2) Black Grignasco Merino Silk - this is probably one of the finest lace yarns I've purchased and is a 2-ply. As you can see, my handspun single is pretty close in thickness. (Look at the shadows too.)
3) Red Baruffa Cashwool - I'm looking forward to knitting with this. A light 2-ply lace.
4) Spice Trail Montague - ah, my favourite yarn base, Montague by Waterloo Wools. Same yarn used for my Battle Weary shawl, my Green Embrace, and my current Tread Softly shawl. It's a tightly plied, 2-ply merino-silk lace yarn. The yarn has lovely stitch definition because of the fiber content and plying.  Especially when compared with how loosely the other lace yarns are plied.
5) Orange Wellington Fibres 2-ply mohair/wool (80/20 blend) - I've had this (and a green skein) forever. I really must knit it.
6) Yellow Centolavaggi - a loose 2-ply lace. From my 2011KALendar shawl.
7) Green Shelridge Farms soft touch lace - another loose 2-ply
8) Green, hand-dyed knit picks bare lace - a 'medium' ply, 2-ply lace. A bit wider than the others.
9) Handspun single - Mermaid colourway of some fancy fibres sent as a sample with another order.  I deiberately spun this thicker than the other singles I've been making (for lace) because of the angelina content. Plied with some plain white for more of a DK weight yarn. (see below)

My favourite remains the Montague for its stitch definition and colourways.I'm looking forward to knitting up the black with some small needles in an intricate lace shawl (for my mom...). I think it will take a while.  The green hand-dyed also has a lot of purple in it (we were actually aiming for a more ocean-themed colourway with blues... totally did not turn out that way). It's for mom too.

Not content to simply purchase mill-spun lace yarns, I of course have to spin some. Here's my current collection of tools:

Far left - a top whorl suspended spindle that I made the other day.
Next - my new supported spindle by Thomas C. Forrester that makes lovely lace. So far I've spun one set of alpaca singles.
Blue - my newest turkish suspended spindle in size 'medium' from Threads Thru Time
Orange - my tiny turkish spindle also from Threads Thru time, which is great fun for carrying around and making lace.
In package - a Knit Picks turkish spindle. A friend is currently borrowing mine and this will be hers. It's a large size.
Bottom: the 'stick' I used for stick-spinning.
Not shown (oops) - my new Rakeshaw spinner that works much like the stick. Mine was made by a local guy and purchased through a guild member. (Yes, I've joined the KW Knitters Guild this year - finally).

And here are the 2 most recent mini skeins I spun:

Singles - showing how the 'mermaid' is thicker. As you can see, the tiny spindle does not make very large amounts of yarn. It's still a lot of fun!

Mermaid single - this wee ball maxed out what my tiny spindle could hold. It wasn't very difficult, by the end, to wind the yarn on to the arms, but I wasn't about to finish with a small amount of fibre left.

Teal singles

Teal plied together.

Mermaid plied with a white wool-silk single whipped up for this purpose. You can't really see the shiney angelina here. I think I'll knit something like a small Yule ornament with this.  It is very loosely plied - deliberately so.

Last night I borrowed a book on the history of Orenburg lace knitting. (The knitters Guild has an incredible library that I now have access to.) I look forward to learning more. I've also been reading Wrapped in Lace and Knitted Lace of Estonia, which have a lot of information about regional lace styles and methods.