I've been trying new things lately in my spinning! Recently I attempted to spin some singles with a lofty, low-twist to them. Instead, they came out like normal singles. I'll try again soon. I also tried my hand at Navajo plying. This was fun! I'm so excited about it that I plan to do it much more often.

In regular plying, you spin two or more strands of yarn, then twist them together. In Navajo plying, you spin one strand of yarn and make a long loop and pull the other part of your yarn through it, like a very very very VERY loose crochet chain, then add twist so that it looks like three different yarns twisted together.

This is cool for a number of reasons. You don't have to deal with lazy kates or keeping each ball of yarn separate as you ply them together. Also, when you ply a multi-colored yarn, you sometimes risk making it look like a barber pole. I had a lime green and light pink yarn, I spun up two strands of it and plied them. It looked like a yellowy orange color, because the two colors were doing a barber-pole effect. Bleh! But with Navajo plying, you're using the same strand, so the same colored areas will be plied with themselves. It's really cool!

And the most awesome reason of ALL? I found a technique online that shows you how you can spin and ply on a spindle. You don't have to spin the whole yarn first - you can spin a certain length, then ply it before you even wind it onto the spindle shaft! It's so cool! A brilliant woman named Tammy Rizzo was the one who came up with this brilliant technique, and trust me when I say that even to a total spinning novice like myself, this was so clearly explained that I had NO difficulty replicating it! So, without further ado, here it is!

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