Captain's Log, Stardate 03.23.2010 I just got a newsletter from Yarnmarket.com and they had this picture that I just had to share with you guys! Isn't he adorable??? Who says alpacas aren't cute???? If you want to see more of them, check out the pictures from when I visited an alpaca farm in July 2009. I'm hoping to get to a fiber festival in June and buy a raw alpaca fleece so I can spin my own alpaca yarn. They say it's easy to process (as opposed to sheep fleeces) and it might be a cheaper way to get alpaca yarn than buying the alpaca roving or commercially-spun yarn. I think I'd like to spin sock yarn with it to see if it's warmer than my wool sock yarn.

Captain's Log, Stardate 01.22.2010 Since late December, I have been learning how to spin wool into yarn using a drop spindle. Yes! It’s true, I have gone totally Amish/old school. (No offense to any Amish or old school people. I mean that in the nicest way.) I don’t know why I suddenly decided to learn to spin. Or if I did know why, I’ve forgotten (I probably explained it to Captain Caffeine at some point, but now I don’t remember what excuse I gave to him). Not having any yarn shops nearby that teach spinning, I bought a Cascade spindle online and some really soft, silky merino wool roving from Etsy.com. I read all kinds of online articles and watched youtube videos. And I spun my first yarn! Here it is! It’s a lace weight yarn (about 30 wraps per inch), since I like using finer gauge yarns over bulkier yarns. It’s rather uneven (although it’s not as easy to tell in the picture) and I didn’t ply it very well, but I made it all by myself! Captain Caffeine does not...