Keeping Track of Your Handspun Yarn – Printable Skein Bands
Keep track of all of your handspun yarn with these FREE printable yarn bands!
Every spinner seems to have their own way of keeping track of the yarn that they spin. You can make tags to tie on to your finished skeins to keep the details close at hand. Some people like to save samples of their spins with notes on fiber and technique. Others create intricate journals of their spinning to look back on.
Until this point in my spinning, I haven’t had a formal way to keep track of my fiber and handspun yarn. I have relied on memory alone, which has not been a great method. If you have followed along with The Cuttle Corner, you may have noticed that I have yarn where I have completely forgotten what the fiber was or how I spun it.
My collection of handspun yarn has grown to the point where I cannot rely on my memory to keep track of what is what. I needed some sort of physical record that was easy to use to keep track of my handspun yarn.
Handspun Yarn Skein Bands
After looking at different ways of record keeping that spinners use, I decided to design a skein band for my hanspun yarn. Using a skein band is a good compromise between keeping a yarn journal and using yarn tags. It gives plenty of room to write down all the information I wanted to keep, like a journal, and keeps that information attached to the skein of handspun yarn, like a tag. I also like having a pre-made list of details to write down, so I don’t forget anything.
Additionally, yarn bands are easier to take on and off if needed. This means you can add a yarn band as soon as you get your yarn off of a niddy-noddy. You can finish or dye the yarn later, and just slip the band on and off as needed.
The next step was to decide what information I wanted to keep for each skein of yarn.
What Information to Record
Fiber
What fiber I spun is the number one thing I want to remember, and often the first thing I forget. Whether it is 100% merino, or an alpaca/silk blend, I want to know right away what fiber type I have.
Tool
The longer I spin yarn, the more tools I have to spin with. Even though it doesn’t necessarily make a difference if my yarn was spun on a spinning wheel, or with a drop spindle, it’s fun for me to remember what tool I used to spin my yarn.
Draft
Did you spin a woolen yarn with a long draw, or is it worsted spun with a short forward draw? The draft while spinning impacts how the yarn will behave when it is knit, crocheted, or woven, so it’s always a good idea to keep track of your spinning method.
Ply
Even though you can figure out how many plies a yarn has by untwisting a small section and counting the number of plies, it is nice to have that information ready to go. Additionally, if you did something special, like a chain ply, or fractal spinning, you can make a note of that here.
Yards
I’m from the US, where we are stubbornly still hanging on to imperial measurements, so I think of the length of my yarn in yards. Feel free to use whatever unit of measurement makes you happy, but either way, you’ll want to keep track of how long your yarn is.
It might seem intimidating to figure out the length of your yarn, but it only takes a few minutes.
First, untwist your skein and lay out your finished yarn and count how many wraps there are.
Then, measure the length of the skein folded in half.
With just a bit of math, you get how many yards (or meters) of yarn you have!
Whenever I calculate how much yarn I have, I always round down to make sure I have enough yarn for any project I start. I’d rather have a bit of yarn left over than not have enough.
WPI
WPI, or wraps per inch, is a common measurement for spinners. It gives an idea of what gauge your handspun yarn is. It is literally measuring how many times your yarn wrapped around fit in one inch. The fewer wraps per inch, the thicker the yarn, while thinner yarns have more wraps per inch.
Dye
Whether you dyed the yarn yourself, used fiber died by someone else, or spun undyed fibers, you can keep track for later.
Date
Finally, I wanted to keep track of when I spun my yarn. This most likely will be a year and maybe a month, not an exact date, but it will give an idea of when I spun a particular yarn. Being able to put my yarn in chronological order will be a fun way to see how my spinning progresses over time.
Notes
No matter how many categories I add to my labels, there will some extra information I will want to add from time to time. I left a large section to add anything else I can think of that I might want to remember later. This is a great place to make a note if you have multiple skeins of the same yarn, or where you purchased the fiber.
Short and Long Labels
Because some of my yarn skeins are thicker than others, I made a short and a long version of my skein bands, so they will fit any size of yarn.
Labeling My Handspun Yarn
I had so much fun going through my handspun yarn collection. The more recently I spun the yarn, the more I remembered and could fill out on my skein bands.
With some of my older yarn, I had to make a few guesses on fiber and draft. But even if I didn’t remember much, I still took the time to measure my yardage and WPI so know what I’ve got the next time I reach for my own yarn to knit with!
I hope these skein bands help you keep track of your handspun yarn!
Happy spinning!
Get Your Own Free Skein Bands!
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