As Cookie mentioned the other day, knitters are glorious people.
Today, the lovely and wonderful Spinnity and Jeni organized a spinning event, at Spinnity's place. We novice spinners were treated to some one-on-one time with more experienced spinners, who even let us use their wheels, which was really awesome. I've been wanting to learn to spin for quite some time, but with our tiny apartment and all, I haven't been able to give it the real effort I think I would need to to succeed.
My lack of coordination hasn't helped my efforts any either. Someone tried to teach me to use a wheel at Stitches, and it was rather pathetic. Amanda from Spin-Off gave me a drop spindle at Stitches too, so with some practice, I have been starting to get the hang of the whole thing. Still, I knew that spinning wasn't going to be a sit-down-for-5-minutes-and-you-have-it sort of thing for me.
Look how patient Spinnity and Jeni are! Here's Spinnity teaching Jen to spin. Jen was doing a great job of learning.
And here's Jeni showing Christina how to spin:
Spinnity thinks it's important to use the drop spindle to learn about spinning, so we started out with that. Here's Sheetal (well, her arms) working with the drop spindle. Sheetal has decided she's a knitter, not a spinner, but I think she could be convinced.
Sheetal thinks that now I'm a spinner. At least I look like I know what I'm doing:
I tried a few different fibers today, or maybe I would have made more yarn. As it is, here's the tiniest hank of handspun ever (Thanks for plying it, Spinnity, even though it was soooo tiny!):
Overall, I really feel like I started to get a handle on the process, which was nice. I look forward to giving spinning another try soon. I hear that a local LYS rents wheels for a very reasonable price, so I'm definitely considering it!
Thanks to all of the knitters/spinners for such a great day! Sorry I didn't get pictures of everyone, but there were quite a few folks there, and it was good to see/meet you all!
I read quite a lot of spinning experience lately ... sounds like lots of fun! But I don't think I have room for a wheel in my apartment!
Posted by: Agnes at March 4, 2006 9:06 PMI hope you go over to the dark spinning side. Is that yarn made with the fiber you got from Stitches? Or is that something else?
Posted by: Cookie at March 4, 2006 10:56 PMHaving longed long for a wheel but unable to put forth the cash, I found my answer at last through a fellow I met at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival last spring who makes them out of PVC and therefore sells that at much more reasonable prices than the wooden ones. I bought a single-treadle wheel for $140 and it's great. I've successfully spun wool, mohair, alpaca, and a gorgeous merino/tencel into a shiny lace-weight yarn. I highly recommend it if you want a wheel of your own. He makes them in all sorts of sizes, from tiny table-top electric ones to giant walking wheels and the feather light for traveling.
http://www.babesfibergarden.com/
Ohhh rent a wheel! I'd never thought of that...*trots of to the LYS to see if they rent*
Posted by: Marlene at March 5, 2006 11:32 PMWheel spinning? Check.
Roving being drafted? Check.
Real live yarn on the bobbin? Check
Person sitting in front of the wheel making it all happen? Check.
Looks like a spinner who knows what she's doing to me! I had an awesome time and it was great to catch up with you.
Posted by: seltsame at March 6, 2006 12:20 AMCongratulations on your very first handspun! And thanks so much for coming. I enjoyed the gathering of spinners very much. And did you see all that food? Who knew that if you summoned knitters to your house, they would provide munchies for the whole week to come?
Posted by: spinnity at March 6, 2006 7:39 PMCongratulations on the handspun!
Here's a question...people keep talking about the "very reasonable" prices of renting wheels from a particular store, but just what are those prices? Sure, I could CALL the shop, but that requires me to remember to do so when, say, the shop is actually open.
Posted by: Elizabeth
at March 7, 2006 7:08 PM