Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Beginning Spinner

I finished up the fiber I got to take home for the week, more Coopworth wool:



I very much enjoyed the spinning, but toward the end of the bobbin felt my legs tiring. Does this mean spinning is good exercise? I can't wait to start playing with color.

This left me with two bobbins of spun yarn, shown below as wound balls because I only had one bobbin to work with. We didn't get time to ply in the second wheel spinning class, although we did see it demonstrated. Since I'm currently without a wheel, I think the plying is going to have to happen on the drop spindle.



In the second class, I got to use a Lendrum castle-style wheel. I think I like the Ashford Traditional I used last week a little bit better - I think it's because the Ashford has a larger wheel and so spun a bit faster. But the castle-style wheel is much more practical for storage, so when I get a wheel, I expect it will be a castle-style one. My knitting mentor is going to lend me his castle-style Shacht wheel, and I suspect after that, I will be quite spoiled.

I don't have pictures of the following, but (EDITED to add pictures)

We also got to spin with Blue Faced Leicester (oh, it's so dreamy, and I could spin a very fine single!), and we carded some pre-washed Romney fleece, created rolags, and spun it up too. I spun two rolags on the wheel in class and then finished the other two rolags at home on the drop spindle.


BFL & Merino samples, Romney samples

I learned that I definitely prefer spinning from roving, and I definitely prefer spinning on a wheel.

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