Sunday, August 21, 2011

Spinning!

Although I have been knitting pretty consistently since my friend, Nance, re-taught me how during my senior year of college, I never had a particularly strong desire to learn how to spin yarn. 

 
That changed when I visited the Genessee Country Village last summer. Since then, I've tried to teach myself how to spin at the UCC using both drop spindles and spinning wheels but I never had much luck on my own.

The UCC came to my rescue this month by offering a 2 day/week spinning class with a wonderfully patient and kind teacher!

Though this yarn is terribly uneven and unprofessional, I'm absolutely thrilled that I produced it today!

 I spun 3 bobbins full of the stuff this afternoon!

While I managed to use the spinning wheel to ply the first two bobbins, I used the Andian plying technique to help ply the third, smallest bobbin.

 I then had to wind the yarn.

Which resulted in 3 incredibly tiny skeins of real yarn!

I have now soaked/rinsed the yarn and set it out to dry, in order to set the twist.

I highly doubt I have enough yarn here to make anything substantial, but I am so happy I learned the process of spinning these past 2 weeks. Man, it is definitely tricky!

I can't wait to go back to the UCC to spin up the extra roving I bought -- maybe in a few weeks I'll have a finished hat or cowl to show you made from this stuff!

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