Drinking on a Lazy Afternoon

Spinning Weekend

After a weekend at the Foster Fair, I am spinning on my Kundert spindle. Nothing beats spinning with other spinners. It inspires you to keep the momentum going.


Carol M won the wheel spinning contest for the longest yarn! Congrats,Carol! I was lucky enough to win the spindle contest for the longest yarn.

I was also pleased about this:

Wednesday Eye Candy

I was taken by the sight of bees covered in pollen this morning in a Rose of Sharon bush. Here is the flower without the bee.

The Value of Handwork

All of you who make things with your hands understand the value of handwork whether it be spinning, knitting, weaving, quilting or some other craft. In the Slater Mill Ravelry forum a member posted this wonderful video about handwork. What I most love about the film is Renate Hiller's spinning with a rock. Renate is the co-director of the Fiber Craft Studio at the Threefold Educational Center in Chestnut Ridge, NY.

And yes, I'm off to find a rock and a stick to play with spinning some fiber. Watch the video ;her use of the stick is very interesting !

Tibetan Spindle

As always I am thrilled by the opportunity to learn new techniques in spindle spinning. I took a workshop many years ago with GALINA KHMELEVA and purchased a Russian spindle. Ever since that workshop I have played with spinning on this type of spindle and not succeeding. Just lately I acquired a beautiful walnut Russian Spindle due to Iris's influence.

Then thanks to Habetrot's video link I found a very interesting approach to spinning on a Tibetan spindle which seems very much like the Russian spindle . I particularly like how the spinner wraps the newly spun singles on the middle of the shaft. This appears to make it much easier to spin new singles since the singles wrapped mid shaft gives the yarn that climbs up the shaft some traction. Later she unwinds the singles at the middle using a figure eight movement and then neatly rewinds the singles closer to the bottom of the spindle.

Does the video inspire you to try to spin on this type of spindle?

Yin and Yang

As we well know gardening
has its highs and lows. Today I had the fearful task of removing poison ivy from the backyard. Armed with several clipping devices and dressed to the teeth in old clothing that covers the entire body I began clipping away. No. I didn't get all of it....I never do, but I got enough to satisfy me.

On to the joy......