My Very First

It's truly awful, but I'm pretty proud of it. It's my very first ball of hand spun yarn.


I did it on a drop spindle and I think I need a bit more practice. It's totally uneven and kind of fuzzy. I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to be fuzzy. It's also badly overspun in,, let's just say.... several...places (okay, most of it). But I'm happy because as bad as it is, it's all mine. I'm going to put it in a little baggy and write the date on it and save it. This way, someday far in the future, when I'm hopefully better at this and I'm trying to do something that's totally kicking my behind, I can pull this out and say, "Well, at least its not as bad as this."


My goal is to master the drop spindle and attempt to produce something that I might actually be able to knit something with (this isn't it) before I jump in and get myself a spinning wheel.

I was thinking of something like the classic "Sleeping Beauty" type spinning wheel, but having tried Kelly's wheel at our Sunday afternoon knitting meetup, I think that for the amount of space I have, a more compact portable wheel may be a better choice.

Speaking of which, there was some discussion last week that Panera should be paying us to come in there every week. Between the knitting and the chatting and the spinning wheels we were the main attraction in the place last week.

And I'm back again

The problem when you get really busy and neglect the blog for a few weeks (okay a month) is that so much has gone on in the meantime that the thought of catching everything up becomes overwhelming and you just keep neglecting the blog. It's a vicious cycle.

So, to update - about five days before Christmas I reached the final stage of holiday knitting. I managed to get through Denial, Anger, Bargaining and Depression fairly quickly. Acceptance took a little longer. Everyone got their hats, but I had to give up on the scarves. My mom and my brother each got one sock. The others are on the way. My sister in law was pretty impressed with the self-striping yarn. I know I always am. My grandmother really liked her socks, but when she opened them - I noticed something odd.

I'm really not certain how I managed to make one foot half the length of the other, but I did, so now Granny is short a sock as well.

Today at our knitting meetup Kelly brought her spinning wheel and I got a quick lesson from her and Helen. I spun a little bit of remarkably crappy yarn and she loaned me her drop spindle so that I can practice with that for a while until I can get my own. It's possible that I may now be hooked.