Monday, April 10, 2006
Spinning a Yarn
I haven't yet mentioned the fact that I borrowed a spinning wheel from a friend. And am attempting to spin my own yarn. And that I've never done it before in my life. But I figured it couldn't be that hard to learn. You see, that's the funny thing about me. I always figure things "can't be that hard to learn", with the exception of anything sports related since I have no faith in my sportsly abilities (perhaps if I'd been encouraged in a sporting direction as a kid, things would have been different...aerobics don't count). I always think that with enough determination, you can learn to do whatever the heck you please. You'd think as I get older, I'd know better. But I don't.
So I got this spinning wheel, and had my friend, T., show me how to use it. Then I tried it. I'm not sure how much anyone else knows about spinning, but I knew nothing. I didn't have any books and the stuff on-line seemed rather vague. But I tried anyway. She had some brown wool her son had brought home from one of his trips abroad, either to New Zealand or Britain, some place where they "grow" wool. Wool for spinning is called roving. So I had this big ball of brown wool roving. When I was watching T. spin, she used both hands, the right hand "feeding" the roving into the spinning wheel, and the left hand holding onto the big ball of roving. It seemed easy enough. I even went on-line to eBay in a fit of spinnerly zeal and bought all sorts of hand-colored roving from a wonderful seller who has a farm called Split Rock Ranch in Colorado.
So I got situated. You get your wheel spinning by peddling away on the treadle, which is basically a big pedal. I start peddling and the wheel immediately starts spinning the wrong direction. Which makes the yarn you already have on your spindle unwind (mind you, the yarn that was already on the spindle was yarn T. had spun, not moiself). I did that for about 20 minutes.
::peddle:::
::ffffffuuufffffftttttffffff::<--- sound of yarn unwinding
::shitandshinola::<--- sound of me swearing under my breath
::peddle peddle peddle::<--- sound of me thinking peddling faster will help
::ffffffuuufffffftttttffffff::<--- sound of yarn unwinding
::ohforheavensakeshitandshinola::<--- sound of me swearing under my breath
::REPEAT 100x::
Finally, after practicing peddling without bothering with the roving, I got the hang of it, sorta. So I try with the roving again. This time it actually goes in the right direction! Victory. Then I try to feed some of the brown wool roving. The spinning wheel sucked up like half the ball of roving in one gulp and I had what looked like one of Bob Marley's very long rasta dreds spun around the spindle.
::blink::
I will not cry
::blink:: ::blink::
I tortured myself like this for about 3 hours until my neck was so tense I couldn't move it for 3 days afterwards. I broke down and bought 3 spinning books on Amazon. I refused to touch the spinning wheel until I got the books and read through them. This weekend I tried again. This time with the roving from Split Rock Ranch. And by gum, I got it! It actually looked like yarn instead of hemp rope. So now I have a new passion. I know the yarn isn't perfect, but I made it and that, my friends, is pretty darned nifty.
| Mrs. Botton was at it again @ 7:48 AM
