Teaching on Skillshare

Hello world!

It's been a colorful summer so far, literally and figuratively. But I have an exciting new project to talk about. I recently began teaching through Skillshare! Skillshare is an online platform with nearly a million and a half users, teaching everything from watercolor painting to how to pair wines with food, professional design skills and more. My class is on Fiber Arts 101: Spinning Yarn on a Drop Spindle. In the class I go over the basics of drop spindles, what fibers to spin, how to ply and tips and tricks for when you're just getting started. The yarns above are three types of fiber prep that I sample spinning so you can get an idea of how they differ. I'm excited to share a bit of what I've learned since I started spinning and hope you enjoy it!

The class and many others is only available through Skillshare premium, but right now you can get 3 months of Skillshare premium for only 99 cents! Click here for the link to check it out. Happy spinning!

handspun: a treat

Over the weekend, I finished a new yarn from another sweet Christmas gift. It was such a treat to spin! The fiber is Hedgehog Fibres 50/50 merino & silk, a roving with these loud, beautiful colors that made for a gorgeous fractal 2-ply yarn. The finished skein is 480 yards light fingering weight, and this week as I have been spinning bulky weight yarn, it has felt so magnified because I went straight from a lace weight single plied together to a bulky singly ply! 

This yarn is absolutely destined for something lacy, the trick is finding a pattern that won't compete with these gorgeous color repeats and the patterning that goes with it. Perhaps a small Lori shawl? Or a delicate Teakettle? For now it is hung in my studio to admire while I'm stash-diving for more pressing projects. Lovely!

The world spins madly on

On Christmas day, my family gave me the most generous Christmas gift ever and I've been spinning like the world is going to end tomorrow ever since, I can't say enough good things about this wheel. Over the 10 days surrounding Christmas & New Years, we travelled from Charlotte, to Orlando, to Atlanta and back, and the Sidekick went everywhere with us, and was ready to spin in easily anywhere we took it. I can't get over how fast I'm moving through my fiber compared to the drop spindle, and I can't wait to put up new inventory in the shop for you so soon. 

In the meantime, though, I've been having a lot of fun with these beautiful, psychedelic braids I received as gifts this Christmas. My first finished project off the wheel (seen above) is this beautiful BFL from Three Waters Farm, about 135 yards of aran weight, in the Cafe Diem colorway. I love spinning BFL! It's so bouncy and elastic, and is a great spinning fiber for practicing drafting (if you're new, and need the practice!). I have another braid of this as well, and I'm debating whether to double my yardage for a more substantial project or do the second braid as a Navajo ply and preserve the beautiful color repeats. 

The second crazy colors I've been working through are in Hedgehog Fibre's 50/50 Merino & Silk top in colorway E. I'm hoping it'll come out to be a fingering weight 2 ply. It's incredibly soft and shiny, and the most silk I've worked with spinning. It's a bit slippery, but I like it. 

Overall, Melo is adjusting to his new position, and leaving plenty of cat hair behind in protest. ;)

If you're wondering, the new wheel is the Schacht Sidekick. After all of my research, watching hours of YouTube videos and finally trying a few wheels in person, I chose it because it had a lot of the features that I was excited about (lots of ratios, extra large bobbins compared to other models, Scotch tension), while still being a compact spinning wheel, made from high quality wood materials (not MDF) and made domestically in Boulder, CO. It's a sturdy little wheel that sits well on the floor, which I know is a complaint for other models of compact wheels, and I've heard, though I have not tried it, spins a lot like Schacht's high-end model, the Matchless. I just love it. If you have any other questions about how to choose a spinning wheel, please send me a message or comment below, or check out the blog post I put together with articles to help potential spinning wheel shoppers a few months ago, here. 

My vision for 2016 is to really take my fiber practice from sheep to skein, and to that end I've been ordering and perusing high quality American-grown fleeces to prepare into handspun yarns. If you know of any farms that I should check out, I'd love to hear about them!

Here's to resisting all of the leftover Christmas candy, and to keeping all of our resolutions!

 

 

 

the year in yarn

All of these images can be found on my Instagram!

It seems like the MOST cliche thing you could possibly say in a year end wrap up post, but I can't believe 2015 is over. It went by SO fast, and yet at the same time I can't believe that I made some of these things this year, not last year. One of the most special things about all of the things that I've created this year, they fit so seamlessly into my life, so comfortably into my wardrobe, it feels like I've had them forever.

More than ever, I've fallen in love with fiber arts this year. I knit my first sweater, started spinning my own yarn, started my handmade business, and really engaged in my local and virtual fiber friends. I finally found a knitting group that I love! I travelled to Asheville (twice!), returned to Rhinebeck, and knit so many beautiful pieces. I checked off all of the things on my Knit Years Resolutions for this year, which feels so good!

I get a little teary with gratefulness writing all of this out. I can definitely be hard on myself, choosing to see all the ways that I need to improve and grow, and don't spend too much time celebrating all the wonderful things that happen. And these were just the fiber-related things! This year the hubs and I also moved to a house, celebrated our first year of marriage, took trips all over the Southeast & Mexico, started the last year of medical school, passed the final part of medical board exams, and adopted our two sweet kitties who we can't imagine life without. 

This week is still a vacation week for me (hallelujah), and I'm really focusing and challenging myself with some big goals for 2016. So check back for that before the week is through. My family were so incredibly generous with me this Christmas, and I can't wait to get back to our house and set up all of the improvements to my studio/guest room! 

I hope everyone who reads this little blog of mine has had a wonderful holiday, full of love and family and hope. I'm blessed that you choose to spend some of your time here. 

two new yarns

We spent the week of Thanksgiving in Florida playing too many board games, drinking too much tea, sitting on the porch too long and eating too many turkey green bean sandwiches. And While there, I was able to finish two yarns that will be in the shop very soon, I hope! 

The first is a 2-ply yarn spun from a pencil roving I purchased at Rhinebeck, a great heathery brown that would be wonderful for an outerwear, something warm and hearty for the cold months ahead. The pencil roving was the first I've spun with, and was very fast to draft, though perhaps not my favorite fiber I have spun. The large skein I got from this 4oz was so worth it!

This grey yarn was exactly what I wanted to be spinning over a break from my regular routine. Thick and thin and altogether an artful, freeform experience. It's a wonderful blend of several wools, including a beautiful merino. 

I love these handspun yarns and the process of creating them, I hope to list quite a few new skeins headed into this new year. 

Lots of blessings from Chapel Hill this season!

 

 

handspun: alpaca cloud

Pure white is my favorite thing to spin. It's so calming, so beautiful, so simple. Ever since I started dyeing in my little kitchen, I have started to see such beautiful potential in white fiber. Would you like to be beautiful brown? Cochineal red? Pale pink? Mossy green? Indigo blue? All of these and more? It's possible. It's lovely, spinning potential.

This is about 190 yards of DK weight single ply alpaca spun from Echoview Fiber Mill Alpaca Cloud. The second time I've spun this in 2 months, which should tell you how wonderful it is. I don't have much experience knitting with pure alpaca, people say that it lacks the elasticity that wool is known for, but I could do a serious 180 on that opinion after spinning it for hours. 

Sorry about the unexpected blogging hiatus the past few weeks. I had lots of plans for posts for Slow Fashion October, and I hope to be able to post one tomorrow just in time for the month to end. It's been great seeing how so many people care about this topic and have jumped into the discussion with so much heart. 

handspun: "aztec" BFL/silk

Back a few months ago after I had devoured my Hey Lady Hey fiber I had purchased and was on a major color kick, I purchased this beautiful combed top from Walnut Farms on Etsy. Located up in Pennsylvania, Walnut Farms has a great selection of spindles and spinning accessories as well as all of their beautiful fiber. I gravitated to the "Aztec" colorway and the results are what you see here! (For a before picture, you can see part of the combed top here.) 

Originally, my spinning plan was to spin some 2-ply fingering weight yarn for some fun socks for the Mr., but it came out closer to a 2-ply sport weight/DK weight. I didn't measure the WPI yet, but it's at about 230 yards. It's been so humid and rainy here this week that it took forever to dry after washing! 

I thought about listing this on my online shop for a hot second, but the BFL is just so soft, and the smallest amount of silk makes this shiny and gorgeous, and I couldn't let go. I already cast on for the Sweet Magnolia cowl for it and can't wait to see how it turns out! Every other fiber I have bought to spin since this one has been white or cream, so I think it's fair to say that this was a blip in my typical color habits. :) 

This was so fun to spin, and I'd love to see if handspun yarns would be something that people would be interested in seeing in the shop as well? 

Happy Monday, and I hope everyone is off to a great start of the week!

for spinners seeking a wheel

When I took this picture, I didn't know what any of these wheels were. Now I know it's a Kromski Sonata, Kromski Fantasia, and what looks like the Lendrum Folding Wheel.

I wish someone would have told me what a deep well I'd be falling into when I started looking into buying a spinning wheel. There's so much to know! There's so many brands, and so many types, and so many features! There is a spinning wheel out there for just about every person who ever wanted to spin yarn, whether seriously or as a hobby. Whether you want to spin art yarn or lace weight. How tall you are, how long you want to spin, whether you like wood or plastic or PVC. Since it has been a busy week for me job-wise and not much in the way of knitting or spinning has been happening, I thought it might be good to synthesize some great resources I've found just in case there are others who are going through the same process I am!

I won't try to re-create what is out there already, so consider this a library of articles/videos/resources. Just in time for the weekend!

The Basics

What is important when considering your first wheel?

What are the major brands of spinning wheels?

Other resources about specific wheel models

Last but not least, I would definitely recommend the Craftsy class on the Foundations of Spinning. It was a great class that you could easily do in a day, and she covers a lot of really valuable information on wheels and spinning in general. 

This is by no means an exhaustive list but i hope it helps others out there looking to make an investment in a tool that can last a lifetime!