Tuesday 12 July 2011

First attempt at spinning

I really enjoying crochet and decided to branch out from crochet to have more hobbies, so the next logical step seem to be to spin my own yarn, so its still linked to crochet. Sooner or later I guess I will have angora rabbits and maybe a few sheep, that will have to wait until I start earning though! I got a starter spinning kit from handspinner.co.uk, It came with an ashford drop spindle, a bag of Merino wool (ready to tease out and spin), the ashford book of hand spinning, and two issues of the mag The wheel. A great starter set in my opinion and it wasn't very expensive either!



So I watched three videos from theartofmegan's channel, the three videos show you how to draft the yarn for spinning, actually spinning the yarn, and finishing and making a skein. Definitely a good watch if you have never spun before!

So the first bit of yarn I spun came out mega chunky but that's because I used a very thick piece of wool and didn't draft it very much. The turquoise thread in the picture is DK weight and is there to give you a scale.

 

The next lot I have spun is using half the thickness of the yarn I used in the first but it is still abit chunky.. maybe more aran weight.



I still have half the amount of yarn that cam in the kit left and my aim is the spin something more like the DK weight. Then its to dying and I will be dying them using dylon in turquoise and blue colours, which are my favourite colours.


I'll let you know how I get on! Any tips are welcome please, I want to tune this skill so I can justify getting rabbits and sheep in the future :P

x

4 comments:

  1. What a fun new hobby! I totally see my own crochet life progressing this way - into dyeing and then spinning and then having my own little farm of sheep :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good luck with the spinning:)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I hope you like spinning. I do not think I would like it. And if you discover that you do not like it, I hope you will find something else you like to do!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Best of luck! I'm too chicken to try spinning yet. Can't wait to see your progress!

    ReplyDelete