I taught spinning today

I had the privilege of teaching four ladies how to spin yarn today.

Yes, there are people in the 21st Century who choose to spin yarn from wool. I'm not sure what causes this type of insanity, but it's more prevalent than you might imagine.

The scene was a nice yarn and fiber shop inside a beautiful home in Elbert County. I had wanted to visit there previously, but "never got around to it." The home is located on an alpaca farm (or you could say there is an alpaca farm co-located with the yarn shop) and specializes in alpaca yarns and fibers.

Three of the four ladies had planned to rent wheels to practice on. The fourth lady said she had a wheel. But when she arrived, the shop owner and I determined that she had an antique semi-functional wheel. Neither of us could spin on it, so we strongly recommended she rent a wheel with which she could learn.

During the three hour class, I helped each of them learn how to use their wheel, how to change the bobbins, and how to make yarn. One of the ladies decided that spinning was not her thing, and that was perfectly OK. (I recently made a similar discovery in a pottery throwing class.) She was much more interested in learning how to process the fiber. That's good, because a lot of us would much rather spin or knit than wash fleeces or card them.

All four students successfully spun a singles yarn. I sent them home with a bag full of different kinds of prepared fiber to spin. They need to practice a few minutes every day, or as close to it as practicable. A follow-up class about how to ply their yarn is offered in two weeks, but they have to spin some more singles to have something to ply.

The shop owner said something very nice about me. She said I was a very "gentle soul" when it came to teaching spinning. Aw, shucks...