Back in 2006, I bought myself a spinning wheel (an Ashford Joy) to celebrate being hired as editor of Interweave Crochet. I got a copy of Alden Amos’s book, and was excited to get down to spinning some yarn for myself.
I dabbled, for sure, for a bit. But I was so busy with work that I ended up not spinning very much at all. I figured someday. Someday.
One of my Craftsy students recently asked me about crocheting with handspun yarn*, and that planted a seed. When I was finally starting to feel better after last week’s stomach bug from hell, I decided it was time to take the spinning wheel out again. This time, I wouldn’t even think of forcing myself to wade through hundreds of pages of dense text to find the bits of inspiration I need to teach myself how to properly spin – I’d follow my student’s lead instead, and take an online class.
I’m into the second lesson of Amy King’s Foundations of Spinning class, and I’m really enjoying it. I’ve had some braids of fiber sitting in a drawer for years, and I’m looking forward to making some yarn!
* From what I understand, the beauty of handspinning yarn for crochet is that you have control over the direction of the twist. Most commercial yarns are designed for knitters, and they’re spun with an S-twist. Because crochet involves different sorts of movements, some S-twist yarns untwist when they’re crocheted, which can lead to really annoying splitting. But yarns spun with a Z-twist work with the motions of crochet. I intend to explore this, for sure, once I get the hang of the basics of spinning.