i’ve finished a few projects recently. want to see?

a scarf to use as a sample for the store:

some yarn spun on my snail shell for selling:

a shrug for me:

and a few other things i still have to photograph.

oh, and i’ve started a new thing, too:

i’m going to wait and see how it turns out before i give you all the details on this one.

on another subject: project runway started up again tonight! love it.

when i took the spinning class i didn’t expect to enjoy spinning. i was just taking it to learn more about fiber and because it was a free class. but, alas, i did. whatcha gonna do?

but wheels are expensive.

while perusing craigslist one morning i noticed an ad for an ashford traditional wheel being sold for $40. it was in pretty rough shape, needed some parts replaced and the wheel put back together and balanced. but the seller was willing to part with it for only $25, so we took a chance on it.

a few parts were purchased, tom did some deconstructing, gluing and reconstructing:

and got it all fixed up:

it seems to work just fine:

the person selling the wheel bought it from the fiber art center, which, sadly, recently closed, and we’ve been able to determine that it was manufactured around 1976 (a bicentennial baby - just like us!)

we call it snail shell:

i was able to take a class last weekend through the yarn store - introduction to spinning:

we rented a wheel and got a basketful of fiber-y goodies.

this was my first attempt at a single ply:

it started as this:

and became this:

ick. not so good.

attempt number two started as this:

became this:

and ended up as this:

a little better. (it’s got a little thick ‘n thin action going on, but so does debbie bliss soho)

on the second day of the class, i turned a big pile of brown fluff (i guess i didn’t take a photo of the roving) into this:

i then plied the two singles together to get this:

much better!

and what’s that skein hanging on? i’ll show you tomorrow…