As I trace my steps in the world of spinning, I realize it is not a straight progression. I think that’s okay because just as I have been told over and over again that there is no absolutely correct way to spin, I believe there is no absolutely correct way to learn how to spin. But the end is the same – the delicious accomplishment of turning fibres into yarn!
Journaling is a powerful tool to combine with your spinning practice. Journaling – the process of noting down your thoughts and daily highlights – can grow your spinning practice by encouraging planning, tracking, and reflecting.
As featured in PLY’s December 2023 newsletter, the Ask Jacey column answers a question about commercial yarns and how they can help create art yarns!
Have you ever blown out the elbow of a favorite sweater? Or knit up an entire sweater only to find you have to wear a turtleneck under it? When choosing a fleece to spin into a sweater, lots of people reach for one end of the spectrum or another: a Merino or associated crossbreed, or something that makes a nice hard-wearing barn sweater like a Romney. However, both of those approaches leave us with a sweater yarn full of compromises. Fortunately, there is an alternative.
Be prepared to smile and laugh as we learn about a handspun sweater adventure to remember for all the wrong reasons!
At seventy-three-years-young, there is no stopping Donna Jo Copeland from keeping a small flock of sheep, a few quirky angora goats, and about eleven English angora rabbits on Breezy Manor Farm, located in Mooresville, Indiana. After over five decades of shepherding, she is still fascinated by her fiber animals and loves working with the gift of their wool. Let’s learn more about Donna Jo’s flock-to-sweater process, which proves that you are never too old or too young to enjoy fibers.
As is the case with many others before me, the more I knit the more I wanted to know about wool. For years I was attracted by the rainbow of colors available. I’d done a lot of dyeing, but a real game-changer for me was seeing a heathered yarn for the first time. After studying it, I realized it was not something I could dye; rather, it was something that had to be spun. I had to learn how.
