Many years ago Bob and I talked about raising sheep so we would have a mountain of lovely fiber to spin, something I have wanted to do since I was a little girl and read Rumpelstiltskin for the first time. When I met Elsie McCarthy at Wing’s Market in East Thetford one day two years ago and she invited me to come knit with her on Thursdays, I had no idea the turn my fiber passage would take.
As we sat knitting with a group of very nice people we talked of many things. When I said I was interested in spinning, she gave me a handmade drop spindle and showed me how to use it. I was a terrible failure at using it. I got out the drop spindle that Brother Bob Scotland had made for me many many years ago, along with a bag of fiber Sister Virginia Scotland had given me. I was a terrible failure at that, too. So, if the free stuff didn’t work, surely if I spent money, then I could do it. Helloyarn.com seemed the perfect place, since I had visited a yarn shop in Massachusetts who recommended helloyarn…and I purchased a new drop spindle and a pound of merino fiber. Still a failure.
Soon Elsie offered to loan me her Ashford Traveller spinning wheel, and her husband, Larry, put it immediately into the back seat of our Camry. I was so thrilled with the wheel and the bags of fiber Elsie gave me to try my hand at spinning on a wheel. It did not start off very well, but now, nearly a year later, I am beginning to spin more successfully…still not well, mind you, but better.