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Reconsider cotton The lovely natural dyed cotton of Ella Baker. Cotton is an amazing fiber—great for keeping us cool and dry when it is hot and humid out. Cotton is the fiber of the ages. It is the fiber the ancient Egyptians cultivated to clothe themselves and also to wrap their dead in to ensure...
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Inspired by the Illinois Prairie Spinners, I am finally spinning this merino top. It was dyed with natural dyestuffs by Earthly Hues in Granville, Ohio. Photo: Kate Larson. Like most spinners, I keep a stash of fiber. When I have a blissful hour to look through my favorite stash, kept in an oak cabinet...
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What I wish history class had been like Norman Kennedy demonstrating breaking up the husk of the retted flax plant to harvest the fiber. Thank goodness for those in our community who keep traditional techniques alive. Norman Kennedy is one of these treasures. We were lucky to record some of his vast...
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Northwest Pennsylvania Spinners and Weavers Guild worked with Camp Stone, an Orthodox Jewish summer camp, to introduce 680 campers to an array of fiber arts. Campers saw a sheep shearing demonstration and learned to card and spin wool using either a drop spindle or a wheel. The newly created yarns were...
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The fabric of our lives Most spinners learn how to spin with wool—it is easy to learn with and is widely available as a spinning fiber. Sometimes not knowing that something is challenging can be a good thing. For instance, I learned how to spin by spinning cotton. I was a college student studying...
Posted to
Amy's Blog
by
Amy Clarke Moore
on
Dec 29, 2011
Filed under:
Filed under: Natural Fiber, Handspun, Spinning Cotton, Spindle Spinning, Drop Spindle, How To Spin, Spinning Wool, Merino Wool, Handwoven, Spinning Fiber, Wool Processing, Types of Yarn, Spinning
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On the Cover: Locks of Romney, Lincoln, and Merino wool, which are the subjects of Beth Smith's article on spinning with the crimp in mind. DEPARTMENTS Editor's Page Letters Reviews As the Whorl Spins Get This! Abbreviations Classified Ads Advertiser's Index Autowrap by Jacey Boggs The Molo...
Posted to
Spin-Off Magazine
by
Spin-Off
on
Nov 25, 2011
Filed under:
Filed under: Natural Fiber, Calendar of Events, Spindle Spinning, Drop Spindle, Call for Entries, Spin-Off Magazine, Wool Processing, Handspun, Spinning Wool, Merino Wool, Spinning, Processing Fiber
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What goes around comes around- and may be spun around twice! As many readers know, the news from your groups and guilds forms the substance of this column. Your events, activities, and projects can be shared with the larger spinning community when you send me your newsletters by post or email. Your comments...
Posted to
Spinner's Connection
by
Peggy Coffey
on
Aug 26, 2011
Filed under:
Filed under: Spindle Spinning, Drop Spindle, Handspun, Wool Processing, Spinning Wool, Spin-Off Magazine, Mohair, SOAR, Types of Yarn, Alpaca Wool
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Spread the word about our free Drop Spindle Spinning eBook Every once in a while I start to daydream about what a world overrun by spinners would look, and more importantly, feel like. What if everyone was a spinner? Standing in line at the grocery store you would be discussing with others the merits...
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Judith MacKenzie explains that being able to make yarns to fit a project is the basis of the spinner's toolbox. Judith demonstrates worsted spinning. Judith demonstrates semi-worsted spinning. What do you have in your toolbox? I have to admit that, as a spinner, I have a weakness for tools. How could...
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The magic of Judith Judith sharing the wonders of bison fiber. Spinning tussah silk. Judith hands on with an alpaca fleece. I remember the first time I met Judith MacKenzie. I was an intern at Schacht Spindle Company, in Boulder, Colorado, and was at a dinner at Maggie Casey's house. Judith was visiting...
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Spinning Across Spain I started my summer off with a trip to Sitges, Spain (just south of Barcelona), to visit my parents who are there for a year while my Dad works on a Fulbright research grant. Traveling with my husband and two daughters, Hannah (five years) and Sarah (eight months), I knew that it...
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What I love about spinning is the generosity of the process. Spinning is not like making TNT, where the steps and proportions have to be perfectly precise (or else), or like computer programming, where every step has to be in logical order. With spinning, you can improvise. You can problem-solve. You...
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I’ve rattled on for years about how hard it is to put spinning instruction in print. It’s such a dynamic, process-intensive craft—so hard to capture in one-shot increments. For all my carrying on, though, I think we’ve done a pretty good job. Thirty-two years of Spin-Off , and...
Posted to
Linda Ligon's Blog
by
Linda Ligon
on
Jun 3, 2009
Filed under:
Filed under: Worsted, Plying, How To Spin, Wool Processing, Spinning Wheels, Spindle Spinning, Drop Spindle, Spinning Wool, Merino Wool, Spin-Off Magazine, Types of Yarn, Spinning
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Last post, I was asking the world at large whether men of the Guatemalan highlands still spin wool on drop spindles, as they did when Olive and Harry Linder visited there in the late 1970s. Having spent several days chasing the answer, I have to say it’s a qualified “no.” Of course...
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Hello, and welcome to Spin-Off's new and improved home on the web! We've been working on this new site for quite a while, and we hope you like it! I'm feeling a lot of pressure while I sit here trying to write my first blog post - I'm not going to be witty or smart enough and no one will...