Except for one problem: six months without my spinning wheel?!?! This is really silly, I know, but I love my spinning wheel and our time together. Spindles don't quite approximate the same experience, for the same reason that rigid heddle weaving doesn't compare to weaving with a floor loom to me. There's something about the whole body coordination of it that makes it such an enjoyable experience for me. It makes me think I should probably take some dance classes.
The good news is that I've come up with what I think is a great solution. Enter the kick spindle. This one is made by Jim Echter at True Creations, and let me tell you, it's fun and truly delightful. It packs up to be quite flat and fits in a suitcase very easily. There's a (beloved) Vanilla Coke Zero can in the photo for scale.
(When I purchased the kick spindle, it came unfinished. That's my own work with tung oil-- thanks, Jenny Jo!-- and wood beams to bring out the lovely cherry color.)
It very quickly sets up to look like this:
How to spin on it? Well, it's similar to spinning on a charkha, supported spindle, or a great wheel in that you're spinning off the tip of the spindle, at roughly a 45 degree angle from the spindle, so that the twist goes into the fiber and leaves the yarn already packed onto the spindle intact. Since your foot is making the wheel spin--the part you "kick" is the shaft below the big flywheel-- you have both hands free to draft however you like. A leader is pretty much necessary to get things started.
I forgot to get a photo of the unspun fiber, but I had a little sample from someplace or another, and I spun up a third of it into a wee little cop on the spindle. I'm looking forward to seeing how much I can pack on there.
Here are the three plies of my sample yarn, wound onto mini tennis balls (meant for mini dogs, but great for holding singles waiting to be plied).
I could have plied on the kick spindle, just by kicking in the opposite direction, but I called on one of my drop spindles for the task.
A little sample skein is born! This is a three ply, and I didn't measure the wraps per inch, but by eyeballing it, it looks like a heavy fingering weight to me.
No doubt you'll see more products from this very cool new toy in the next six months. Is there anyone else who, like me, enjoys involving both hands and feet in the creative process? Am I just a dancer in denial? I've always been wary of sheep shearing, but maybe I should give it a try, since that's clearly a whole body experience...
yes dance, YES. agree. anytime you wanna pop into a dance class, bellydance or otherwise, just lmk. let's try to make a hoopjam in Bryant Park next week!
ReplyDeleteI was looking at your beautiful kick spindle and was contemplating purchasing one since neither of my wheels is portable. Was it hard to learn to use? Any advice or suggestions?
ReplyDeleteHi Julee! This spindle was not hard at all for me to learn, but mostly because I've spun on a fairly wide variety of spindles and wheels. The drafting process is basically identical to what you're used to with a wheel, since you still can use both hands. The spinning off a point part is something I've done with both support spindles and charkhas, if you've ever tried either of those.
DeleteI've had a few friends try spinning on it, and honestly it's been pretty easy for everyone to pick up if they already knew how to spin on a wheel. I'd recommend watching the youtube videos that are out there for this spindle, and maybe some other videos of people spinning on charkhas, great wheels, and support spindles to see some different techniques.
Enjoy your search for portable spinning!
Hi, the spindle and spinning look great. Can you tell me if this is much faster than drop spindling for producing quantity. I have no room for a wheel as it must be put away. I only used a wheel once and it was not really productive in anything but laughs and very, very " artistic yarn "
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