The holes drilled through the ballister to hold the spindle on my mini bike spinning wheel (still with me? Good, let’s move on) worked fine for a time, but the stress of the spinning maladjusted the holes and the spindle was binding instead of turning. Taking my engineer husband’s advice, I made an axel. I installed a tube for the spindle rather than just two holes. I had to open the existing holes a bit to fit the tube, and the only tube I could find locally that was small enough was square, but I was able to affix the tube and the spindle shaft fits well.

Because the axel has metal on metal, I needed some lubricant to ease the motion. I found my youngest’s old valve oil for her coronet. Works a treat. Another benefit of musicians in the house.

After wrapping my two-ply yarn onto a PVC niddy noddy, I rinsed the fibers and left it to dry. When it was dry, I used my yarn swift and cake winder to get the yarn ready for use. This 100% alpaca yarn will join the other yarn I’ve spun from Sugar Plum’s fleece in a knit lace shawl project.

The PVC niddy noddy is an easy DIY. The swift and ball winder are good investments for yarn enthusiasts, although your local specialty yarn store may have a set and be willing to help wind skeins into cakes.

Today’s theme is if something doesn’t work one way, try another. I started plying my alpaca singles with my upcycled spinning wheel.

The converted mini bike worked OK for the first two of three center pull balls, but the third was too much for the spindle supports (two holes through a ballister). So instead, I used the spindle as a supported spindle, used a serving spoon with the handle tucked under my leg as the spinning bowl, and was able to finish plying the third ball.

The spindle was too heavy to rest back on the upcycled wheel supports, so I looked around the house for something to hold the spindle while I transferred the yarn to a niddy noddy. I found that the wrought iron (or at least imitation wrought iron) legs of a side table were the perfect distance to hold the spindle shaft. So I flipped the table over and was able to wind on to the niddy noddy. The curves of the legs actually did a fantastic job of keeping the shaft from jumping all over.

Sometimes it is not what you can buy, but what you can repurpose.

I’ve been working through my carded alpaca rolags (although they have unrolled in the basket so are now more like small batts) both with the upcycled wheel and walking with the drop spindle. The charkha-like motion of the converted stationary mini bike means I have to wrap the newly spun yarn into a cone shape on the spindle. To ply, I like to have center-pull balls, so I have to rewrap the yarn.

I’ll let the balls sit for while, then get to plying. The thicknesses of yarn produced by the two different methods is close enough that I will combine it all together into one skein.