It is official, spinning is a lifetime “go”. My criteria for lifetime crafts is if I can craft in the car on long trips. I tested spinning and plying on a recent trip and I can spin in the truck! Hurray!

It took a little creative problem solving, and I have to wrap the yarn around the spindle more often, but I can spin and A: not get sick and B:be productive. Nälbinding and crochet are also good car crafts. Knitting not so much; I drop too many stitches when we go over bumps. Wire work makes a mess of tiny bits of wire. Similar problem with carving (not to mention using sharp knives in a moving vehicle is not recommended). Leather work also uses sharp implements. Drawing, reading, embroidery, sewing, and cross stitch make me ill in the car. Yay for spinning!

I probably went a little far wrapping the plied yarn around this spindle, but I was determined to get it all on. Me? Stubborn? Ha.

I was determined to get it on one spindle so it would be easier to use my wool winder. It was easier, and the cake made by the wool winder is easier to draw yarn from than a ball (for me that is).

I can’t help myself. I find bits I can use to make spindles, then suddenly I have made another spindle. Or two.

The whorls on these are made from either post oak or cedar elm (we have both on the property). I took a branch that has been sitting my log pile for about a year, cut slices, then sanded the slices into donut shapes. The shafts are store bought dowels, with one end sanded to a point and the other end has the diameter reduced slightly to hold the whorl. They aren’t perfect, but they function ok and are pretty. It does make me want to get my lathe up and running again so I can make perfectly round whorls.

Update on Tigger: After Tigger freaked out and injured herself during the coop clean out, she went into isolation for two days. We wrapped her foot, which made her limping worse, took off the wrap in the morning, and that evening she perched all night. I let her out in the morning and she seems right as rain.

Update on Navi: Although Navi is gaining weight, her crop is large and squishy again. So she went back into isolation with copper sulfate drinking water. One bird out, one bird in.

My Mom sent me a box of merino wool roving and her drop spindle (thank you Mom!) It was interesting to spin with a store bought spindle rather than my cobbled together bits.

I don’t like spinning directly from the roving, however. I was having trouble with fiber management and drafting. I know some wrap the roving around their forearm, and others use a variety of distaffs, but I still let too much twist into my fiber and often need to untwist a bit so I can thin out the draft. So I made some rolag type things. The videos I’ve seen on making rolags for spinning take fiber that has been carded. I don’t have large carders (yet), so I spread a section of roving out (like Halloween spiderwebs), and layered two colors together (to double the amount of finished yarn, honestly), then rolled it up perpendicular to the fibers. I think these rolags are easier to manage as I am still learning.