An Easy Target

I did it again… I got sucked into something I really had no intention of doing.  Saturday we went to the Natchitoches/NSU Folk Festival.  I wandered around, and then I saw it… something that had intrigued me before.

There in front of me was a lady using a drop spindle to make cotton threads, then weaving them into beautiful garments and home accessories on a loom.  She also had a spinning wheel, but I knew that was totally out of my means so I didn’t even glance at that.

I have lately been wondering about a drop spindle.  How do you use it?  Is it hard?  Can I do this?  I was bitten by the bug after she took about 20 minutes of her time and demoed the spindle for me.   Even though she did not have any spindles or fibers to sell she graciously spent time explaining the process to me.  It seemed she was speaking a foreign language as she named off the different tools needed, what the fiber was called in its different stages, so many new terms I was totally lost, but yet the fiber and her nimble use of the simple spinning tool really called my name… again and again.  I kept repeating, “I do not NEED another hobby or craft!”  My heart did not believe that and did not listen to me.

I dragged my Honey over to her booth to look at the spindles because I was about to ask him to make me one.  He looked carefully at the different styles and, “Yes”, he said, “I can to this”.  As I was about to leave she reached into a bag and pulled out a handful of green cotton seeds.  Yes, different varieties of cotton plants produce different colors of cotton fiber.  Who knew?  If all goes well, about a year from now I will have just a few green cotton plants producing a reasonable amount of green cotton.

Sucked in, I tell you.  I was totally sucked in!

When I got home I did some internet browsing.  That was such a dangerous thing to do in my weakened state after trying to fight this tug of my creative spirit all afternoon.  Oh, I was SOOOO sucked in, and SOOOO bad!  It turns out my favorite knitting site also had a lot of items for spinning at very reasonable prices. 

Wool roving,

 

a book,

a drop spindle,

and a niddy noddy

are heading my way from KnitPicks.  I will surely post pictures when my new things arrive.

No regrets!  I will absolutely love trying to spin my own yarn for making socks or other knitted items.   Perhaps I was born in the wrong century?  NAAAWWW!  I love my AC too much to dwell in pioneer times, but I sure do enjoy trying my hand at old craft skills.

I wonder what I will get sucked into next?  I have discovered my heart/creative spirit does not listen to my pleas of “no time for new things”, so I might as well stop fighting it and dance with my muse.  Cue the music!

KAT