Day of crafts

We didn't need to go anywhere today, so I took advantage of it and did some crafts.

J. helped me hang this thread holder that I found for a crazy small amount on a garage sale list. Each of those slots has at least two, if not more, spools of thread it in.

This makes me happy because it gets it off the floor where cats and children like to play with the spools of thread. I've already had to go through once and reroll all the thread back on the spools. It wasn't that much fun, so am glad I won't have to do it again.

I spend some time working on my quilt. I trimmed up these quilt squares so they were all the correct size,

and made some of them into pinwheel squares. 

J. helped me repair the new (to me) spinning wheel I brought home a while back, so with this bit replaces, it can now be treadled.

And I had time to do some research and learned that it is a Scotch tension, bobbin led wheel. I was hoping that it was when I bought it. My current wheel has a different tension system which isn't quite as flexible as a Scotch tension. I'm excited to try it out.

In the process of learning about it, I also learned that the braking system on the bobbin is missing a small spring to make it work, plus it needs a drive band so that everything turns. This means I really should take it to my local (and by local, it's an hour away) spinning store. They should be able to help me repair these two small things so I can start using it. Considering new Scotch tension wheels start at $750, I think I can replace the brake and drive band. As I looked more carefully at it, it really is a beautiful wheel.

Inspired by my work on the wheel, I also decided to get out the drum carder I got at the same time. I drum carder takes raw wool and gets it ready to spin. It does the same thing that hand carders do, only faster and easier.

Here is a glimpse of the carder. It is a beast. Heavy, heavy, heavy, but works really, really well for something that is manual.

There is a handle which attaches to that large drum. When you turn it, it has that large chain which causes both the large and small drums to turn. You feed the wool down the chute to the first drum, and it is then carded and ends up of the second, larger drum. When you unroll the wool off the larger drum, this is what you end up with.

I know this doesn't look like much, but this is unspun wool which is ready to go. The drum carded did in just a minute or two what would have taken me 10-20 minutes to do with hand cards. I can't wait to use it more... I just need a fleece.

After all this playing with spinning wheels and wool, I decided I needed to do some real spinning, so got out a project that I had put on hold for a while. Here is some of the roving I've been working on spinning.

And here is what it looks like as yarn.

As well as all this, I played Settlers of Catan with J., Y., and K., and TM took the younger six to a local forest preserve for an hour long hike. Not a bad way to begin our fall break, I'd say.