Bored and lonely and what comes of it

The weather has kept everyone indoors if they have cool, very brief encounters with neighbors, haven't seen friends for so long anyway except on Zoom. Living alone and petless, it weighs on a person. 

No pets because I can't afford the medical bills. If I could find a cat with a trust fund I'd take them in a hot minute. 

Meanwhile what comes of boredom, especially when it's too hot, even early, to walk, is a stirring of new ideas.

Last night I thought maybe I'd consider supported spinning. This is a spindle spinning form where the tip rests in a bowl and it's different from drop spindling.

The idea came from this lady, a pioneer in handspinning cotton, hemp and those more "difficult" fibers. 

She then weaves her clothes from the fiber she's spun, some from plants she's grown. She also loves dyeing. A kindred spirit to many of us.

Ages ago I was given a bunch of cotton roving, organic, undyed, by an experienced spinner who had tried and failed to get anywhere with it, having been given it in her turn by another good spinner with similar dismal results. 

And this week, on the HGA presentation of Textiles and Tea, Joan explained it in about two minutes! 

The ratio on a wheel used for wool and other animal fibers, is no good for the very short staple of cotton. I know not of wheels and ratios, but next the question came up of drop spindling cotton. She explained it's impossible. 

Staple length (fiber length) way too short, an inch or two, compared to the several inches of animal fiber. So the fiber can't support the weight of even a light drop spindle. She said you have to use a supported spindle. Ah.

You can catch the recording if you Google HGA  and go from there. Not a lot to see, but much wisdom and generosity to share. She loves to teach and has a full schedule still, in her 80s.

So last night I was thinking about supported spindles and one thing led to another. I tried a few experiments with what I've got.

This is one of my spindles in top whorl position, my usual.

Then here it is on bottom whorl position, see the little channel at the top to keep the fiber from skidding off.

Trying the movements for supported spindling

And here's the modular one

Comes apart like this

So I tried it.

And it worked. I got twist, wobbly but working. There's nothing to stop the fiber skidding off, which is also true of real supported spindles, and which I found unnerving. 

But it still worked once I got the moving parts and angles organized. My finger is only to hold it for the pic, not part of the technique.

So here's the battlefield I mean experiment area.

The marble eggcup is a nice bowl for the tip of the spindle. I wondered if I could just try the principle by using my lightest spindle low whorl style.

I could not get any twist at all, just unspun roving coming off. So after a few goes, concluded that I couldn't achieve a fast enough spin with this idea. You're supposed to be spinning on a tip, not a screw. But I learned a bit about holding the spindle anyway 

On to the next step. I remembered my modular spindle, where the whorl slides on and off the shaft. Tried that, and found that I got a much better spin, even achieved twist, yay.

But it's still only improv and I need to do better. I priced some beautiful supported spindles, which are not exactly my range, and I still wanted to build rather than buy.

Lady doing bottom whorl drop spindling. It has some things in common with supported spindling. Both have the whorl low down. Otherwise a bit different.

Then on YouTube of course, I studied several terrific spinners including my favorite Spinning Sarah, who said she was working with a spindle stick and whorl.

Soooooo, I have the whorl, so I went and ordered two spindle sticks on Etsy, direct from the maker, and with any luck I'll be able to get more serious about this when they arrive. And the total for two sticks, the shafts for my future spindles, is less than a single supported spindle. Some of them are artworks in themselves, but right now I would like effectiveness. There's an elegance to that itself.

Quite a busy time after all. 

But not exactly meditative. This video is lovely, but it's more aspirational than realistic for a beginner. 

It's like people saying knitting is so relaxing, you should take it up. While glossing over the high anxiety of the learner, trying to keep the same number of stitches, and omg a big hole..

Anyway, enough reading about what I'm doing.  Time for you to bustle around and help me identify this plant which I got years ago from a neighbor. 

I don't like the color, but the goldfinches, our state bird, love the seeds. So I keep it as a kind of civic duty. Anyway, what is it? Your wisdom, as always, appreciated.

Off to have tea and a lemon bar now.