Louet’s new unbelievably tiny portable powerhouse is also finally a flyer lead scotch tension wheel, robust enough to fit almost every need! Read the details in my real-world test report.

This year, I hadn’t planned on any knit, crochet, or woven Christmas stuff. And usually when I do make such plans, they’re for crochet items, which are significantly faster. But then, as it happened, I had a yarn that I wanted to swatch for photos, and so sometime in late October I decided I’d combine […]

The Basics of Spinning Wheel Drive Ratios Spinning wheels are pulley systems. Changing ratios is basically the same principle as changing gears on a bicycle, except instead of sprockets and chains, you’ve got pulleys and drive bands. Simply put, a ratio of 5:1 means that the drive wheel’s circumference is 5 times that of the […]

Leslie’s sweater yarn is now complete, and shipped off to her! I’m left with three partly-full bobbins of single-ply yarn, which I’ll finish up and keep for myself, and two batts that I expect I’ll spin very fine, again, for myself. By completion, about 45 hours total were spent on the yarn, from dyeing and […]

A few weeks back, I embarked on an exciting custom spinning project for a longtime friend, who wrote me to say she was ready to start knitting the sweater of her dreams, and did I have the right yarn for it by any chance? I wrote her back immediately telling her I insisted she let […]