UPDATED 17 July 2017! I originally wrote this in 2008, but have updated it annually ever since. At this time of year, we seem to always have a huge crop of new spinners and would-be spinners looking for information about getting started. So I thought I’d take a morning and pull together an overall post […]

Updated as of 11 February 2015, to reflect the latest wheels on the market and latest pricing. Choosing your first spinning wheel is somewhat like choosing your first car. There’s a level on which it doesn’t really matter exactly what it is, because it’s going to do the trick to get you started, and odds […]

A common stumper for many spinners working on producing yarn to a specific thickness involves the question of plying structures. How many plies do you want? How do you know how thick or thin to spin your singles if you know how many plies you want to use? When you get right down to it, […]

Honestly, there are plenty of times — many of them in December — when I find myself thinking I clearly did better living closer to the equator. It’s partly the shorter daylight hours and the sad, oblique nature of what sunlight you seem to get. When you couple that with a frantic rush to finish […]

There are those teachers out there who are vastly more experienced and graceful than I am, and were able to blog from SOAR. I think Sara’s secret is that she does not sleep, and that this in fact is part of what gives her the opportunity to make all the rest of us look like […]

I just sent this out to the folks confirmed for my workshop at SOAR. A week from today, there we’ll be… and I figured I’d pass it along because some of the advice in it is probably decent advice for anybody that’s traveling to a class. Hi folks, The Spin-Off Autumn Retreat is right around […]

Whew. Well, for the moment at any rate, I’ve rejoined this newfangled modern world thingy. Here’s a little info about where I’ve been. Actually, I’ve been right here. You just couldn’t tell, and apparently, it isn’t newsworthy outside of the immediately affected area, either. But this is some of what’s been going down: Power just […]

I’m just busier than I can even begin to say. Seriously. For now, I leave you with this:

Omigod, it’s August. How did that happen? Once again, summer drawing towards a close finds me further and further behind on things I thought I’d do. Like, this year, blogging hardly at all, ev en with the whole early-rising thing going on. At least there have been some remarkable early mornings. So, here, have some […]

I was heartbroken last night to learn that Ruth Schooley had passed away suddenly on Tuesday. I never met Ruth in person, but for at least 15 years she was everpresent in my online fiber world — a world in which she leaves a huge void. Generous to a fault, positive, kind, driven… we will […]