Transcript for
Episode 121:
Three Things I Wish I Had Known When I Started Spinning
There are many things I wish I had known when I started spinning. In this episode, I'm going to tell you about my top three.
Hello, dear Sheepspotter! Welcome back! I'm so glad you're here. Welcome to episode 121 of The Sheepspot Podcast. I'm Sasha, and my job is to help you make more yarns you love.
So I'm getting ready to invite a new cohort of new and self-taught spinners into Spin School next month, and I've been thinking about why learning to spin was hard for me and what I wish I had known at the time--what I think would have made the process easier. So today I want to talk about a few of them. Let's dive right in.
Spinning is big. It contains multitudes.
The first thing that I wish I had had when I started to spin was a map of the territory, by which I mean a 30,000 foot view of everything that's entailed in becoming a good spinner. I really find learning a new thing easier when I start out with some kind of conceptual map that I can slot information into as I learn it. And with spinning I really did not have it. I remember feeling like every time I turned around there was a new vast bucket of knowledge to try to take in. My spinning teacher tried to cram everything from washing fleece to drumcarding into the few lessons I took with her, and honestly, at that point I just needed to learn how to get comfortable with drafting, and in some ways I probably would have been better off focusing on just that. On the other hand, though, I often say that it was the experience of washing raw fleece for the first time that really turned me into a spinner. I just loved everything about it, and that experience made me persist through my many attempts to try to get my drafting under control.
So I needed two things at that time that are a bit contradictory: on the one hand I needed to know what to focus on first, and to take the time to do that. But I also needed to get a sense of all the parts of spinning, so I could know that there was more to spinning than just the drafting I was struggling with.
I call "all the parts of spinning" the Pillars of Skillful Spinning™, and it's one of the first things I teach to new spinners, to give them that crucial conceptual rubric. Basically, the pillars are the big subtopics within spinning. If I'd had access to them then I would have understood that drafting is one bucket and fiber prep (washing fleece and drumcarding) is another bucket. And I could have actually decided to focus on one or the other. Which leads me to the next thing I wish I'd known at the beginning.
Take it treadle by treadle.
I wish I had known how to break the spinning process into a series of steps that I could work on one at a time, and I wish I had known what to focus on when. In Spin School, I teach the pillars in a very specific order, so that each module builds on the one before it. And within each module, I do my utmost to break things down into the smallest possible components to allow my students to focus on one thing at a time. We're all absorbing far more information every day than our brains were made to handle, and I think a lot of us are teetering on the edge of being completely overwhelmed cognitively most of the time--I know I am. So giving students a framework in which they can take on a single, manageable task, work on it, and take the time to really "get it" is crucial to help them keep going through the hard parts. I was trying to learn how to understand my wheel, draft, and ply all at the same time. No wonder I was overwhelmed!
Understanding your wheel is job 1
Finally, I really wish that I had known how important it is to understand how your wheel works. I am probably the least mechanical person you'll ever meet, so I avoided even trying to understand my wheel for literally years. So I didn't know how to help my wheel help me to spin more easily and create the yarns I wanted to make. If I had known this, I think I would have struggled a lot less with drafting.
This is why I teach wheel mechanics in Module 1 of Spin School. It's the foundation that undergirds everything else. And in case you aren't particularly mechanically-minded and you've also avoided learning how your wheel really works, I'm going to give you an overview of how I teach that module now, so you can see how to break down this topic yourself.
First, learn the names of the parts of the wheel. This is crucial so that you can understand what spinners are talking about when they are talking about wheels, and so that, if something is wrong with your wheel you can describe it accurately to others.
Once you've mastered the parts of your wheel, the next step is understanding drive systems, or, in other words, how the parts of your wheel relate to each other and what moves what. There are three drive systems, bobbin-led (Irish tension), flyer-led (Scotch tension) and double-drive, and each has its pros and cons. It's important to know which drive system your wheel has and its strengths and weaknesses.
When you've spent time with your wheel and feel that you understand the drive system you have and how it works, the next step is understanding take-up tension: what it is, how it works, and how to adjust it so that the yarn is taking up onto the bobbin but not yanking the yarn out of your hands. This can make a huge difference in your spinning experience and in the yarns you make!
When you've mastered take-up tension, if you have a treadle wheel, go on to learn about drive ratios, which control the amount of twist that goes into your yarn with each treadle. Learn what the actual numbers mean (hint: for a 15:1 ratio, your flyer or bobbin turns 15 times every time your drive wheel turns once), and which ratios you have available to you on your wheel.
If you tackle learning about your wheel in this order, I think you'll see that understanding each step provides a foundation for understanding the next one. You need to know the parts of the wheel to understand the explanation of drive systems. You need to understand drive systems to understand take up tension and drive ratios. And understanding those will make what I teach in the next module, drafting, much easier, because you and your wheel will be besties and you'll know exactly how to help it help you.
So, the three things that I wish I had known when I started spinning:
I wish I'd had a conceptual map of the territory that is spinning knowledge. This would have helped me organize the information I was learning and helped me to take one thing at a time
I wish I'd taken one thing at a time
I wish I'd taken the time to really understand how my wheel works, because knowing that makes everything else a thousand times easier.
If you a new or self-taught spinner, and you'd like to master spinning fundamentals in a step-by-step way, I created Spin School especially for you, and you can find all the details and get a notification when we enroll the next cohort at sheepspot.com/spin-school, so be sure to check that out.
Also, there's a dedicated discussion thread in The Flock where you can comment on this episode and discuss it with me and other listeners. The link to this thread is in the show notes for this episode, which you'll find right inside your podcast app. So just open up the description for this episode, click the link, and you'll be taken right to the thread.
If you haven't joined The Flock, Sheepspot's free online community for inquisitive handspinners, you should! You'll get access to all of the freebies I've created for the podcast, as well as several self-guided spinning challenges, our weekly spinning check-ins every Friday, and lots more. Join us at theflock.sheepspot.com.
Darling Sheepspotter, that's it for me this week. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back next week with a discussion of the most cost effective way to get started spinning. You don't want to miss it. Until then, spin something! I promise it will do you good.