Bluegrass Yarn And Fiber Crawl - Random Tip #1

Today starts the 2026 Bluegrass Yarn and Fiber Crawl.  Of the ten days of the tour, our farm stop is scheduled to be open on both Saturdays from 11:00 to 4:00 and also Wednesday afternoon/evening from 4:00 - 8:00.  I am happy to schedule other times as well, but please email first as this is a working farm, so who knows what's going on each day.

My focus for this year's crawl is education.  There are shopping opportunities here for sure, but I enjoy teaching and encouraging more than selling, so if Auntie Reg (the boss) isn't here, let's go out to the barn or sit on the Wool House porch and have a good time talking sheep and wool and fiber arts and teach each other some fun new things.

I know most readers of this blog are not local or not in a position to travel out here so I thought it might be fun to post some random tips each day that anyone might find helpful...or at least interesting even if you aren't a fiber or sheep person.  The tips will mostly be geared towards folks just starting out, but you never know everything :-).

Today's random tip is about angle of twist.  If you are having trouble with either over spinning or under spinning your yarn, use a color of wool that isn't a solid color.  Let's zoom in.

This is Kaala and her gray is a mix of light and dark and those dark strands show up as you spin, making it easy to see what you are doing.  As you add more and more twist, the angle (shown here in the dark diagonal line) changes.  

In general a 45 degree angle is a good starting point, but you may want to spin looser or tighter depending on what you want your finished yarn to do.  You might want to add in more twist for a stronger yarn for a pair of socks or less twist for a softer feeling yarn for a scarf.  

Bonus tip today!  Don't set your roving down on top of a dried up marigold flower.  Free seeds included with each purchase ;-D.

Wednesdays Are For Painting

I painted this several "Wednesdays" ago, but forgot to share it.  And when I was taking a picture of it I forgot to take one that showed exactly what it is.  It's a drop spindle.

This picture really doesn't show them that well either...and looking at it now I see that I'd forgotten to completely tighten down the hooks after they dried.  This picture was from the November Kentucky Shepherd's Market.  I am nailing this marketing thing!

I just love these colorful spindles.  I especially love to spin with them.  As the spindles twirl they look like kaleidoscopes.  The spindles on the bottom picture are just generic sheep.  The spindle in the first picture is a custom order with Pinto, Short Round, Tabitha and Maggie.  

It's hard to beat spinning with your friends...and actually spinning your friends.  The roving the spindle is nestled down into is some of Tabitha's.  I'm glad it has good home :-).