Peeve the First
I’ve noticed that there are a lot of people, whith more experience with a drop-spindle than I have by far, who identify themselves as “spindlers”. I infer that this is to provide a separate designation for those who handspin on an drop-spindle from those who spin their yarn on a spinning wheel.
This term really bugs me, though. I mean, how many thousands of years have people been spinning fibre with spindles? And how many hundreds of years have they been spinning with wheels? I’m pretty sure that the answer to both is “3-4”. Shouldn’t the drop-spindle spinners get “dibs” on the name “spinner”, as they had held for so many, many generations? I know it’d be ridiculous to call the others “wheelers”, so why is “spindlers” alright?
Arrgh. I just want to spin. Am I not a spinner? Or maybe that makes me a spinster? (No, wait, I’m married, so that can’t be right either…)
Peeve the Second
Why are there no resources for the drop spindle spinner beyond the most basic of basics?
I borrowed Lee Raven’s Spin It: Making Yarn From Scratch from my local library, and I’m certainly glad I didn’t but it. Though I haven’t read it fully yet, from a flip-through it appears to contain nothing that I haven’t already found on the internet (making a CD spindle; the basics of spinning; a few really easy knitting & weaving patterns for homespun).
I don’t know if the few other books are maybe better (P. G-R.; the Interweave “Spindle Tresury”; etc.); I’m certainly hoping they are! I can “get” the basics. (I bet pretty much anyone could figure out how to start, given a bit of roving and a spindle.) What I’d like is resource to help take me from beginner to intermediate. Why is this such an extreme request? I know that the wheel-spinnners get tons of books and such on various hand positions, how to prep the fibre, add/detract twist, etc. Surely, even if spindle-spinning is a more personal and intuitive endeavour, there must be more information that could be passed on?
Aemmeleia's Ephemera 