I am a member of the Kent Guild of Spinners, Dyers and Weavers. Now I also run a small business, Shearer Girl Yarns, selling my hand
dyed yarns and fibre from local farms. I love working with natural fibres and
natural dyes. People often ask if I have my own sheep or live on a farm, sadly
neither is true – maybe one day. I can also be found writing for Yarnmaker magazine and I’m on Twitter @Romneyteg.
I’m looking forward to taking part in Spinspiration and
hearing about your fibre adventures!
Here is my spinning story.
Beginning Spinning – Lydia’s Story
I started spinning four years ago. I am horse mad and I have
always had an interest in farming so I was volunteering at the Working Horse
Trust, a charity which promotes traditional heavy horse breeds.
As part of the grassland management system, the trust has a
small flock of Southdown sheep. I helped out a bit at lambing time and enjoyed
a few Southdown sausages but didn’t have a lot of contact with the sheep. When
I saw the flock’s fleeces abandoned to rot in a barn, I was horrified. I
thought maybe I could learn to spin and do something with all this wool. I also
thought I could save the charity some money by learning to shear.
So I came to shearing and spinning at the same time. I went
on a shearing course, then a few weeks later I was at the Kent County Show and
wandered into the tent of the Kent Guild of Spinners, Dyers and Weavers. I was
fascinated to watch the ladies spinning and see all the colourful things they
had made. I kept going back to their tent. Eventually, one of the spinners
asked if I would like to have a go. I did and was hooked. Janet said afterwards
she knew I must have been keen because I kept coming back!
I was helping out on shearing jobs that summer. One of the
shearing customers had an Ashford Traditional wheel, still in pieces in its
box, tucked away. I bought the brand new wheel for a good price, along with
carders, a niddy noddy, lazy kate and a video. I lovingly waxed my wheel and
put it together but it would not spin. I was in despair. I took my wheel to a
Guild meeting and explained my dilemma. A huddle of ladies appeared around me
making all sorts of suggestions and within minutes they had my wheel set up and
spinning.
I got a Portland fleece from a shearing job and washed it
without sorting it because I didn’t know anything about sorting fleece. I dyed
some of the fleece with Dylon dyes and felted a fair portion by accident. I
carded the wool by hand and spun lumpy yarn. Eventually I spun enough to make a
jumper. A bullet proof jumper - the yarn
was so dense and over spun.
 |
| My first handspun |
 |
| My never quite finished bullet proof jumper |
In the meantime, I decided fleece washing was a tedious
business and so I flung my second fleece, a Black Welsh Mountain, in the
washing machine. Again, I hadn’t sorted the fleece, nor had I noticed the
hardened clumps of poo attached to the bottom end. The poo softened in the wash
and distributed itself throughout the fleece. Being forgiving Welsh Mountain,
the fleece didn’t felt and I did manage to spin some.
Since then, I’ve learned by trial and error, reading books
and by watching fellow Guild members. These days I also learn a great deal
through online resources, such as Spinspiration!
