Spinning Blind!

I don't think anyone who knows me doubts my love for my spinning wheel..and spinning. I also love watching movies, or watching life go by from my patio, or watching Cosmos on the Science Channel.

I spin for a living now and am very, very picky about my end results. In the beginning this usually meant watching my drafting and twist with an unwavering eye. A good knitting or crocheting yarn is about consistency, consistency, consistency. Not that I dislike spinning funky novelty yarn..but in my opinion it is about learning the rules and perfecting them before cutting loose and breaking them.

Spinning is also a meditation for me. If I am not watching a movie or some geeky science show, I am often sitting at my wheel with my eyes closed, chanting in my head with the rhythym of my feet and hands providing the beat for repetitions.

Wait..did I just say spinning with my eyes closed?!

You bet! I have found this technique great for creating yarn by feel, that is amazingly consistent..often more consistent than watching my drafting with eyes open.

I read an article a few years ago about a group of blind women who used to spin yarn. The yarn they produced was coveted for its incredible consistency and softness. It made a lot of sense to me, our eyes decieve us far more than any other sense. Rather than removing my eyes, I decided to use a bandanna as a blindfold to explore the world of tactile spinning.

Learning how to spin by touch gives you an incredible feel for the fiber and yarn. Your hands will sensitize to things like crimp, contaminants in the fiber, and twist.

I encourage you to give this method a try..it can be frustrating at first, but eventually you will learn to trust your hands as well as your eyes to produce beautiful yarns.

You will need a blindfold, your wheel , and fibers prepared by different methods (rolags, raw, top, roving etc).

Get your equipment set up. Put your blindfold on. Go back to spinning 101 and spend a few minutes treadling your wheel with an empty bobbin. Focus on listening to the sounds your wheel makes. Eventually you will be able to hear when it needs oil, or something isn't right.

How does your foot feel on the treadle? Do you push more with one part of your foot than the other? Or is it even across the treadle? What sound does your wheel make on the down treadle? On the up? These exercises are just to get you used to opening up the other senses to your spinning.

Lift up your blindfold and grab some of your fibers. Re-cover your eyes and actually feel the fiber. What is the weight like? Is it smooth? Crimpy? Can you tell if it is top or roving? If it is a rolag is it light and airy or is it more compact? Amazing what you can learn with your eyes closed.

Now for the fun part. With your blind fold on, attach your fiber to your leader. Try spinning with your usual drafting method for a few minutes. You will probably feel a bit of anxiety..you just lost control of the normal faculty to see if you are doing it "right". Concentrate on your usual drafting method now. How much feel do you have for the yarn being formed by your fingers? Most spinners have about 2 fingers on the drafting hand, and 2 fingers on the twist hand. How does that limit your ability to feel the yarn?

Let's try something else. My wonderful hubby took some pictures of the hand holds I use for "blind spinning". In this photo, my left hand is holding the fiber. My forefinger and thumb control the amount of fiber coming from my drafting hand. The fiber is held *lightly* under the remaining 3 fingers. (Nothing worse than spinning matted fiber from sweating hands). When you are spinning blind, this hand will allow you to feel what is coming through before the twist goes in.

The right hand is controlling the twist coming in to the fiber (this works for any draw style you prefer. I started with a short forward draw while learning this). Most spinners use the forfinger and thumb to control the twist. We are just going to add the remaining 3 fingers so the twisted yarn passes through them, giving you a feel for the twist and diameter of the yarn you are spinning. Here is another photo showing the forward hand palm up, and the yarn passing over the last 3 fingers. You can also spin palm up, it is just a matter of preference. If you spin palm up, the untwisted fibers are felt by the 3 fingers on the hand, and the final twist and diameter is felt by the thumb and fore finger.

Alrighty..start spinning. Focus on the feel of the fiber as it flows through your fingers.

Don't worry about what the yarn is going to look like, just concentrate on how it feels.

Once you are comfortable doing this, start feeling your treadling in comparison to how your hands are moving. Is there a rhythym to your drafting and treadling? Good! You won't believe how this will improve your consistency.

Eventually you are going to run out of fiber, which brings us to (drum roll) the BLIND JOIN! Yep. You are not allowed to take the blindfold off to join the new fiber on. Use those sensitive fingers to feel when the fibers are aligned and ready for twist. After you are done swearing and get the hang of it, you might just notice that your joins are now smoother as well.

Try all of your different fibers and drafting techniques. I notice that my long draw/woolen spinning is the most interesting. I can feel how much fiber was coming through with the draw back, even though the fiber was no longer between my fingers. I could also feel when just the right amount of twist was in it, and have since learned how to draft out the slubby thick spots all by feel.

Is it nerdy to say these techniques liberated my spinning? Probably a little. But it has greatly improved my spinning as well. My last project, Sangre De Cristo was spun almost entirely "blind". It is one of the softest, and most conistent yarns I have spun to date. (This is not subjective, each skein was measured on the Mcmorran balance and all were a more consistent grist than anything I have spun before.)

Now you can spin while meditating..enjoying a movie without missing an action scene, or have a conversation with your spinning buddies at the next spin-in.

Groovy!
The yarns in these photos are available for sale at www.rumplestiltskeins.artfire.com