What is a Bedouin Spindle?

Recently, on flickr, I posted this photo:


Now, there are a ton of fun spindles there. Top to bottom (or, back row to front row):

• Top (or mid, if you like) turkish spindle. Made by Ray's Spindles, bought from him on-line a few years ago. A fun little spindle.
  
• Niddy-noddy spindle. From The Woolery. Pretty cool, you wind-on like a niddy-noddy as you spin. Wa-la, skein when done! Not sure how much it holds, but it does actually work.
  
• Bedouin spindle. From Detta's Spindles, also made by Ray. All purpleheart, pretty cool.
  
• Flax spindle. Made for me by a local wood turner. I wouldn't recommend it; we tried several models, and never got one to spin satisfactorily. Which may be why the lady in the picture this was copied from looks so grumpy! (Hmmm, I always thought it was Italian, but it says Portuguese. C'est la vie...!)
  
• Balinese spindle. Bought at Estes Wool Market a few years back. Pretty, no? I've not spun on it, though I imagine it's a support spindle of some sort.

I was asked how well the Bedouin spindle spins.

It's a decent spindle, as spindles go. I love that it's all purpleheart :-) that's fun! I honestly don't think that I've ever filled it full with yarn, just tried it out and used it randomly on scraps here and there. It has a notch-and-groove arrangement, so you can half-hitch it near the top (if you find you need to) and then bring it up through the groove so the yarn comes down the middle of the shaft, for a reasonably well-balanced spin without a hook.

Give the whorl can be removed, it would be handy to have two of them, then you could fill up two and wind a two-strand ball from the two full whorls -- the shape of the whorl would probably keep your spindle-full from rolling away, that is, if you would around the whorl as if it were a Turkish, rather than below the whorl like a top whorl. The whorl piece, however, being one piece, would remain stuck in the center of the ball ~ you would have to unwind the yarn from it.

From a little bit of internet research, it appears that current Bedouin spindles are quite a bit larger ... see this picture in this post, and that they use their spindles as top whorls, filling below the whorl. There was also a man (a man! hooray!) spindling at a Bedouin market. His spindle appears to be a mid-whorl, and he's completely covered it with yarn!

There isn't any mention of the Bedouin spindles in Bette Hochberg's "Handspindles", though she has the whorl shape drawn in her diagram, "Basic Spindle Whorl Shapes". I also don't recall mention of it in any other books, so if you've seen one, let me know!

That about sums up my experiences with it -- happy spindling!

Ten things I learned on my summer vacation

10. From New Jersey's Liberty Park, all you can see of the Statue of Liberty is her backside. Her hair, by the way, is in a bun (we debated this during the plane trip from Seatac to Newark).

9. Eating a Van Dyke's ice cream cone every day (almost) is a sure way to gain 10 pounds on your summer vacation. That, and the Italian birthday party for Grandpa Zac. Who knew there'd be, like, four entree courses?? and two desserts???

8. Winding your two cakes of singles from your Turkish spindle into one 2-strand ball is the best way to manage the yarn for car plying.

7. Plying is by far the most satisfying way to spend a car trip (as passenger, not driver, ha ha).

6. Leaving yarn on a spindle is almost impossible for me. Bring on the portable niddy-noddy!

 

5. Knitting is a good way to relax my hands and arms from car spindling.

4. Stitch markers are important to remember - thank goodness I did!

3. A row counter would have been handy too, so I made an impromptu one (a pure MacGyver moment, I assure you!) ... using the tail of yarn at the start, I put one finger-crocheted chain in it for each row of the pattern (it had a 5 row repeat). One, two, three, four, on the fifth row I ripped out the chain and then started again on the next row, one, two, three four ... by the time the fingerless glove was done, the tail of yarn wasn't too over-fuzzy from all the chaining and ripping. I think this could be a new staple "tool" in my yarn basket!

2. For knitting in the round, magic loop ... if the round starts with a knit stitch, bring the yarn up so it won't get hung up in the loop; if the round starts with a purl stitch, bring the yarn down so it won't get hung up in the loop. Once I figured that out, the knitting was alot more fun!

1. If you want to finish a fingerless glove, be sure you have the first one with you -- otherwise you'll be waiting until you get home ... well, it's done now!


0. (bonus!) Good things come to those who wait ... my new Pocket Wheel was ready to be picked up by the time I returned (ordered in April ... I hear the wait is 6 months now).

Click on any picture for bigger or more flickr-d details :-)

What did you learn on your summer vacation? Bonus points for knitterly or spinnerly things learned!!

North Olympic Fiber Arts Festival, October 2008

It's that time again! we're all busy here organizing the upcoming North Olympic Fiber Arts Festival, with its theme of Natural Material / Material Nature. The festival is held in Sequim, WA, October 3, 4, and 5.

I've volunteered to organize the vendors, with terrific indoor three-day vending and fun outdoor one-day vending (Saturday). If you are nearby and sell fiber art supplies, tools, or finished items, please check out the paperwork and consider having a booth at the show!

We're also offering a full slate of classes again after having such a blast last year! Spinning, knitting, crochet, felting, weaving, kumihimo, card making, dyeing and lots, lots more! For details on the classes and registration information, please see details here.

More information about NOFAF's exhibit and all the activities occurring that weekend are available on its website, www.fiberartsfestival.org.

See you there!