Sunday, June 08, 2008

8 June: Busy and quiet

Yesterday I put on my Guild of SWD hat and demonstrated spinning at a local event. After a damp start, the day turned out fine and warm, and hundreds of people attended the event. As there was a maximum of 4 of us, and only 3 for most of the time, there wasn't an opportunity to go and see what else was going on. Not even the Morris dancing, by the side that DH used to belong to.

There is nothing quite like demonstrating a minority activity in public for making you feel you are an expert, even though you are far from it. It was slightly surprising to be asked what we were doing by one puzzled person, but mostly parents were pointing us out to small children - Sleeping Beauty got a lot of mentions!

Curiously, most of the public is totally ignorant about spinning wool, but knows about spinning dog hair!

One of my colleagues made a point of weaving with red and white, to the amusement of some of the Dads, and several people reminisced about spinning and knitting in their childhoods. One man spoke about holding skeins of wool for his mother to wind.

And there were some delightful surprises when teenage boys at that difficult spotty age got fascinated by the mechanics of the spinning wheels, and were able to have interesting conversations. Then there was the poor lad who wistfully said "lovely colours".

During the day I managed to spin 2 bobbins of singles, which I plied together and finished when I got home; here is the skein, with the one I prepared earlier wound into a ball -


Then this morning, early, we went and walked in Hamsterley Forest before the Sunday morning rush. We hadn't noticed this gnarled old tree by the river before -

5 comments:

Maggie May said...

That was exciting doing your spinning for the public. What a lovely photo. I love the strong reflection of light on the water.

Granny J said...

That looks like a lovely quiet place to walk.

stitchwort said...

Thank you.
granny j - parts of the forest are far from quiet when the mountain bikers get there, and then there's the horse riders, picnickers, campers, barbecue enthusiasts, etc.

tea and cake said...

ha ha, know what you mean about the 'quiet' countryside - we live near to a ski-ing place.
Lovely for you to be an 'expert' for the people - well done! K xx

Lucy said...

How lovely about the spotty teenage lads getting interested int he mechanics of spinning and the colours! ( Shame they're not so lovely when they're riding mountain bikes round the woods...)