Making Progress and Marls

I'm delighted to see that as the workshop progresses we are having more and more people joining in, commenting and posting pictures. Virtual workshops rely heavily on feedback and chat, so keep spinning and telling us about your progress. We really do love to hear about your successes and your challenges.

Todays lesson is Gimp. Please be patient with yourselves. It is not easy to achieve a quick success with this yarn. I would also suggest that you spin more than you normally would in your singles. I often feel that I'm just getting the hang of something and I have run out of singles. The first time I spun a gimp yarn, I had about 2 inches of gimp and about 5 yards of handspun that was definitely not gimp but attempts at gimp.


Karen you asked about holding the fibres for a marl yarn. Yes, more practise is always encouraged. When I spin a marl yarn I'm holding the colours side by side in my drafting hand. When I notice that one colour is flowing more than the other small tweaks or pressure with my thumb evens the flow of one colour over another. You are not holding two distinct fibre supplys in one hand, but you could in order to help control the flow of colour in your marl bring your middle finger up inbetween your two colours which might help in keeping your fibres more evenly distributed in your marl.

Looking forward to hearing more. Enjoy your spinning.