No, really, I only did this for school...

Yep…that's what I keep telling myself. ;-)

I have many interests/diversions {that's an understatement} that go with the "Jack-of-all-Crafts, Master-of-none" in the blog header. However, I actually DO try to resist picking up every craft or new technique to which I am exposed. Sometimes I am even successful!

As part of the Spring semester's weaving class, a very talented and experienced spinner from the Tucson Handweaver's and Spinner's guild came by to demonstrate spinning on her spinning wheel and to support our instructor's guiding us on spinning yarn on drop-spindles. My spinning efforts on a very well-loved drop-spindle from the classroom cupboards produced, uh….more effort than yarn. {grin} You could say I epitomized the "drop" part of drop spindling.
However, I did dutifully take home some mystery fiber to try and spin it on the drop-spindle I have at home, obtained after a spinning lesson {mumble} years ago.

Said drop-spindle still had on it some of the "art" yarn (i.e. thick-n-thin) I'd spun in that first spinning lesson with a bit of un-spun roving hanging from it.

People pay big bucks for "art yarn", don't they?
(Ok, maybe not this art yarn. {grin})

So (since the cats were asleep), I roughly spun the pink/red roving into more "art" yarn, attached the new mystery fiber (later identified as bamboo), and did a little spinning - as homework . I was somewhat relieved that my less-well-loved drop spindle spent much less time on the floor than the classroom spindle (and I didn't wake up the cats) but I was still achieving "art" yarn.

A few days later, I was attempting to explain spinning to a classmate who had missed the spinning demonstration due to illness and something quietly clicked. No, not a big "ta-da" click, just a quiet "makes more sense" click and when I went to try to show her how spinning on a drop spindle was done - I was actually able to spin something a little more even than "art" yarn. She thought I was a prodigy and I was rather surprised to be, well, spinning.

Isn't this what real spinners do?
Take a picture with a dime to show the width of the yarn?
{A nickel might make mine look more impressive.} 

It was kind of fun. And I found myself spinning just a little more of the bamboo and thinking about picking up a bit more from the classroom to spin. And then I went to my stash and tracked down this ball of orange-y roving that had been sent to me in a yarn order of many years ago….

...and then… I got distracted with the next adventure in our Weaving class (Solar dying) and I didn't get back to spinning.
But I keep thinking about it. And I really enjoyed the spinning I did this semester.

But I already have soooo much yarn. The idea of spinning to create more yarn to add to the scary stash causes a question-my-sanity moment.

Though...I could…just spin up the mystery roving to see what happens. If all else fails, I could add it to a fulled kitty bed project….

We shall see. Besides, I've never considered myself to be perfectly sane. {wry grin}
Isn't it: "You have to be loopy to knit (crochet), warped to weave, and twisted to spin."?