COOK- While most people who visit Cook’s Country Connection petting farm go to visit with the wide variety of farm animals who make their home there, others have a more practical, and creative, reason.
Many of the farm’s residents, like the sheep, alpaca, and goats, require an annual shearing, and their fleece coats are valued by fiber artists who spin the wools into yarn or use it to create other crafts.
That process was on display Saturday during a Barn to Yarn event, where local fiber artists spent part of the day demonstrating their crafts, many using fleece from one of the farms’ animals. Saturday was also worldwide “spin in public” day. Four women spent the day at the farm, demonstrating different ways to use fleece, and many first got interested in fiber arts after visiting or volunteering at the farm.
“I learned to spin right here on a drop spindle, two years ago,” said Nickolette Turman, of Virginia. A drop spindle is basically a dowel with a round piece and a hook on one end of the dowel. It is an ancient, yet simple tool, used to create yarns, and can be mastered easily, unlike spinning with a wheel, which takes a bit more practice.
Turman said she now has two spinning wheels at home, but both need some repairs. She was using a rather unique metal wheel that Pajari kept at the barn. And once she got started, she quickly was filling the spindle on the wheel with yarn from a fleece she had purchased from one of Pajari’s sheep.
“So far I haven’t done anything with my yarn,” she said. “I just enjoy spinning.”
Most spinners first get introduced to the craft with a drop spindle, but if one wants to be able to produce a greater quantity of yarn, the next step is to learn to master a spinning wheel. Experienced spinners make it look simple, gently pulling a bundle of cleaned fleece into the hole on one end of the wheel, and getting a consistent width of yarn. Beginning spinners quickly learn that besides being able to perfectly time the spinning of the wheel with the rhythm of one’s feet on the pedals, one also needs to perfectly feed the narrow width of fleece into the wheel. Pulling the fleece too quickly may cause it to break off, and too slowly will introduce bumps into the yarn. You need to have two hands working together, but also doing different tasks at the same time, one pulling, the other gently adjusting the tension and letting go, while also perfectly timing the motion of the pedals.
Shirley Johnson, of Cook, had brought two spinning wheels to show off.
“This one is a little Frankenstein-ish,” she said, pointing to a wooden box with an electric motor. She had built this electric spinner by herself, after seeing some examples online. The electric wheel allows one to spin without using your feet. But soon she was back spinning on a more traditional style of upright spinning wheel, that her husband had built for her. She said she has learned a lot of spinning tips and tricks from watching videos on YouTube.
Johnson said she likes to buy fleece from the farm. She enjoys designing knit and crochet items using the naturally -colored fleece, sometimes combining two or more colors together to get a tweed effect.
She grew up on a farm where her family raised beef cattle, and enjoys spending time at Cook Country Connections, which feels like home.
Nickole Dahl, of Chisholm, was spinning from a fleece she bought that had some color mixed in with a natural brown. Her five-month-old daughter Constance laid on the floor cushioned on a sheepskin rug. The baby was enchanted and amused by the spinning motion of the wheel. Dahl wore a sweater she had knit from her handspun woolen yarn. She also had brought a large square shawl, knit from alpaca fleece she had spun from some of Pajari’s flock, that had intricate lace patterns of flowers and dragonflies.
“I had my eye on that pattern for a long time,” she said. “But I didn’t realize it was knit on size two needles.” Size two needles are very slender, often used for lacework or socks, and the smaller the needles, the thinner and finer the finished piece will be. It also means the project will take longer to finish, because there can be two or three times as many stitches per inch.
Dahl has been spinning for about 14 years, she said, after her husband bought her a drop spindle and some fleece as a Mother’s Day gift. While she had learned to knit as a child, she really started getting interested in knitting once she had children, and she enjoys patterns with lacework or cables.
Marci Jenson, who is a longtime volunteer at the farm, was demonstrating needle felting, where wool is repeatedly poked with a barbed needle, which packs it into a dense three-dimensional fabric. She learned after Pajari gave her a needle-felting kit as a gift about five years ago, and she quickly became hooked on the craft. She sells custom gift items, as well as needle-felting designs onto felted sauna hats.