Over a year ago I bought an interchangeable spindle from KCL Woods, which has multiple shafts that screw into the top whorl of the spindle. And I have spun lovely yarn with this spindle:
But I didn’t have a Lazy kate to go with these spindles. A Lazy Kate is a spinning tool that allows one to place the spun singles each onto a place from where you can combine, or “ply” the individual yarns together. If one owns a spinning wheel, you usually buy a Lazy Kate to put the bobbins onto.
I tried this little combo with a clear Lucite container:
It didn’t work very well – the yarn kept getting caught in edges and on the spindle. The Shoe box version worked about the same. The best luck I had was with letting the shafts wander over the floor, but then the singles would get caught in each other. Plying sucked.
Well, KCL Woods has a Lazy Kate for its spindles, and I finally bought one:
and I spun a couple of sample yarns that my lovely friend Judy (who is in the middle of buying a manufactured home and blogs about it at Wine, Spinning and Song) gave me. One single was pure wool, the other a lovely wool-silk blend (the shiny one on the bottom):
I put the spindles into the Lazy Kate and made some very lovely yarn!
Using this tool with the interchangeable spindle is now pretty efficient – it saves any rewinding of the cop onto another device, and I can now ply straight from the shaft of the spun singles. It also make me want to figure out how to transfer the cops from my other spindles onto a set of sticks that can go into the Lazy Kate too. I will spin more if I can make it more efficient, and spindle spinning is very portable!
The yarn I spun is very delicious in color and feel – I’m hoping to find a tad more yarn to combine with it for a lovely cowl as a gift.
3 replies on “Spindle Spinning the Lazy Way”
I’m not a spinner, so I don’t understand all the specific challenges you were facing here, but you sure ended up with some really beautiful yarn!
Thanks. It turned out well, for a test spin!
Sounds like you would highly recommend the Lazy Kate from KCL.