School children and spinning flax

A few months ago I responded to an online post that was looking for someone who could spin flax into linen for a London school visit, I thought for a moment and decided I’d follow it up. I had done some flax work a few years ago,, mainly to make bookbinding thread, but rather left it behind when wool work took over much of my time. I’m generally happy demonstrating in front of people and  I figured that I wouldn’t get picked as there was bound to be many others  more experienced than I. Much to  my surprise and delight I received a very  positive email, as several exchanges we met up to discuss the details. It was to visit 8 different primary schools in East London , talking and demonstrating about flax and  showing how to spin, it might have been because I use drop spindles that I was picked! The project is one which has been running for a few years enabling school children to grow  vegetables in the school garden, which they tend  and ultimately enjoy a meal or two from their labours, a thoroughly worthwhile project which was developed into growing and processing flax as well : which is where I come in.

I’ve been working on getting a selection of teaching materials together to show the various stages of the process of spinning.

spinning in progress, with both bleached and unbleached flax, on top whorl spindles

I know that there is only enough time to introduce it to the children, and barely enough time to let them have a play as well, but if I have enough samples they will, hopefully,  have an idea of how fascinating the whole spinning process is.

Hand made wooden spindles, all traditional styles made from sticks and twigs, a few stones and even a potato…

I’ll take a few of these spindles as well, jut to show that no magical equipment is needed, in fact the simple things are often best.

from ultra fine singles to heavy 4 ply yarn

I’m not entirely sure what we will end up , but I thought it would be a good idea to have a few samples available so that they can see that a whole range of threads are possible, and suited for lots of different jobs.

Spinning jacob

Jacob fleece might be one of my favourite wools, it is very variable both in quality from fine to coarse fibres and also from pure white through cream to brown and almost black.

I was given a  large bag  of jacob which was remarkably  clean, it had been skirted already but there was hardly any straw or  vegetable matter, it felt and smelt  wonderfully woolly  with a  generous coating of lanolin.

I gave it a quick wash with a little detergent and lots of hot water, a few rinses later and after drying in the sun it was ready to go.

I decided that I would simply spin it as it came, not worrying about separating the colours,  in the hope for a rustic  grey.

The photos should all be fairly self-explanatory, the 3 ply was spun after making a plying cake  with 3 singles  and spun tightly to make a good hard wearing sock yarn

Freshly washed
picked through and locks fluffed up
starting to mix with the carders
a full spindle with a rolag
a cake of singles
3 ply skein waiting to be washed and set
finished skein , ready for knitting socks