Spinning

I showed a second grade class how to spin last week, and it was quite exciting to see their faces as they went back to their seats with the short pieces of woolen yarn they had each spun.

I also feel that I am beginning to get the hang of the charkha.

However, this evening, thinking back on how I explained to the children the difference between spinning wool and cotton, and how certain spindles are better for one or the other, I pulled out my glass spindle (narrow whortle, spins faster but not very long) and the freshly carded cotton (prepared for the charkha) and spun. It worked. Best cotton thread I have produced this far. I can really do it!

This is exciting in itself, but tomorrow is my museum group, and next month I am supposed to give a short bit about spinning as part of an afternoon about cotton textiles in Africa, and I can tell the group leader that I will be able to demonstrate not just spinning with a spindle, but spinning cotton with the spindle she gave me from Burkino Faso. I am verp pleased with myself.

As well you should be pleased!
It's especially awesome that you're teaching spinning to children, and I'm sure those kids will always remember happily that hands-on lesson.

I read with the children in two classes, and have often had my spinning with me, so the children in those classes have had the chance to spin with me during breaks if they wanted. I was really rather thrilled that a different teacher came up to me and asked if I was the reading volunteer who spins, and would I be willing to come in and talk to her class as part of a unit on textiles.

She had to be careful how she said it, too. In German idiom to say someone spins is to say that (s)he is crazy.