Going to Alston Hall (14th September)

LittleBerry · Going to Alston Hall (14th September)

Quite by chance I noticed Alston Hall (Lancashire) have 1 day a month spinning (& other crafts) with a lady called Carol Leonard.

I have taken the bull by the horns and I and my Ashford Traveller are going next Friday Very Happy

to see if I'm on the right tracks or going wrong and what I can do to improve....

Aparantly a lot of the ladies go on a regular basis and I get the impression that she will spend time with you if you're a beginner despite having set topics for the others... I will let you know how I get on....

n

oooh you lucky thing, i have heard this is really good.... I am sooooo jealous!

n

jacquie

Hope you learn a lot! It will be great to be with lots of other spinners for the day too.

LittleBerry

n

India who writes twelfthknit has been.
If you look back in her blog to the 8th and 11th of July she was very happy with the tuition etc.

n

LittleBerry

ohh thanks for that.... it's always good to know... not to gloat but AH door to door for me is about 25 minutes!!!

If you get chance to go do so it's a lovely part of lancashire and your other half can do 'private study' if he doesn't fancy any of the courses, which basically menas he gets fed & watered etc but can do what he wants, DH has taken a laptop & books a few times inthe past and quite enjoyed it....

Fi

Enjoy yourself and have fun playing.

chrissy

do you need to have a wheel to go?

chrissy

forgot to say, I have spent so much time at alston hall, both my mum and grandma used to be cooks there, so I spent every half term and summer there playing in the grounds and helping the gardner in the fully walled kitchen garden, pure heaven

LittleBerry

I don't think you need to have a wheel Chrissy (but ring and check) she also does drop spindling too (I may take mine not that I can use it at the moment)...

When I first enquired the lady asked if I had my own wheel and was I a beginner etc etc as she said the teacher liked to know, so I'm presuming that if you don't have your own wheel there will be one you can have a go on/share with others etc....

I have to agree it's a lovely place, you do feel like you're away from the world down there.... I've only been once since they did it all up it's really a very smart place now LCC has put quite a bit of money into doing it up....

chrissy

I can't do these next few but am really considering doing the january one, let us know how you get on.

LittleBerry

Well I had a very good day....

The class started at 11am and we worked until 1pm and then broke for an hour for a salad buffet lunch followed by a further 2hours in the afternoon, finishing at 4pm with cake and coffee....

Carol was a lovely tutor and managed to get me spinning with a drop spindle within 5 minutes Shocked

so I spent the morning practising my drop spindling, I couldn't believe how easy it was once someone had shown me...... The ladies in the group that have been going awhile were dying fibre and thread in the morning whilst we spindled...

After lunch Carol showed us how to spin on a wheel, ply a yarn from a centre pull ball whilst the other ladies carried on with their own spinning.

The group was friendly and helpful and Carol was always around to help out and answer questions, I would recommend the day to anyone....

The October class she is going to me demonstrating the different drawing methods.....

For those with no equipment at all spindle or wheel she does have spindles and a wheel that people can use, but you do need to let Alston Hall know when booking etc....

n

If she got you spindling in five minutes that's excellent.
It isn't hard, but it's one of those things where seeing it done makes it SO much easier.
Sounds like you had a fab day, I wish it was closer to me.
The day showing different draws will be good. It's said that you should do all those things when you are still a beginner and haven't got entrenched in one kind of spinning technique.

n