My Dad & more on hand carding

May 5th was my Dad's birthday. Although Alvin Belde passed away in 1983, I can still hear his distinctive voice, full of mirth, and see the twinkle in his blue eyes. Born in 1914, Dad was a crazy nut, in the best possible sense. I wish you all could meet him, but since that's not possible, I'll do my best to introduce you to him via my tappings. If you would enjoy seeing a tribute to my Ma, head for the past post, My Ma and more on spinning sock yarns.

Born with the sun in Taurus, my Dad was said to be (according to various online astrological sites): calm and gentle when everything's going well; can easily become angry when provoked (Oosh, those eyes turned into slits at that point!); peace loving; patient (Not when helping me with math homework!); self-reliant bordering on stubborness; affectionate and sensual; outdoorsy (baseball remained a fave for him); and good with money. Good with money? Geez, something else must have been going on in my Dad's astrological chart that negated that last attribute. Generous with money would have been more on target...that is when he had it!! Ma used to say that money burned a hole in Dad's pocket. This is definitely something passed on to me...to Chris' chagrin. If I have $20 today, I can almost guarantee I won't have it tomorrow.

Another thing that I got from my Dad was my pride in handwriting. He was only able to go to school until the third grade. His own father died around then and his mom needed for him to go to work. Somehow, despite his lack of formal education, Dad had developed undoubtedly the most beautiful handwriting I've ever seen. Around 7th grade, looking at my own horrible handwriting, I set out to make him (and me) proud and never looked back. My own writing never got close to his in beauty, but I've often received compliments, if only to say that my writing has a rather unusual-looking flourish. And one more thing regarding education: Dad may not have gone very far formally, but he was street-smart in every sense of the word.

In the above pic, my good-looking Dad is shown in his WWII army uniform. Luckily, Dad wasn't shipped overseas. Ma used to say that Dad fought the battle of Florida by selling cigarettes in the canteen. He is said to have turned as brown as a nut due to some intensive, regular, tanning sessions on the roofs of buildings. Ma attributed all his later wrinkles to those earlier war days. I think she was dead-on correct. But I bet he must have looked damn handsome with that tan....

Now only a man with the charm of my Dad could ever...and I mean ever...get my Ma on the slopes. I'm guessing she only did so in order to buy her cute skiing outfit. But charm he did have. And I think the word charisma was named in his honor.

I was always proud that my parents loved each other. My Dad virtually adored my Ma. If she was doing dishes, he'd sneak up behind her to hug and kiss her and I can still hear Ma say, "Oh Al..."

My Dad should have gone into show business. He was the ultimate performer and loved an audience. Early in his life he did take part in theater and was a talented tap dancer. Alas, my Capricorn Ma worried about him pursuing such a life, perhaps to the point of losing him, and put the kibosh on it all. But Dad would not be completely stopped from entertaining...as all his immediate family, relatives, friends and business associates can attest.

Above you can see my Dad with some of his props. I've seen him dressed in drag, portraying a mad professor (after he washed his fine hair and it all fell into his face); acting as a lush (sans his upper and lower false teeth); being Truman Capote...wearing a fur jacket, beret and eye glasses with windshield washers; imitating Bill Kennedy (anyone from Detroit remember this guy on TV?); wearing a too-small Tyrolean hat and using balloons as props...don't ask...

Here Dad is with his favorite instrument...the kazoo! And perhaps his favorite animated companion of all-time, the cymbal-clapping monkey. He used to take this stuff to parties and wow the pants off everyone. My Dad had a wicked sense of humor and could tell (and remember) a joke like no one I've ever met. Believe me, these were NOT saintly jokes by a long run.

Here's Dad with Buns. Buns was given to me by an old boyfriend, but when I went downtown to the University of Detroit during my college years, Buns stayed with the folks. In fact, Buns never left them. My parents used to bring down Buns to the dorms to visit me and my friends...along with a basket of cleaned clothes that Ma "took care of" for me. Now I was NOT spoiled...just loved, mind you...

I treasure this picture. It was taken when Chris, David (sleeping next to "Bapa") and I lived down in Hamtramck, Michigan. See the past post, The Road To Becoming a Fiber Artist, Part Two, for more on that time period.

My Dad thought the sun rose and set on our David, oldest of the spider (now 26.) Nearly every day that Dad went to work, he would stop at our home with a box of animal crackers in his inside coat pocket for David. I can still see Dad dancing a soft-shoe tap for David, to one of the old Broadway show tune albums we used to play. And kazoos...there were no better musicians than David and Dad on kazoo...everything from "Tiny Bubbles" to "The French Song." David, now a jazz and classical violinist, had firm musical roots set during those childhood years.

How I love my Dad and how we all miss him. I remember when I was dancing in plays in high school and Dad would secretly buy tickets to ALL of the performances for ALL of the various productions. 'course he would only show himself after the performance he saw with my Ma and perhaps, my brothers. But he was always there. Proud. Encouraging. Loving. Sentimental. My crazy nut of a Father.

Now for a big hiccup and onwards towards more hand carding:

Swooping is a term I think I coined. I have seen other spinners do the same or similar moves, but I'm not sure they call what they do swooping. Please take a look at last week's carding post, Hand Carding Wool Locks For Spinning, to see bare-bones-basic techniques. Parallel carding stays the same here. Pretend I have parallel carded and fibers are caught in both the right and left carder. But rather than doffing all the time to remove fibers from one carder to the other, I swoop...up or down.

If you have hand, wrist, joint or ligament problems this technique may NOT be for you. If you have flat-backed carders, this technique may be difficult to do. If you have stiff teeth on your carding cloth...and I'll be even more opinionated by saying, if you do not have Louet carders (especially the cotton carders) you may find this technique difficult to do. Why? Because you definitely need carders that allow you to transfer fibers easily and effortlessly if you want to swoop. You'll KNOW by carding a few times if your own hand carders do not transfer fibers well.

Above is a pic showing swooping "up." The right carder is swooping up to transfer the fibers from the left carder onto the right. Swooping up is basically an exaggerated tipping up of the right carder. The teeth of the right carder and the left carder do engage, in this case. The right carder's teeth sink into the fibers of the left carder to transfer those fibers to the right carder. This motion can be done once, if all fibers transfer at once, or more times, if needed.

Swooping negates having to change hand placement on the cards for regular doffing. Basically, I can parallel card, swoop up, swoop down, repeat ....until I'm done with that little batt.
Then, a final seesawing (see last week's post) and it's time to take off the batt...either by keeping it as a batt, rolling a rolag or rolling a cigar. More on the cigar in a moment.

Swooping up again to catch the fibers nearer to the handle.

Fibers have transferred from the left carder to the right.

Swooping down is an exaggerated, downward motion with the right carder. As in swooping up, the teeth engage. However with swooping down, catch the fringe of fibers off the straight edge of the right carder onto the teeth near to the straight edge of the left carder. When you swoop down, you remove the fibers on the right card and transfer them back to the left. You can swoop down in one or more motions, until all fibers are caught on the left carder.

Parallel carding again. Repeat swooping up and down...followed by parallel carding for as many times as needed. I usually need to repeat all steps 1-3 times, depending on the fibers and what I'm aiming for from a homogenous standpoint.

Here I have seesawed (again, see last week's post) the fiber to sit on top of the right carder. Note that I found some little nub I didn't want in my batt. Unwanted trash? Remove it!

Please note: If your fiber has a lot of seeds, burrs and other garbage, hand carding will do a very nice job of blending it well with the fibers. In the pics down below, I'll show you a way of dealing with this problem.

If you roll the fiber across the carder, rather than from the straight edge to the handle edge, you get what's often called a "cigar." A cigar, as you can imagine, is a more parallel preparation to spin from than a rolag. It can be spun as is, but keep in mind that all the fibers are more-or-less of a similar length and if you're killing the baby bird (see the past post, Please Don't Kill The Baby Bird) with a death-grip on one end of the prep, no drafting will be occurring anytime soon.

Continuing to roll the cigar...

One way to deal with a cigar is to predraft it.

Once predrafted, you can wind it around a few fingers...

Grab a portion of the end of the predrafted fiber and bring it through the middle of the wound fiber, to the other side.

And what you'll be rewarded with is a "nest" of fiber. Push the "egg" (the end you brought through) down and you're ready to spin. Have fun filling a lovely basket with nests for later spinning pleasure.

Here's a favorite tool of mine...the dog rake. This little gem can be found right in a pet store.
The teeth on the dog rake are blunt-ish and tho' I'm using it as a combing implement, I need not worry about the tender noses of my 2, black, curious cats, as I would be if I used other sharp-tined, wool combs. I enjoy how the handle of this particular dog rake fits into my hands. Interestingly, it's not unlike the handles of my hand carders of choice: Louet cotton carders.

Often I like to dog rake locks prior to hand carding them. The dog rake is a dandy remover of trash and short, tangled fibers that I wouldn't want in my carded preparation. To use the dog rake, hold the lock firmly on one end and comb with the rake as shown.

After such treatment, the lock tends to fan out, with air separating the fibers. Note a bit of short stuff that was removed. Next, hold the lock from the fanned out edge. Make sure you can comb right to the middle of the lock, otherwise both ends will be combed and not the middle. There may be more fibers left in the dog rake once the butt end of the lock is combed, because that's where you'll find shorter, sometimes tangled fibers in abundance (depending on the fleece used).

Finally, dog-raked-locks lashed onto the left carder for hand carding. Nice.

Next week, hand carding with more than one color and/or fiber. Someday, maybe drum carding will be addressed by the ol' spider. I've been asked if I do drum card? Yes, I do. But truthfully, hand carding fits into my lifestyle better. I can hand card wherever I choose: in the living room, outside, at meetings/conferences, with or without friends/family, whilst watching tv, listening to a book-on-tape, etc. When I drum card, I tend to go out into my dye studio and stay there until my carding session for the day is over. I don't mind that, but I appreciate how hand carding can be done under many circumstances and in many places. Hand carding is extremely portable, just like hand spindle spinning.

Received an e-mail from Julie, an excited knitter who has just bought her first spinning wheel this past weekend. I like Julie...she wrote that I "rocked." I've never been told that before. I like being someone who rocks.

Julie wrote:
A question: The book I have (Teach Yourself Visually: Handspinning, by Judith MacKenzie McCuin) mentions the need for oil, but from what I've found on the internet, Lendrums don't really need to be oiled. There wasn't a manual with the wheel, so I don't know for sure. Should I get some oil just to be
on the safe side?

The spider answers:
Generally, when a wheel manufacturer says that there is no need to oil their wheel, it means that the wheel was made using sealed ball bearings. Indeed, oil will not be needed on such bearings as it does no good there. However, I still find that there's a few spots I like to oil to make my wheel perform at its best. As the bobbin sits on the metal shaft of the flyer, I find that a drop or so of oil on the metal shaft at either end of the bobbin helps the bobbin to rotate very freely. On my Lendrum, Schacht "Matchless" and Louet S10...I like oil on the outside of the cylindrical orifice...the part that sits and rotates in a metal cylinder on the Schacht...the part that sits in a plastic-ish cylinder on the Lendrum...and the part that sits in a half-moon metal cuff on the Louet. Oil on the outside of the orifice, not the inside, please.

Otherwise, check with your manual that hopefully came with your wheel for their oiling instructions. No manual? Contact the wheel maker OR just do a search online to see what parts that others who own the same wheel are oiling. Quite a lot of extra oiling goes on besides the above described on my Schacht...wherever metal hits metal or metal hits wood/leather.

I use 30-weight motor oil for all of my wheel oiling needs. Now I know this is a topic that's rich with opinions in spinning circles. My choice is not the only oil choice nor the best for everyone, but it works well for me. What's your fave oil for using on spinning wheels? I would find it difficult to be without the little oil bottle originally sold by Schacht, tho' now available generically through many spinning vendors. It doesn't leak and the fine, metal tip dispenses only the drops I ask it to.

A long time ago I once sat next to a nice lady in a guild meeting. Her wheel was clunking and squeaking something awful. She exclaimed, "Wasn't it romantic how her wheel talked to her?," or something similar to that. All I kept thinking was how that wheel was crying for oil to ease it's thirsty and weary parts. Spinning wheels are machines. Machines generally need to be oiled...at least on the parts that aren't sealed. Would we think it was romantic if our car talked to us in the same way as that spinner's wheel? Hmmm.

Thank you, Julie, for your question. Readers, keep those questions coming, please!!
Thank you, Leslie, featured in the past post, Leslie - Knitter, Spinner, Solar Dyer & Friend, for your photographic creativity in all of the above hand carding pics.