Monday, February 5, 2007

What's a Wheel-along?

Welcome to the Wheel-Along Blog! For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, this is the blog for people who are interested in building their own spinning wheels in order to spin fiber into yarn. The main pattern is the Little Great Wheel, recently featured in Spin-Off magazine, but if you want to design your own or use a different pattern, that's ok, too. Started as an idle thread in the Yahoo Spindlers group, I created this blog for aspiring wheelbuilders to come discuss their trials, tribulations, and triumphs. Also allowed are related wood projects, such as lazy kates, swifts, spindles, etc--but try to keep the focus on the wheels.

We are just getting off the ground, but here are a few guidelines:

1. Observe proper netiquette at all times. This means no off-topic posts, no put-downs, and NO SPAMMING. Even if you think a link to something kind of spinning related is great, this is NOT the place to post it. Please go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/spindlers and post it there instead.

2. There is NO TIME LIMIT to this wheel-along. No one will tease you or laugh at you for taking months or years to build your wheel. Materials and tools can be hard to come by, and some of us have never used those tools before. Don't worry! We're all here to support each other.

3. List mom is Divinebird, as shown in the sidebar. Please email me if you have any questions or issues that need to be addressed. I am NOT responsible for the behavior of any other member, anything that happens on a linked community or site, or any incorrect information given by someone else. I merely run the community. :)

4. If you have information about building spinning wheels, books, plans, or techniques, please post it. Make sure links are formatted properly (no extra punctuation, for instance) and feel free to drop me a line so I can add them to the sidebar as well.

That should be all for now! Also, for the moment, anonymous posts ARE allowed. If we get too much spam, we may change that, but at this posting you do NOT need a blogger account. However, your Gmail account should work here, so even if you don't have a Blogger/Blogspot ID, you MAY still be able to sign in with Gmail, who now owns Blogger/Blogspot. :)

Let's get going! The woodshop awaits!