Craft me Happy!

Learning How to Make Patterned Christmas Pom Pom Baubles

2025-12-11T17:38:00.000+00:00

Back in 2013, Mr Printables started sharing how to make pom pom animals and pom poms with letter motifs worked into them, and linking to them on Craftgawker (remember Craftgawker?!)

Image copyright of mrprintables.com

Well I was fascinated! I loved the idea of wrapping yarn around a pom pom maker in such a controlled way that you could create pictures and designs on the surface of the pom pom. To add to the magic, there’s also a little ‘Ta-Da!’ moment at the end when you’ve finally finished wrapping and you get to cut open your pom pom. I love a good mystery project with a final reveal at the end!

Back then, I didn’t really have a need for an animal shaped pom pom, so I never did get around to giving it a try. However, the desire to make pom poms with motifs and patterns on them has lived quietly in my brain for well over a decade now, so this year, I thought I’d scratch that itch and have a go.

My local Maker Space are making Christmas decorations for St Mary’s Church’s annual Christmas tree festival. This year our theme is ‘Christmas Joy’, and what could be more joyful than a big round pom pom bauble with a Christmas image worked into it?

Full Disclosure - I’m an Amazon affiliate. The following blog post contains links to products that I’ve purchased myself. If you click through and make a purchase I may receive a small percentage of the purchase price at no additional cost to you. This blog makes no profits and any income from my blog goes a small way towards funding future blog projects.

Materials I used to make patterned pom pom baubles

Pom pom maker - I prefer the hinged pom pom makers by Clover or Habico. I’m using the 8.5mm pom pom maker by Habico for all of the following pom poms.
Yarn. Pom poms are very yarn hungry so I used inexpensive or donated yarn that I wasn’t overly precious about. Use a mixture of textures and thicknesses held together for added complexity and to speed things up.
Small, sharp precision craft scissors for cutting the pom pom open and for finer details. Sharp fabric scissors for sculpting the pom pom.
Big eye beading needle for threading a hanging cord through.
Strong upholstery thread, waxed linen thread or strong crochet cotton for tying the pom poms.
Metallic thread or Chinese knotting cord to hang the pom pom baubles from.
Kumihimo bobbins - if you have more than two yarns wrapped separately at a time, these help reduce tangles.

My First (Failed) Attempt - A Christmas Tree Pom Pom

I began by building up a simple long triangle for the tree, dotted with red yarn. I added a block of brown yarn for the pot and then filled the outside with natural cream yarn.

I had such high hopes! You could clearly see the Christmas tree shape when I first cut it open…

… but when I removed the pom pom maker, my Christmas tree unfurled its branches to reveal a much wider tree than I’d planned, and that cute little plant pot at the base became a long, thin line. I’d made more of a berry bush than a tree.

To top it off, I’d managed to wrap the second tree on the reverse side upside-down!

To prevent me from making the same mistake again, I dotted one side of the pom pom maker with Sharpie, so I knew which side was the top once I’d covered up my design with the background cover.

My Second Attempt - Another Christmas Tree Pom Pom.

If I’d actually stopped to think about it, I should have realised that the final wraps of yarn on the pom pom maker make up the outer edge of the sphere. I need to shrink and distort my motif width-wise if I want to avoid the design stretching out to the outer limits of the pom pom circumference.

At this point, I was still learning and experimenting. I wasn’t in a position to make a tutorial, but I did take a photo of every layer for my own reference.

Here’s my first layer. I’m using two strands of green yarn held together to create more visual interest. Also note that I’m using separate strands for the white background above and below the tree.

I added another layer of the same colours, this time bringing the white yarn further down to cover the top of the tree and adding a couple of wraps of red yarn for Christmas baubles.

For the third layer, I brought the white background down even further and added a little more red for a tree bauble.

For the last layer of the tree, I covered the dark red for the pot with the background colour and brought the top background yarn down further to cover more of the green.

Finally, I covered everything as tightly as possible with the background colour.

Here’s the final half of my pom pom with the arc at the base completely filled in with the background natural yarn.

I repeated the same winding pattern for the reverse of the bauble.

I’ll share how I tied my pom poms later on, but here’s how it looked before the trim…

… and here it is afterwards.

From making this second pom pom, I learned a few more things. I’ll make a list of everything I’ve learned with this experiment and post it at the end.

Reverse engineering my pom pom design

At this stage, I still wasn’t quite sure how the size and placement of the layers were affecting the final design, so I thought I’d analyse the photographs to see if it would help me to design future motifs.

I’ve overlaid just the tree wrap sections over the final cream yarn of the completed pom pom with all of the layers to scale. It’s almost like a cross-section of the pom pom while it’s still wrapped around the pom pom maker. I’ve numbered the layers to show how the tree design was reduced with every layer. I’m certainly no pom pom expert, but I was starting to get a better feel for how altering the wrap placement and coverage affects the final motif.

Christmas Pudding Pom Pom Bauble

I’ve seen quite a few Christmas pudding pom pom baubles online, but they’re all very simple and stylised - they all have a very definite straight line between the pudding and the white sauce. I wanted to make one that looked slightly more realistic, as if it had sauce dripping down the sides.

I designed a very simple half pudding as a kind of reference to follow while I was wrapping the pom pom.

I think the key to getting more detail on a pom pom like this is to go big! My pom pom maker is 8.5cm wide, so it requires a lot more layers to fill it. More layers mean more design definition.

These were the colours I chose for my Christmas pudding using oddments from my yarn collection. They’re all double-knit weight yarns and a real mixture of fibres and textures.

I divided the two brown yarns so that I could wrap four light brown, two dark brown, and one dark red, holding seven yarns at a time for the lower Christmas pudding.

As I was holding seven strands for the pudding, but only one strand for the white sauce, I ended up working three layers of the cream yarn for every single layer of the browns. (From here, I just call this one layer.)

For my first layer, I wrapped the cream yarn almost to the centre of the pom pom maker, filling the rest with the brown yarns.

I brought the brown further up over the cream for the second layer - this should create a drip effect with the previous layer.

I brought the cream wraps down to almost the centre again to create another drip…

… and then brought the brown back up again.

Finally, I filled the middle arch of the pom pom maker with a division of brown and cream again.

I repeated this wrapping pattern on the reverse section of the pom pom.

When I cut my pom pom open, I revealed definite drips, which was very pleasing!

As usual, after I tied the pom pom and removed the pom pom maker, my Christmas pudding pom pom was very untidy before its haircut. If you fill the pom pom maker to capacity (as I do), your pom pom will end up much wider than it is tall, so it needs a good trim to neaten it up. A fully filled pom pom maker results in a much denser pom pom. (It’s also a lot less likely to fall apart between cutting and tying.)

I trimmed my Christmas pudding into a relatively tidy ball using good-quality large fabric scissors. To give my Christmas pudding more of a 3-dimensional, realistic look, I went in with my precision craft scissors.

I carefully trimmed off several millimetres from all the way around the edge of the brown yarn with my small craft scissors, where the pudding meets the sauce. I went on to trim the rest of the pudding with my large fabric scissors, rolling it and ruffling it, trimming out any sections that stuck out from the slightly smaller ball shape I was trying to form. I wanted to give the impression that the sauce was thick and drippy on top of the pudding, so I wanted it to protrude out above the brown of the pudding..

Finally, I went in with my small scissors, cutting the cream yarn at an angle, all the way round the edge to try to give the impression that the sauce was rounded, rather than sticking out like yarn.

To top off my Christmas pudding, I needle-felted a couple of leaves. I could have just cut some holly leaves out of felt, but I do like the 3-dimensional quality I can get from needle felting. These are just free-formed, but I might have achieved a better result if I’d used the cookie-cutter method and a sugar flower holly leaf cutter.

I needle-felted 3 little berries out of crimson wool. You can read how to make these here.

To create a hanging loop, I took a length of Chinese knotting cord, folded it, and then knotted it.

I then used a big-eyed beading needle to thread both ends of the cord down through the middle of the pom pom separately.

It was then just a case of knotting the two ends of the cord, cutting it, and hiding the cut end amongst the longer strands of yarn.

To finish it off, I stitched my 3 felt beads together to form a loop and attached my two leaves underneath with a few stitches through the pom pom.

I absolutely love it! It’s so squishy but dense. With ‘Christmas Joy’ as our theme, this makes me smile every time I see it!

Poinsettia Pom Pom Bauble

At this point, I was starting to understand a tiny bit more about how to design and wrap a symmetrically patterned pom pom.

I got quite ambitious and decided to see if I could make a poinsettia pom pom. I wasn’t sure if I would manage to get the definition for a more detailed design like this, but my curiosity was piqued.

I definitely needed to use my large 8.5cm pom pom maker for this one!

I took my poinsettia design and warped it in Procreate so that it would sit on top of a semi-circle. This effectively gave me a pattern to follow. After a couple of false starts, I simplified my poinsettia design to this pixelated set of chart instructions. The gaps between the arched lines in the image above represent a single layer of yarn wraps.

To get better definition I used a separate length of yarn for each colour section of the pom pom. I join a new yarn in simply by wrapping it around tightly and securing the end under the first wrap.

I’m using kumihimo bobbins to wrap the separate yarns around to try to keep everything under control. At this stage, I’m still undecided as to whether this makes it less fiddly than just using a long length of yarn, but I’m giving it a good try. They do get tangled quite a lot, but it still feels quicker than pulling a long length of yarn through every time.

Here’s my first layer. I notice that most people who wrap patterned pom poms don’t usually work a layer at a time - they tend to build up a single colour at a time in little piles. That method wouldn’t really work for a complex design like this with sections that jut out over each other at an angle.

Here’s a collage of all of the layers as I placed them down. I haven’t gone into too much detail as it was quite time-consuming and took several hours to make half a pom pom. Sadly, I managed to fill the pom pom maker just before the final layer on the chart. I just covered everything in yellow yarn so that at least there would be a complete background behind the poinsettia.

For my own reference, this is approximately 9 layers of double knitting yarn on an 8.5cm pom pom maker - although I did stop winding yarn at the sides for the last couple of layers as it was getting overly full.

For the reverse of the pom, I didn’t have enough yellow yarn to cover the whole of the pom pom maker, but I also couldn’t bring myself to spend another 3 hours wrapping a layered pom pom. I thought I’d have a go at a much simpler flower design this time, employing the method I’ve seen other pom pom makers use.

Instead of building up layers of colour across the full arch of the pom pom maker, I wrapped bunches of colour in sections to try to form a representation of a poinsettia. This method felt a lot less precise - but at this point, I wasn’t even sure if my original method had worked so it was a very useful learning experiment.

This method took less than an hour to wind, but I’m sure if I did it repeatedly, it would take significantly less time.

After 4 hours (total) of wrapping, it was now time to cut my pom pom open!

Here’s the side I methodically wrapped, layer by layer…

… and here’s the side I wrapped more quickly in bunches of yarn sections. It’s all looking very hopeful!

To tie my pom poms, I use a strong upholstery thread. You want a thread that can be pulled on really hard without risk of breaking. When I knot it, I wrap the thread through 5 or 6 times to reduce the chance of the knot slipping, and then work another knot on top of it. I will do this several times, wrapping the thread around the pom pom and placing the knot in a different area until it feels like the knot cannot be tightened any further.

Mr Printables recommends a waxed linen thread, which further reduces the risk of the knot slipping, but I’ve also seen other pom pom makers use a fine cotton crochet yarn, which is probably as strong as upholstery thread but wouldn’t dig into your hands as much.

Here’s my pom pom immediately after I removed it from the pom pom maker. It’s like an untidy, fluffy rugby ball!

To get a sharper pattern definition, I needed to trim a significant amount of yarn off my pom pom. A dense pom pom is also a lot more durable. This is going to be a Christmas bauble that will hopefully get packed away year after year, so it needs to be hard-wearing.

I used my sharpest pair of fabric scissors, rolling it, fluffing it, and trimming it until I was happy with its roundness and density. It was very satisfying!

After trimming, my final pom pom is about 8cm, which is a little smaller than the pom pom maker I used.

Frustratingly, I don’t think either side looks obviously like a poinsettia. The vague suggestion of a poinsettia, maybe… I think I might have been a little too optimistic. Regardless, I’m still really happy with my final pom pom bauble. Pleasingly, my favourite side is the one that I spent the most time on. It has an organic complexity, while the one wrapped in bunches of colour looks simpler and bolder. For me, the complex one is just visually more interesting.

I’m really learning the limitations of surface pattern pom pom design. Natural, organic motifs lend themselves perfectly to pom pom decorations, as imperfections are inevitable. I’m embracing the imperfections!

Star pom pom

In contrast to the complicated, organic shape of a poinsettia, I thought I’d try a bold star design next. Large pom poms use a lot of yarn, and there is quite a lot of wastage, so I didn’t want to use my precious handspun yarn to make pom poms. However, I was running out of inexpensive yarn… in the end, I chose a Christmassy red and green for my star pom pom. That might have been a mistake!

I designed a layer plan to follow, with teal blue/green for the star, and red for the background

I attempted to follow the pattern I’d designed, but it got much trickier to stay on track as the pom pom maker filled up. Again, I used several kumihimo bobbins to store my yarn on to allow me to layer up the design without carrying the colour across. As every layer hides the previous one, I found it very easy to lose track of where I was supposed to be. I also think I may have already reached my limitations for designing motifs for this size of pom pom…

I definitely need to invest in an extra-large pom pom maker!

The first reveal, when I cut the pom pom open, made me hopeful that I might have made a star pom pom.

But when I released the pom pom from the pom pom maker, it turned out that I’d made more of a festive tomato!

I attempted to rescue my festive fruit pom pom by giving it a significant trim. I sculpted it with my fabric scissors into a kind of drop shape and then cut a hole in the centre of the star so that I could glue in some sparkly crystals.

Hopefully, I managed to rescue it a little!?

Snow-topped striped pom pom bauble

At this point, I’d come to realise that my 8.5cm pom pom maker was better suited to simpler, bold graphic designs like the tree or Christmas pudding so I thought I’d make a basic striped pom pom with a bit of a twist.

I chose 4 slightly Christmassy colours from my small stash of cheap yarn …

… and divided each colour into 3 balls for each colour. This would allow me to work a kind of fade from the white into the coloured section - suggesting that snow had landed on top of the bauble. That was the idea anyway.

This was my process for every layer of the pom pom. I held 3 colours to wrap the lower part of the pom pom. When I was well past halfway, I dropped one coloured yarn and picked up 1 strand of white. After wrapping these yarns two or three times, I dropped one more coloured yarn so that I was now holding one coloured yarn and two white. I wrapped these yarns two or three times and then wrapped to the end holding just three strands of white yarn.

I reversed this wrapping pattern to work the same coloured yarns over a second layer and then changed colour to build up a striping pattern with a dithered fade into white at the end.

Here are my wraps at the end of every colour change.

I began making this pom pom by just allowing my balls of yarn to hang loose, but I very quickly got in a tangle. Much like knitting using the intarsia method, it became so much easier when I wound my separate yarn balls onto kumihimo bobbins.

Cutting the pom pom open revealed a satisfying speckled fade.

Before trimming…

… after trimming

To finish it off, I looped some metallic thread, knotted it, and threaded it through the pom pom using the big-eye beading needle. I attached a couple of beads to the top loop using a crimp bead.

I’m so pleased with my first attempts at making patterned pom pom baubles! I’ve learned so much just by allowing myself to play and experiment. These are going to look so cute hanging on our Christmas tree this year!

Now, I’m just itching to get hold of a bigger pom pom maker to see how much more detail I could capture if I were able to go bigger!

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Finally, here’s a summary of everything I learned from my first few attempts at making patterned pom poms -

Symmetrical designs are significantly easier! It is still possible to make some non-symmetrical motifs by building the design across the two halves of the pom pom - take a look at Mr Printables impressive examples of asymmetrical letters.
If you’re going to repeat a hidden motif on both sides of the pom pom, make sure to mark the top of the pom pom maker at one end.
Wrap the yarn tightly around the pom pom for a more dense final result.
Filling the pom pom maker to absolute capacity will result in a much denser pom pom, and it will also help the two halves of the pom pom stay together during cutting.
Remember that where you wrap the yarn at the base has a greater effect on that colour’s final position (not where it is positioned at the top of the wrap), as this is where it will be secured.
Holding several similar-coloured yarns together can create visual interest and speed things up.
When changing colour, cut the yarn at the top of the pom pom arch.
If you’re going to use the same colour repeated across one layer (more than a few strands apart), use a separate strand of yarn for each section to prevent rogue strands appearing where they don’t belong.
Use the sharpest scissors you can find for cutting the pom pom open. Large fabric scissors are useful for sculpting the pom poms. Roll it around in your hand, fluffing it up and trimming off small sections at a time until you achieve your desired shape.
Use a thread that won't break when you tug on it to tie your pom poms.
Bigger pom poms allow for more detail and definition in the final design. You can always trim it down for a really solid and dense patterned pom pom.
The more you trim it, the denser the pom pom.
Pom poms don’t have to be spherical. Experiment with pointed drop shapes, eyes, hearts… anything you can imagine.

Thank you so much for reading this far! If you've enjoyed this blog post, please pin this image to Pinterest. It really makes a difference to me and helps other crafters find it too.

Questionable Blend number 11 - Twinkle Twinkle

2025-10-15T15:33:00.000+01:00

I’ve been writing a blog series over the last couple of years, sharing several different ways of spinning commercially available, multicoloured blended tops. I’ve tried to choose blends that contain colours from more than half of the colour wheel. The kinds of blends that are a little tricky to immediately guess how they’ll spin up.

I’ll be using the word questionable to describe any blend that would cast doubt in the mind of even the most experienced spinner. A blend that would cause you to pause before ordering it and question how it might turn out.

Novice spinners are regularly attracted to the bold, multi-coloured stripes of a vertically blended top, but are frequently left disappointed when their beautiful combed top turns to mud on the wheel. In this series, I’ll be sharing several techniques that can help reduce the amount of optical mixing during spinning, so that some of those original colours still show up in the final yarn. By the end, the tops will almost certainly not be questionable.

Twinkle Twinkle

Images of Twinkle Twinkle - Reproduced by kind permission of World of Wool

Above are the images of Twinkle Twinkle from the World of Wool website. They don't look like the same blend! The first image is much too washed out, and while the second image is a slightly closer representation of Twinkle Twinkle, the yellow is much more prominent than in the blended top I have in front of me.

Above are the colours of the merino and bamboo fibres within Twinkle Twinkle. Optical mixing is magical! Even when I opened the fibre at home, I was sure there must be some purple or blue in there.

Here’s my photograph of Twinkle Twinkle, and to my eye, it’s a very close representation of the top I purchased. I’m so confused! This barely resembles the images on the World of Wool website. It’s beautiful! Either something has gone amiss in the blending process, or World of Wool need to take a look at their photography because the website images do not do this blend justice. It’s beautiful!

I originally chose Twinkle Twinkle as I wanted to see how the yellow bamboo fibres would neutralise the more purple hues within the blend. On opening it, I was hopeful that I shouldn’t see too much brown in my final yarns, as the yellow is much more subtle than the website images suggest.

I arranged all the yarns from the blends in this series into a kind of muted gradient, and I’ll be spinning them in this order. They have all been spun with no attention paid to colour management; they’ve simply been pre-drafted, spun, and then chain-plied.

To begin with, I spun 8g of Twinkle Twinkle to see how it looks when I allow the colours to freely mix together during spinning. I just drafted it out and then spun it from the tips. I then chain-plied it at the wheel to achieve a 3-ply yarn.

Much like the Hawaiian Dreams I spun previously, the resulting yarn is a very pretty, tonal purple. This time it's much darker and richer with a golden sheen, thanks to the 15% yellow bamboo content. It's beautiful, and a colour I would very happily wear!

From a distance, the colours optically mix together into a warm aubergine colour, heathered with purples and pinks. This one is going to be very difficult to achieve distinct colour variations as it’s so well blended, but I’m looking forward to spinning it to see what I manage to come up with.

(Ad) Most of the yarns in this series will be spun on my Electric Eel Wheel 6 - This is an affiliate link. If you click through and make a purchase, I may receive a small percentage of the purchase price at no additional cost to you. Any income from my blog goes a small way toward funding future blog projects.

Spinning Twinkle Twinkle 4 Different Ways

Spinning from the Fold - Short Draw

I'm spinning all of the yarns in this series from the fold as this is one of the most popular ways of trying to keep the colours in a multicoloured top a bit more separate.

To prepare my fibre for spinning from the fold, I grasp the full width of the top at the very tips and just pull. This allows me to spin from just a little over a staple length of fibre.

Over the course of writing my Questionable Blends blog series, I’ve been working on improving my long-draw spinning - a technique I find much easier when I spin from the fold. However, I decided to spin Twinkle Twinkle using a short sideways draft as I’m beginning to suspect that long-draw spinning from the fold increases the possibility of the colours mixing together. Twinkle Twinkle is one of the more blended tops in this series, so hopefully this will result in a little less colour blending.

It’s definitely a theory I plan to explore more thoroughly in the future…

Here is my single, spun from the Fold with very little twist entering the drafting zone. As is usual with yarn spun from the fold, the colour sections are short, but it's reassuring to see quite a few pops of colour in there.

The final chain-plied yarn is a very subtle heathered autumnal purple that is much less flat-looking than the yarn spun from pre-drafted top.

The knitted fabric is a pleasing autumnal purple with subtle pops of colour that add a little visual interest without being distracting.

Splitting the Top Vertically

All of the blends in this series were split vertically as it's one of the easiest ways of ensuring the colours in a blended top don't completely mix together when you spin them.

As Twinkle Twinkle is so well blended, I had to tear it into quite thin strips to ensure that my final yarn had a little more colour variation. Some of the sections were so thin that I ended up combining two or three nests of similar colours together so that I had a fibre supply that was thick enough for me to draft from.

As you can see, most of my nests are similar in colour, but a few of the lighter ones should stand out to add a little visual interest to my final yarn

This may well be the most subtle yarn I've spun by splitting the top vertically.

It is rewarding to see those subtle purple and orange streaks running through the yarn...

... which show up as gentle colour fluctuations in the knitted mitred squares.

Hand Combing a Gradient

Back in 2023, I used my hackle to turn a custom blended merino and bamboo top into a gradient.

In my experience, bamboo fibres tend to be shorter, on average, than merino fibres. By taking advantage of the differences in average fibre length, you can often achieve a gradient when you remove the fibres thinly from a hackle or comb.

Here you can see that there are more of the shorter yellow bamboo fibres in the middle of my combed nest. The merino - being a more natural fibre than the bamboo rayon - has a much wider range of fibre lengths, so they are distributed throughout the combed top with a greater proportion of merino fibres on the outside of the nest.

I repeated the combing four times and arranged the nests in alternating order to avoid abrupt colour changes when I spin them.

The dark and light fibres show up quite well on the bobbin.

This technique results in one of the more striking yarns with streaks of purple and muddy orange.

Knitting it up, I get a kind of gradient that gently cycles through the colour changes. If I were to use this technique for a sweater, I would probably diz the fibres off my hackle to give me much longer sections of colours. Plying two, three, or more gradient singles together rather than chain-plying them would give me an even longer gradient with complex, dithered colour transitions.

Making Blending Board Pencil Roving

This is a technique I discovered while I was writing my Spinning into Focus blog series.

I break off just one length of top that’s a little over the length of my blending board. I then open it up so that all of the colours are sitting next to each other, rather than on top of one another. The fibres are then just laid on top of the blending board in a single layer, while trying to get them to stretch across the full width of blending board.

I then brush the fibres down, starting at the bottom and gently working my way gradually up the board, holding the fibres above the brush to keep them straight.

With the two blending board dowels, I draft off all of the fibre into one single blending board rolag.

You can see that opening up the top and arranging it in a thin layer across the whole of the board allows me to now spin the blended top from the side, rather than the end. I can spin the colours one after the other rather than all at the same time.

Unfortunately, thick blending board rolags are quite unpleasant to spin from as they take quite a bit of tugging, and the colours have a tendency to bunch together and optically mix into a single hue.

To avoid this, I draft the rolag out into pencil roving, making it much more enjoyable to spin from, and increasing the chances of getting more fluctuations of colour throughout the final yarn.

It’s lovely to see a nice selection of blues, pinks, purples, and even greens in there.

But the final chain-plied yarn is still very subtle and understated.

The knitted mitred square sample shows the greatest variety of colours without being too busy.

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It should be noted that the first and last yarns are woollen prepped, rather than worsted. Even though they were both spun short-draw, the singles still don’t have quite the same sheen and smoothness as the two yarns spun from the end of combed top.

From left to right - spun from the fold, split vertically, combed gradient, and blending board pencil roving.

Yet again, I’m so very thankful to have started my Questionable Blend series. I never would have bought Twinkle Twinkle based on the images on the World of Wool website otherwise. Whichever method I chose to prepare it resulted in a beautiful dusky pink/light aubergine, that I would very happily wear.

My next blend will be the final Questionable Blend in this series, and I think it’s going to be an interesting one…

Related Posts

Spinning 12 Questionable Blends

Questionable Blend #1 Higglety Pigglety

Questionable Blend #2 Over the Rainbow

Questionable Blend #3 Gourami

Questionable Blend #4 Rainbow

Questionable Blends Blanket Knitting Pattern

Questionable Blend #5 - Loriini

Questionable Blend #6 - Blaze

Questionable Blend #7 - Libra

Questionable Blend #8 Hickory Dickory

Questionable Blend #9 Tropical

Questionable Blend #10 Hawaiian Dreams

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"For the Love of Wool" Wreath

2025-06-05T18:10:00.000+01:00

For the last few months, I've been working on a wool sculpture to exhibit alongside my crafting friends from my local Maker Space. The art pieces we created are currently on display at Melton Mowbray Museum as part of The Great Big Green Week and will remain there until June 16, 2025.

Everything we created was made with a focus on zero-waste, environmentally friendly practices, and swapping and sharing skills to promote community and keep crafts alive for future generations.

For my main exhibition piece, I decided to create a variation of my Joyful Wreath, incorporating some slightly different elements that I couldn’t fit in when I made it back in 2022.

I wanted this wreath to be a little moodier than the Joyful Wreath I made previously. I intended for the colours to be a little more sophisticated, so each one was blended with the addition of 10% black wool to add a little shade and complexity.

I wanted to celebrate the potential and beauty of wool - a fibre that is undervalued, renewable, and compostable, but is often discarded in favour of synthetic plastic alternatives.

For the base, I spun some worsted-weight Blue Faced Leicester, which I divided into four balls so that I could knit the base quickly by holding four yarns together.

The base was knitted as a flat piece…

… which I then sewed around a 30cm metal ring base (affiliate link), stuffing it with wool combing waste as I worked my way round.

As I had only 4 months to create my wool wreath and wanted it to be as maximalist as possible, I covered just over half of my ring in wool and knitted fabric, securing it at the ends with Gorilla Tape (affiliate link). I also liked the idea of making an asymmetric wool sculpture this time, as I wanted it to be very different to my original Joyful Wreath.

I’d spun two different yarns that I planned to make all of my elements with…

A variegated yarn…

… and a second yarn with much longer colour sections that I intended to separate out into all the component colours :-

Both of these yarns were spun using varying proportions of cyan, magenta, and yellow merino wool, blended with 10% black.

To begin assembling my wreath, I used the variegated yarn to crochet around some USB powered fairy lights (affiliate link). You can read how I did this previously here.

Using the combing waste that is inevitably produced when I blend colours together, I created some layered, needle-felted flowers in a rainbow of colours.

Stitching the fairy lights on and then the flowers really helped to dictate where all of the other colours were placed later on. I wanted a complex meandering of colour changes along the base, rather than a strict adherence to their colour order.

I went on to knit curlicues from the 18 different colours of handspun yarn. You can find the instructions on how to knit these here.

I worked out a pattern for a 5-sided star and made dozens of them in various sizes. To adhere to the theme of zero-waste, some of the stars were stuffed with yarn scraps, while most of them were filled with wool combing waste.

Some of the stars were knitted in variegated yarn and left plain, while others were knitted in the solid-coloured yarn and had a row of beads knitted in around the edge. The variations in scale and colour all added to the complexity I was aiming for.

As I could see my solid-coloured yarns beginning to run out, I joined them all together again using a Russian join so that I could ensure that none of the yarn was wasted.

Here’s how my wreath looked at the halfway point. I find the best way to approach decorating a wreath that I want to be totally covered is to add all of the bigger pieces first, as it’s so much easier to then fill the gaps with the smaller embellishments.

I turned some of the knitted beads from my earlier blog post into colourful acorns by drilling a couple of holes to add a yarn string. I then glued the balls into the acorn caps with epoxy glue (affiliate link).

Finally, with my variegated yarn, I made some 2.5cm pom poms. These were made 5-at-a-time using my Multipom - wrapping it around 50 times for extra fluffy, but tiny, wool pom poms.

To make them fuller and fluffier, I finished them with my handheld steamer (affiliate link), which made the seam virtually disappear.

Once I’d attached everything, the shiny, wreath base was looking very hard and metallic next to an abundance of wool and soft colour so I used the last remaining length of variegated yarn to wrap around and cover the metal base.

It really brought the whole thing together, and I was happy that my “For the Love of Wool” Wreath was finally finished!

I’m so pleased with it! It’s totally bonkers and I love it!

Now, I just need to decide where to put it once the exhibition is over…

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If you've found any of this post interesting or useful, please pin the image above to Pinterest; it really makes a difference to me and helps other crafters find it too.

Some of my other related blog posts -

My Joyful Wreath - Completed!

Knitted and Felted Beads

How to Knit Curlicues or Spirals

Easy Layered Needle Felted Flowers

Needle Felted Balls or Beads

Making Silk Top Pom Poms
on the Multipom

Crocheted Fairy Lights

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Knitted and Felted Beads

2025-05-15T14:14:00.000+01:00

I’m currently working on a wool sculpture to exhibit alongside my crafting friends from my local Maker Space. The art pieces we make will hopefully be displayed as part of The Great Big Green Week. Everything we create will be made with a focus on zero-waste, environmentally friendly practices, and swapping and sharing skills to promote community and keep crafts alive for future generations.

For my exhibition piece, I decided to make a variation of my Joyful Wreath, but I’ll be adding some slightly different elements that I didn’t manage to fit on when I made it back in 2022.

I first experimented with knitted beads in 2012…

These beads were knitted with heavier yarn over just a few rounds and then felted with a hand-held food mixer. This time, I’ll be using a lighter, sock-weight yarn and just putting them in the washing machine to fuzz them up a little.

A Spectrum of Knitted Beads

All of my knitted beads are made from handspun yarn that has been made by blending just cyan, magenta, yellow, and black.

The colours were mixed in varying proportions to create a full colour wheel, however each blend had the addition of 10% black to make the rainbow a little more moody.

The beads are relatively simple in construction and take about 15 minutes to make from start to finish. They do use a couple of more advanced techniques, but once you get the hang of them, they’re pretty easy to make.

Knitted Beads Instructions

I knitted my beads using sport weight, handspun yarn and size 2.75mm circular knitting needles. I wanted my stitches to be quite dense, so I used a slightly smaller needle size than I normally would for this gauge of yarn.

Circular Cast-On

Cast-on 14sts using a pinhole cast-on or disappearing cast-on.

There are several different ways of working this circular cast-on, and a few tutorials on YouTube.

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A post shared by Kathryn (@craftmehappy)

The pinhole cast-on is a method of picking up several stitches from inside a loop of yarn, which can then be gathered together after you’ve worked a couple of rounds.

Divide the cast-on stitches in half and continue in magic loop.

Knit 9 rounds in stocking stitch.

(As the beads are knitted in magic loop, I found it easier to keep track if I thought of it as 18 rows rather than 9 rounds, moving my counter on every time I turned my work.)

Finishing the Bead

Using a wool needle, thread the cast-on yarn tail through the cast-on stitches and pull tightly to close the base up securely. Thread the yarn through to the inside of the bead and roll it up inside the base of the bead.

Cut the working yarn and thread it through each of the stitches as you pull them off the needle.

Stuff your bead with wool. I’m using wool combing waste, but scraps of leftover wool yarn would also work.

Pull the yarn tightly to close the bead, and then thread the yarn through the cast-off stitches to secure them in place. Insert the needle and yarn through the bead, bringing it out at the opposite end.

You could leave them like this or you could embroider them, sew beads on, or felt them to reduce the stitch definition. Grouped together like this, they remind me of a bunch of tiny balloons!

Felting the Beads in the Washing Machine

As the beads were knitted using 100% non-superwash merino wool yarn and stuffed with wool combing waste, they will shrink and felt in the wash if they are mistreated enough.

As I want my wool sculpture to have variations in texture, I decided to throw one in the washing machine, along with my guinea pig bedding, to see how it fared. Afterwards, the bead was rolled into shape while it was still wet to make it nice and round.

You can see that the stitches of the one on the right are much less defined, and the bead is denser and fuzzier than the one on the left that hasn't been through the wash. I really like this effect, and from a distance it looks much more like a needle-felted bead. I went on to put the whole lot in a delicates laundry bag and put them through two washes (along with my guinea pig bedding) at 40 degrees C.

If you were to try this yourself, I would definitely recommend just shrinking one to start with to see if you like the effect. The water needs to be above 40 degrees for it to felt the beads, and it helps to have something substantial in the washing machine at the same time to assist with the felting eg. towels, blankets, jeans.

Size Variations

The beads are so quick to knit up, it's very easy to experiment with different sizes of beads to see what works for you. Experiment with thicker wool yarns and larger needles, and fewer stitches and rows to see what size works best for you.

The Possibilities

I haven’t quite decided how I will use my beads in the wool sculpture yet. Whether I’ll just group them like berries, sew beads onto them, or attach them to the ends of wire to have them radiating out from the edges…

… as a touch of whimsy I have a few acorn caps that are small enough to turn my knitted beads into colourful acorns. I have a couple of weeks to decide so maybe I might add a handful of colourful woollen acorns as a fun, joyful element!

Thank you so much for stopping by, and happy crafting!

If you've found any of this post interesting or useful, please pin this image to Pinterest. It makes a big difference to me and helps other crafters find it too.

How to Knit Curlicues or Spirals

Easy Layered Needle Felted Flowers

Needle Felted Balls or Beads

Rainbow Decoration Knitting Pattern

Making Silk Top Pom Poms
on the Multipom

Making Layered Singed Flowers

Virtually No-Sew Knitted Hearts

Crocheted Fairy Lights

----------

Please be sweet and share the love. Leave a comment, subscribe to my YouTube channel, like my Facebook page for regular updates or follow me on Pinterest, Bloglovin' or Instagram

Modifications, Fixes and Upgrades for the Electric Eel Wheel Nano 2

2025-03-21T16:46:00.014+00:00

I make no secret of how much I love the Electric Eel Wheel Nano. Maurice Ribble developed it with the intention of making it the smallest, most affordable electric spinning wheel on the market. Maurice wanted to bridge the price gap between drop spindle and spinning wheel, at a price that was competitive enough for non-spinners to satisfy their curiosity about e-spinners, without having to make the significant investment of a production-level spinning wheel.

Full Disclosure - I’m an affiliate of both Dreaming Robots and Amazon. The following blog post contains links to products on both sites. If you click through and make a purchase I may receive a small percentage of the purchase price at no additional cost to you. This blog makes no profits and any income from my blog goes a small way towards funding future blog projects.

I personally backed the Kickstarters for the Nano 1 and Nano 2 as I couldn’t resist purchasing a tiny little travel spinning wheel that’s small enough to spin from my lap in the car, or just perch on the arm of the sofa next to me.

Spinning from my lap in the car passenger seat

I own several e-spinners now, but I reach for the Nano more often than say, my Electric Eel Wheel 6 or my Hansencrafts Minispinner, purely because it is so tiny and portable.

Maurice intentionally built the Nano to be as basic as possible to keep the costs down. He knew that spinners, generally being a creative bunch, might modify and accessorise it to suit their needs. This minimalist design approach helps to keep the price of the Nano as affordable as possible.

About 5 years ago, I wrote a blog post about the modifications I made to my Nano 1.0. I changed the yarn guides, and the tension system, designed an orifice reducer with a twist keeper, and found a way to attach my battery to the base.

Well, the Nano 2.0 is quite an improvement on the Nano 1.0 but there were still modifications I felt I had to make to the Nano 2.0 to make it perform better than my modified Nano 1.1. - the wheel that, for a long time, became my most used e-spinner.

The Tension System

The most important improvement I made to my earlier Nanos was to switch out the elastic tension band for a beaded cord and spring tension system. I find the tension from the supplied elastic band on all of the Nanos so far to be a little unresponsive and I have to turn the tension up to the point that it slows the wheel down more than I would like as the bobbin becomes fuller.

Unlike the Nano 2.0 - the first Nano didn’t come with a tension knob, but I thought I would mention my earlier modification because there are still advantages to this system.

As the tension is chosen by positioning tiny crimp beads, there is no guesswork involved in choosing the tension level, and, as the beads are so small, the tension changes are made in tiny, measurable increments.

For my Nano 2, I just cut the elastic off and knotted the 1mm Chinese knotting cord onto the tension knob instead. There’s no difference in the feel between this and the beaded system, it’s just a lot less fiddly with a tiny bit more guesswork.

I opened up the last two coils of the spring and attached them to the base with Gorilla Tape

The tension is created by the downward force of the Chinese knotting cord on the bobbin, attached to an Ashford brake band spring on the other side.

If you’re looking for an alternative to the Ashford brake band spring, I find sewing machine tension springs to be quite similar and cheaper. (I ended up buying a whole pack of these and I’ve modified a couple of Nanos for local spinners that were ready to give up.) Both springs, however, need a little trimming with memory wire cutters to allow them to fit.

I can achieve much higher speeds with the spring and cord system and I can feel the yarn being gently pulled onto the bobbin. With my modified Nano 2 and its stronger motor, I will happily ply a full bobbin - something I would have found far too slow and laborious on the previous models - modified or otherwise.

Shielding to Prevent Flyer Erosion

Unfortunately, I was one of the first Nano 2 owners to discover that the flyer isn’t as resistant to erosion as the earlier 1.x models.

Owners of antique wooden spinning wheels often see little channels that have been worn into their wheels by yarns rubbing over the edge of the spinning wheel orifice over time. The plastic of the Nano 2 is a different type of plastic to the one used on the Nano 1.x and unfortunately, it has proven to be less resistant to erosion. If you spin fine and fast - especially with stronger fibres like silk and bamboo, or coarser, abrasive wools - the speed at which the flyer erodes increases dramatically.

After just 2 or 3 weeks of spinning a fine single of blended Devon Closewool, Romney and Exmoor Blueface wool this is how my Nano orifice looked. My final yarn is quite a bit itchier than the merino I spin more often so I’m guessing I was pretty unlucky to begin my first Nano 2 spin with a significantly more abrasive fibre.

To prevent further erosion, I very quickly covered the channel with some sticky back copper tape… This stopped the yarn from cutting into the plastic but the foil would eventually dig into the groove causing me further tension issues.

After replacing the copper for the third time I decided to use something less flexible to shield the orifice.

Some people have had success by enlarging the orifice with a file or Dremel and then gluing in a ceramic ring (designed for a fishing rod). As you can see, I bought a set of ceramic rings for this purpose but realised that it would reduce the size of the orifice, making threading the orifice slightly trickier, so I decided against this solution.

Next, I bought a pack of 10mm metal eyelets to glue into the orifice. To make them fit, I filed down one side with my Dremel and ground down and polished the base so that the yarn would glide smoothly over it.

This worked really well to cover up the groove and prevent further erosion but again, it made threading the orifice a little difficult. I work with a slightly smaller and longer orifice reducer so it was quite fiddly to thread the single through with my orifice hook.

Maurice’s 3D-printed orifice insert covered in epoxy to reduce friction

Maurice also came up with a solution to shield the Nano 2’s orifice with a 3D-printed insert. I tried it for a little while but I found that as 3D printed items aren’t glossy smooth, I had to increase my tension further which again, slowed the wheel down.

After mulling it over for a few months I began to wonder if shielding the full circle of the orifice was absolutely necessary… I’m right-handed and I will always thread the Nano to the right so shielding the left side of the orifice felt a little redundant:

As the centre of the Nano travels at a slower speed than the flyer arms - and the Nano doesn’t reach the same speeds as the Electric Eel Wheel 6, would it be an issue to use just part of the metal eyelet to shield the orifice? After all, this was the best solution I’d come up with so far. The metal eyelet gave me the smoothest spin with longer-term protection than a 3D-printed insert; it was only threading the yarn that was the issue.

If it works, I can always add the same shielding to the reverse side which will balance the flyer a little better anyway.

Cutting Down a Metal Eyelet to Shield the Nano 2.0 Orifice

With my Dremel Flex shaft positioned firmly in a vice, I used a sanding disc to cut a flat edge into the metal eyelet.

I stopped frequently to check the fit. (Unfortunately, I cut off slightly more than necessary but that’s just an aesthetics issue.)

With my Dremel Flex shaft still in the vice, I cut the eyelet in half using a cutting disc. (This is actually the second version I’ve made of this version. The first time I tried it I didn’t leave enough protection at the bottom and my yarn would occasionally get stuck on the sharp bottom left edge so the additional width at the base is necessary.)

I returned to the sanding disc to file down the base of the eyelet and round off the sharp corners. I kept placing it in the orifice and feeling with my finger underneath, filing it down until the base of the eyelet was just long enough to protect the plastic of the Nano without being in the way.

Finally, to ensure that the yarn didn’t catch on any burrs on the eyelet edge I rounded and polished the lower edge of the eyelet until it felt glossy and smooth against my fingers.

I then used a two-part epoxy to glue the metal eyelet section in place.

...Several months later, my partial shielding of the orifice with a section of metal eyelet is still working well for me and I've experienced no issues with the slightly unbalanced flyer. The black enamel coating has worn away, revealing the brass of the eyelet underneath but it shouldn’t get any worse than this.

I’m so pleased to have finally found a solution that has allowed me to fall in love with the Nano again! It was touch and go there for a little while…

Changing the Yarn Guides to 3D-Printed Ceramic Ring Guides

The day I opened my Kickstarter Nano 2, I switched out the plastic yarn guides for some wire split ring guides made out of 0.8mm jewellery wire. I much prefer super-smooth guides and I felt that the original plastic guides had too large a surface area and, being made of plastic, are much more likely to add unnecessary friction. Reducing the friction on the yarn means that I don’t have to increase the tension as much and I can therefore increase the maximum speed that the Nano is capable of when the bobbin is at its fullest.

You can see the video of how I made wire yarn guides for my Nano 1.0 here.

Unfortunately, as the Nano 2 arms are narrower, more flexible, and don’t unscrew like the ones on the earlier models, over time, my wire yarn guides became a little wonky and loose so I thought I’d have a go at designing some ceramic yarn guides.

I have ceramic yarn guides on my Hansencrafts Minispinner and, as I’d already bought the ceramic rings to try to fix the eroding orifice, it was the next logical step for me to have a go at designing ceramic yarn guides for the Nano.

NB, my yarn guides use a size #16 ceramic ring. I was unable to find a set containing just this size on Amazon.com, but this pack has 4 of the necessary ceramic rings. If you are in the UK, this set on Amazon.co.uk contains just size #16 ceramic rings.

My 3D-printed yarn guides fit snugly on the Nano 2 flyer arms and a little shrink tubing is added for friction. The addition of tubing means that the guides flex a little which helps to hold them in place. This does also mean that I needed to use a different plastic to the regular PLA filament I used in the beginning.

Over time, I found that my PLA yarn guides expanded due to flexing, and became loose so I reprinted them in PETG. After several months, they’re still holding on nicely.

I used a 2 part epoxy to glue the size #16 ceramic ring in place. I put down grease-proof paper to protect my work surface and pressed it down with a cocktail stick to protect my fingers.

I then wiped off the excess glue with kitchen roll.

I cut 4 x 5mm lengths of 4.5mm heat shrink tubing and threaded them onto the open end of the yarn guides.

It’s then just a case of pushing the tubing down until it sits snuggly over the corner of the lower section. (I wouldn’t advise actually heat shrinking the tubing as this can easily distort the 3D printed plastic. Ask me how I know…)

The shrink tubing sits discreetly under the flyer arm, adding just enough grip to hold the yarn guide in place while still making them easy enough to move with one hand.

If you would like to print your own yarn guides, you can find the stl file here -

These are provided free for personal use and not for resale. Snortimer’s hub designed the original ceramic yarn guides for the Nano and they can be purchased here.

Fix for the free-rotating tension knob

One issue a lot of Nano 2.0 users have experienced is that the tension knob will rotate back due to the pull of the tension band. I spin with very light tension on the Nano, so this isn’t something I’ve experienced myself but I thought I’d share the solution that has worked for other spinners here, and make the modification to my Nano 2.0 at the same time.

A lot of people find that just tightening the screw helps to fix the problem. However, a more secure way to prevent the tension knob from rotating when it’s pulled on is to add something behind the tension knob to create friction and hold it in position. Firstly, I used a screwdriver to release the knob from the wheel.

Spinners that have carried out this fix recommend placing a rubber or silicone washer between the knob and the wheel. I couldn’t find either of these at my local DIY store, and I didn’t want to send off for 50 washers online so I decided to make my own. I cut little circles out of a silicone sheet I had already, and then punched holes in the middle with my Crop-a-dile.

I threaded one of my makeshift silicone washers onto the screw. If you don’t have any spare sheets of silicone lying around, a piece of rubber or nitrile glove would probably do the job.

It’s then just a case of screwing the knob back on tightly and wrapping the tension band around it.

Fix For the Bobbin Binding on the Flyer

If you're still having tension issues, and you're struggling to get the yarn to pull onto the bobbin, it may be that the flyer arms are too tight on the bobbin, causing it to brake, even with no tension.

When I first unboxed my Nano, I couldn't get any take-up. One of the issues was excess plastic flashing inside the orifice reducer, causing the singles to get caught. However, the main issue was that the front bearing hadn't been properly pushed on during assembly.

With my thumbs positioned on either side of the front bearing, and my fingers gripping the back of the bobbin, I gave the front bearing a firm push and felt it click into place.

You can tell if your bearing is not seated properly as less of the orifice will be visible in front of the bearing than is shown in this picture.

Another thing that can cause the bobbin to bind on the flyer is if the flyer upright supports are angled inwards slightly.

Maurice made a video about this issue that is present in a very small number of Nanos. You can see his video here. If you're not comfortable heating up the flyer arms to bend them outwards, alternatively, you could grind off a little of the plastic on the end of one of the bobbins to see if that helps to fix the problem.

Improved Orifice Reducer with a Built-in Twist Keeper

I shared my idea for an orifice reducer with incorporated slits to prevent the twist from travelling up or down the singles at the beginning of 2020. My own design has evolved a little since then and I’ve seen many 3D printing companies selling their own versions.

Mine now has a section behind the front to wrap a good long length of singles around, and I doubled the number of slits - purely to save rotating my arthritic wrists… there’s always a slit in the right position regardless of where it stops.

I might pop my Nano into a bag 2 or 4 times a day and this helps to prevent too much twist travelling down into my fibre while it’s still attached to the wheel. It also acts as a secure place to repeatedly hold the twist in the end of my singles whilst preparing my next handful of fibre when I'm spinning from the fold or just grabbing for my next rolag.

You can download my updated Nano orifice reducer here.

Again, this is provided free for personal use and not for resale.

Blanking Plate for the Nano 2 Base

In my blog post about the modifications I made to my Nano1.1 I wrote about how I'd managed to attach it to my battery for increased portability -

Well, my needs have changed a little since then. I originally attached it to the battery so that I could pick up everything I needed to start spinning with one hand and take it up or downstairs. That battery was pretty large but it didn't matter too much as I wasn't travelling far with it.

Over the last year, I've been taking my Nano out to more craft and spinning groups which means I have to pack it away in a bag and walk a short distance with it so, (with a chronic spinal condition), the weight and size of the battery became really important to me.

I needed the Nano to be even more portable and lightweight which meant using a much smaller battery that didn’t attach to the base.

I designed and wove myself a little bag that’s just big enough to hold the Nano, switch, a tiny battery and 50g of fibre above the wheel. .

With the smaller woven bag, I found myself fumbling to pull the Nano out as I don’t like putting my hand underneath the Nano and touching the exposed motor, wiring, and circuitry so I designed a base plate to protect the internal wizardry from my clumsy hands. I can now happily grab hold of the Nano by sliding my hand underneath and it all just feels a lot more solid.

The suction cup feet are perfect for holding the Nano bottom in place. An added bonus is that with a thicker base, the feet don’t fall off nearly as often as they used to.

You can download and print your own base for the Nano here -

These can be downloaded for resale, but please mention this blog post as the original source for the design idea.

Orifice Hook with a Kumihimo Cord

I love the little orifice hook that comes with the Nano but it does have a tendency to get knocked off the tiny little magnets. After losing one and struggling to find a spare, I decided I needed to put it on some kind of leash to attach it to the wheel. That way I would never lose an orifice hook again.

I've seen spinners tie the hooks to their wheels with ribbon or yarn but I didn't want it to be permanently attached.

I came up with the idea of threading the whole thing through a large jump ring so that I could remove it easily if I needed to, but otherwise, it would always be on my wheel. The cord also makes it a lot easier to see from a distance, or just prevents it from getting lost in general - I’m far less likely to lose it down the side of the couch with a long cord attached!

You can read how I made the kumihimo cord for my Nano orifice hook here.

Extension Cable for the Switch

I usually spin with my Nano to my right side, an arm’s length away. As the Nano is not in my eye-line and I tend to avoid rapid movements, I needed to find a way to turn it off quickly without having to lunge for the wheel.

I bought myself a Micro USB extension cable for the supplied Nano switch and I can now sit with the switch and battery in my lap without the requirement to reach out quickly to turn the Nano off. It also means that my hands are pretty much in the correct position when I’m ready to start spinning again.

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Testing my Modified Nano by Spinning a Core-spun Yarn

I read so many spinners on the Electric Eel Wheel Facebook group saying that the Nano is only really suited to spinning fine, smooth yarns so I thought I’d challenge this belief on my modified Nano 2. Now that I’ve improved the tension system, shielded the orifice, and installed ceramic yarn guides, my Nano 2 should be much more capable of spinning a lumpy, bumpy textured yarn.

I keep a big basket in my craft room, purely for storing my combing waste. When inspiration strikes (or my basket starts to overflow) I like to turn it into something fun!

I managed to spin this highly textured core-spun yarn from combing waste which required a responsive, firm pull from the tension system at a very low speed.

Admittedly, I had to split this bouncy, fluffy, core-spun yarn over two bobbins, and I still only managed to fit 30g* across both bobbins, but I did manage to produce a very usable weaving yarn with no issues at all. I’m pretty pleased with that!

*(For reference, I usually manage to fit between 55g and 65g of fine yarn onto a Nano bobbin.)

The Future Nano 2.1

With the Nano, Maurice wanted to design and manufacture a spinning wheel that was as affordable as possible, to make spinning accessible to anyone who might simply be curious about spinning but didn’t want to make the significant investment of buying a regular, full-sized spinning wheel. Unfortunately, the original basic design meant that sometimes a little tinkering was necessary, which is not ideal when you’re new to spinning.

I regularly read other spinners on the Electric Eel Wheel Facebook Group telling newcomers to the forum that the Nano is not the best starter wheel. In the past, I would always recommend the Electric Eel Wheel 6 over the Nano as it would be challenging for a non-spinner to pinpoint the source of a particular tension issue, especially if there is more than one factor at play.

Maurice Ribble is a regular contributor to the Electric Eel Wheel Facebook Group and the Electric Eel Wheel Ravelry page. He has taken on board all of the issues that spinners have with the Nano to bring out an upgraded version of the Nano 2, which is far less finicky and much more suited to beginners than earlier models.

I’m a product tester for Dreaming Robots, and I’ve recently been testing the Nano 2.1, which is due to be released later this year. In my opinion, this is a much more significant upgrade than the name modestly suggests. The difference between spinning on this and an 'out-of-the-box' Nano 2.0 is huge! I personally think that the Nano 3 would be a more fitting name to reflect the massively improved spinning experience. -

The Nano 2.1 has a completely redesigned flyer with a tilted orifice, making it much more forgiving of beginner yarns.
The flyer is made from glass-reinforced nylon, which firmly tackles the problem of yarn eroding the flyer orifice.
The tension knob now stays solidly in place when you turn the tension right up.
The yarn guides are much more rounded, reducing friction and the need for additional tension.
The bobbins have bearings at either end to reduce bobbin chatter, are much more open in design, and now only have one brake band pulley end to avoid confusion.
The Nano 2.1 now uses a spring and cord tension system and is much more responsive than the original elastic tension system.

With affordability at the heart of the Electric Eel Wheel range, Maurice is also planning to sell an upgrade kit for Nano 2.0 owners, allowing them to purchase just the improved flyer, bobbins, and tension system to fit to their existing Nano 2.0 without the expense of a completely new spinning wheel.

Phew! Well done if you’ve made it to the end! As you might have guessed, I will always have a soft spot for the Nano, regardless of model. It’s a very capable little wheel with ultra Spin Anywhere portability. I’m so pleased that the future Nano 2.1 will finally be a brilliant beginner’s spinning wheel too.

If you've found any of this post interesting or useful, please pin this image to Pinterest. It makes a big difference to me and helps other spinners find it too.

At this point, I normally suggest similar related blog posts, however, my list of spinning-related content is becoming a little unmanageable... If you'd like to read more blog posts about spinning and fibre preparation, please take a look at this page here where you will find links to all of my spinning and fibre articles.

Thank you for reading, and happy spinning!

Craft me Happy!

Learning How to Make Patterned Christmas Pom Pom Baubles

Materials I used to make patterned pom pom baubles

My First (Failed) Attempt - A Christmas Tree Pom Pom

My Second Attempt - Another Christmas Tree Pom Pom.

Reverse engineering my pom pom design

Christmas Pudding Pom Pom Bauble

Poinsettia Pom Pom Bauble

Star pom pom

Snow-topped striped pom pom bauble

Questionable Blend number 11 - Twinkle Twinkle

Twinkle Twinkle

Spinning Twinkle Twinkle 4 Different Ways

Spinning from the Fold - Short Draw

Splitting the Top Vertically

Hand Combing a Gradient

Making Blending Board Pencil Roving

"For the Love of Wool" Wreath

Some of my other related blog posts -

How to Knit Curlicues or Spirals

Knitted and Felted Beads

A Spectrum of Knitted Beads

Knitted Beads Instructions

Circular Cast-On

Finishing the Bead

Felting the Beads in the Washing Machine

Size Variations

The Possibilities

Related Blog Posts -

How to Knit Curlicues or Spirals

Modifications, Fixes and Upgrades for the Electric Eel Wheel Nano 2

The Tension System

Shielding to Prevent Flyer Erosion

Cutting Down a Metal Eyelet to Shield the Nano 2.0 Orifice

Changing the Yarn Guides to 3D-Printed Ceramic Ring Guides

Fix for the free-rotating tension knob

Fix For the Bobbin Binding on the Flyer

Improved Orifice Reducer with a Built-in Twist Keeper

Blanking Plate for the Nano 2 Base

Orifice Hook with a Kumihimo Cord

Extension Cable for the Switch

Testing my Modified Nano by Spinning a Core-spun Yarn

The Future Nano 2.1