FO: Yarn swifts

Finished these nearly a fortnight ago but have been unable to photograph them until now.

These are the yarn swifts made of my own two hands. They took a very long time (6 weeks of woodworking classes) to make and when they were done, I cried because I am a sook and because I've never made anything from wood before. I call them "Adam".

These are made of jarrah, with a pine dowel as the spindle and I am very proud of them. I was going to sell one but find I am unable to part with either of them just yet.

To my great relief, they work. They will go at high speed with a ball winder and not topple over or try to take flight.

Yarn swifts look simple to make. They are not. It's not just me who says this, my very experienced woodwork teacher thinks so, too. I didn't have a pattern. I copied the dimensions from a really horrible old swift I bought of eBay at an inflated price, made some alterations to the design (natch) and made everything from scratch. Next term I'm making more swifts, but in a simpler design. To do them I'll need to shape wood, so I had a practice with the lathe on Monday night and made these.

Idiosyncratic 12mm dpns made from pine dowel. They aren't quite done yet. I have to steam the timber to get the marks out made by the clamp on the lathe, lightly sand and then estapol them. They will either be great dpns for all that floofy wool I bought not so long ago, or I'll be able to trade Buffy something for them.