Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Chop Suey


How do you make pretty spindle shafts when you don't have a lathe?


Use chopsticks.


Neither of these whorls go particularly well with the chopsticks that I had on hand, but they do illustrate the principle. It was tricky to poke a hole in the top of the stick for the hook- both had a sort of plastic end-cap. However, the stick that didn't have a topper, split when I screwed the hook in, so it's worth wrestling with the cap.


Both of these spindles weigh 1.1ozs, both are 9 3/4" long, and both spin just fine (a teeny bit of wobble, but the whorls weren't made for spindles, they were made for jewelry, so they're not perfectly balanced).


I have more chopsticks on the way (different colors and designs) and I'll probably switch the whorls out when those arrive (that's the nice thing about grommets- no glue makes for easy mix-n-match). I use opened screw eyes for the hooks, so I can buy most of my *ingredients* at Menards.

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