The Apple Creek Farm

After knitting for about two decades, about a handful of years ago I wanted to get into spinning with wool. I couldn’t afford a new wheel, or even a used wheel – but I found that my area of the world had a whole lot of antique great wheels. Great wheels are actually wonderful to start on because they spin using a spindle, which is a very simple mechanism. – I have a growing number of rescued great wheels, they’re so beautiful and functional!

My humble means launched me into researching great wheels so I could figure out how to purchase an antique that was in a usable condition. That rabbit trail led to other historical spinning methods, and I purchased my first drop spindle just to be able to participate in the annual, historical spinners holiday: Distaff Day.

In the meantime, my husband and I decided to move our family, including 7 children, to the country. Where we bought an 1850s farmhouse with a little barn, and got some chickens and goats, who are pretty spoiled.

Through a series of rather divine appointments, I found myself invited to demonstrate the medieval distaff at the WNY Fiber Fest. At that point I was using a modern drop spindle with my distaff but wanted to properly demonstrate using a medieval spindle and whorl. I made my first spindles by sanding down and hand carving cheap wood knitting needles. And made my first whorls using air dry clay.

Researching became my new favorite way to unwind, and I got this wild idea to ask a family friend, who happened to make historically inspired banjos, if he would be interested in making some historically accurate tools for me. They came out astonishingly wonderful!

As time went on we quickly outgrew his capacity to stock the store, so I got a lathe, and set to work! Over the months leading up to the Christmas season of 2025 I had lots and lots of opportunities to hone my skills, and now make most of our fiber tools myself. Which gives me a lot of freedom make replicas of spindles and distaffs from digital museum archives and artwork.

At the same time, my in person opportunities have continued to grow. Apart from regularly demonstrating historical spinning, I have also found opportunities to teach historical and modern spindle spinning.

So much of this has seemingly falling into my lap that I’m just following where it goes. We have lots of big plans and ideas, like the little row of fiber flax we started this year, and researching sheep to see which breed would suit our needs best.

We have so much fun tinkering, making, and researching over here – it’s an honor and a joy to make you heirloom quality tools and gifts!