Carrying on tradition

by Robin Nistock –

I learned to spin in the mid 1980s.  My parents kept a flock of sheep and I was determined to learn how to turn that lovely wool into yarn.  When I married in 1990, a small group of sheep from that flock came with me and formed the foundation of the flock we have now.

I joined the Genesee Valley Handspinners Guild in the early 1990s and I was there to help start the Finger Lakes Fiber Festival in 1994. Our business, Nistock Farms, is a full time sheep farm which produces lovely raw fleeces for handspinners and other wool products from our flock – prepared fiber for spinning, mill spun yarn, quilt batting, books and many other sundries.

Andy, my husband, is an excellent woodworker and has developed a line of tools using lumber from our own forest for the fiber artist.  Skein winders, blending boards, lazy kates, rug hooking and punch

needle frames are all carefully crafted one by one to ensure quality items that will serve the user for decades.   

The guild and festival grew in parallel to our business and we have been intimately acquainted along the way.  Although we don’t have a brick and mortar store we do attend several other area fiber festivals yearly and sell worldwide through our online store (www.nistockfarms.com). 

We strive to keep our animals happy and healthy and in return they give us amazing wool.  We love being able to introduce people to the fiber world and tell them a story of exactly where their wool or spinning tools came from.  I still spin but I usually save it for a guild meeting as it feels like a guilty pleasure to spend time doing it when there is so much other work to do.  I have many projects planned….. I just have to live past 100 to do them all!