It's been awhile...

I haven't really been accomplishing much though.  I worked on the Harp's log cabin project yesterday, and can see light at the end of the tunnel.  Once I get that off the loom I'm hoping to finish the Brooks Bouquet project on the Flip, and then finish the rug.  By then I will have thoroughly checked out Sara Lamb's new weaving book for a new project. :-)  I'm semi-tempted to try out the floor loom too - maybe over Christmas I'll get around to that.

In spinning news, the bobbins are almost full on both the Polonaise and the Production. WHEW!  And I finally fixed (I think) the annoying click from the Pol's footman having a little too much travel by stuffing some wool in-between the metal rod and the wooden dowel.  But I have a lot of spinning left to do on all my projects (maybe I shouldn't have so much going at once?).

Since everything looks the same, I didn't take any photos.  It rained all day so I couldn't even get a decent nature pic.  Maybe next time. :-)

Even more spinning...

I haven't spent as much time spinning this weekend as I thought would, but yesterday I worked on this on the Production:

  

colonial wool roving

because I really really really want to start this:

merino

And I worked on this:

mill-end wool roving on the Bulky Pinkie

And then today I worked a tiny bit on this:

Coopworth on the Pedal Pusher + spindle

this:

Wensleydale lamb/yearling & kid mohair/tussah silk/silk noils

and this:

Corriedale cross on the Navajo spindle

But not enough to make obvious progress.  I'm hoping to do some more on the Navajo (I really need to shorten the shaft) tonight, plus some Spindolyn-spinning.

And maybe I'll do some weaving this week - anything is possible! :-)


In closing, a photo of Comfort Dog! :-D

Yet another spinning post!

But first - we had a bad storm a couple of weeks ago, and I lost my favorite willow tree. :-(

It also severely damaged the cotton plant, so I picked the largest bolls and put them on my dehydrator a la Spin-Off's latest issue:

One boll pretty much popped open on it's own, but the rest needed a lot of help - I don't know if they will be any good (and I forgot to take a picture of them opened).  But I'll probably plant the seeds from this year's 'crop' next year - it's a neat plant with beautiful flowers, and I have a better spot for them than where I planted this one.  And if I don't want to spin the cotton, I know a couple of people who would take it off my hands. :-)


Yesterday was a fun day - I went to the not-so-local fiber fair with a couple of spinning friends, and a great time was had by all. :-D  Though I was considerably lighter in the wallet by the time I got home, because I bought:

Some border leicester:

The white has that sparkly stuff already blended in ('angelique'?), and I bought a package of coppery sparkly stuff to blend with the reddish/brown BL.  I've not spun BL before, but one my friends just loves it, and these were softer than I expected.

BFL:

I've not spun BFL before either, though I did buy some cloud (I think) several years ago - it's still languishing in my fiber stash. :-/  This is plain ol' (sooft) roving.

Some merino (I'm itching to get to that purple!):

I've spun a merino blend before, but not straight merino.  The red isn't particularly soft, but it may be due to the dye.

Corriedale cross:

Not quite as soft (I'm noticing a theme here) as most of what I bought, but I loved the color. 

These wool blends are surprisingly soft:

I'm currently thinking of spinning the non-stripey ball on the Pinkie for bulky yarn.  Maybe. 

My almost-favorite purchase:

Black mohair.  Super soft and soo lustrous!  It's in lock form, so I'm probably crazy for not buying it with more prep, but it's such a beautiful black with a bit of silver-gray I couldn't resist. :-)  I have enough to try spinning it from the locks, and trying combing and carding it to see which way I like it (a friend said I could use her drum carder if I decided to go that route).  I've not spun straight mohair before so I'm not sure which prep to go with.  I would like to keep it 'lustrous', so it seems like that would mean combing, if not straight spinning from the locks.  I might spin this on the Tenor Spindolyn once I get the milk fiber finished.

But the neatest stuff I bought:

Silk top in coppery-sunny colors.  So outside my usual color choices but wow do I love how it looks.  I will probably spin this on the Liten Spindel.  I want to get spinning on this too (need lots of lotion on my hands first though :-/)!

This time I tried to stay away from my usual color picks, because I'm drawn to blues/blue-greens and darker browns.  The silk and the various reddish colors are definitely a departure for me (though I'm doing that red colonial on the Production these reds are quite different from what I would usually pick) - it will be interesting to see what they look like spun!  I really didn't need any more fiber, but what you see here is all of it, so I didn't buy pounds and pounds - I'd never get them spun if I did!  And I still have those awesome batts from Corgi Hill to do - I need to get to spinning!

I need to go shorten one of the Navajo spindles a smidgen, and put some Danish oil on the shaft, and then I will start matching fiber to wheels. :-D


Your parting nature shot:.

My hometown, last weekend: :-D

My, how the time flies!

I've been traveling a lot lately, and not crafting much.  But...

Here is the milk fiber on the Tenor Spindolyn:

I tried spinning it on the Pinkie, but the Pinkie has just too much pull-in even though this is a long-stapled fiber - it's really slippery and I don't move my hands fast enough.  I really like how soft it is, and how soft it stays once spun up.  I think I'll ply this with the super-soft black alpaca I spun on the other Spindolyn (I need more Spindy spindles!).  This probably isn't my favorite fiber of all time to spin, but I do like spinning it - especially on the Spindolyn! :-D

And I've done a tiny bit of knitting (last night) on the capelet:

I've almost finished the bottom edge ribbing, and then I need to pick up and knit the collar and button bands.


We've been doing a bit of woodworking - we made this for a spinning friend:

Didn't Hubby do a nice job on the walnut whorl?!

Here are our first and second Navajo spindles:

And the next two - the walnut one is for another spinning friend - but the cherry is MINE, all MINE. :-D

And I'm trying to make a knitting sheath: 

I'm actually going to try using it with the Spindolyn, for those times when the Spindy base isn't quite as easy to use. 


And I have a 'brilliant' idea regarding the Pedal Pusher and the spindle attachment, but I'm going to keep mum until I see if it works at all. :-)

Holy cow!

I just realized how late it is and that I missed doing a blog post last week!  Though I really didn't have much to show - and actually still don't.

I did spin, ply, and wash the green batt.  I used the Bulky Pinkie for this, and became a more attentive and better ply-er because of it. :-)

That is a quarter instead of the usual dime to show how thick the yarn is.  It's still not a very soft yarn, even after washing; but it is very squishy and it's probably soft enough for a hat.  It's 4-ply and the singles were averaging about 14-16 wpi. :-D  Wow is it hard to spin a thicker single but I loved how it turned out!! 

I also washed some more of the churro fleece today.  Since I want to spin from the locks this is a lot more labor-intensive than a usual fleece-washing.

I have maybe 4 ounces washed so far.

Last week I bought a beautiful pair of batts from Corgi Hill Farm on Etsy - now I just need to figure out how to preserve those beautiful colors while I'm spinning it.  (I forgot to take a picture today - I'll try to remember for the next post). 

Along with the alpaca I also bought from her, she sent along a sample of milk fiber.  Interesting-looking stuff, very fine and silky.  From what little I've been able to find on it so far, it's best spun from the fold so I'll be learning another new technique. :-D  I want to do the milk fiber on the Pinkie since it's a slower wheel (and it's the only wheel that doesn't have a project on it right now).  I think I'll finish up the bobbin of colonial on the Production and then try the new batt on that wheel - that will give me time to get a better idea of best to spin it.

I haven't done a lick of weaving, for some reason I'm really into spinning right now.  Maybe next time?

Not bad...

I was inspired by a comment a spinning friend made, and while straightening out my upstairs fiber stash decided to try my newest drop spindle (yes, I buy them - I don't use them but I buy them) with the small number of Perendale rolags I came across:

I didn't 'drop' it once (it did come unwound from the shaft once); and I've learned at least this Perendale is not particularly pleasant to spin - it feels surprisingly coarse. The spun yarn has a bit of a sheen to it though, so we'll see how it is once plyed and washed. I still prefer my Spindolyns, but it's nice to see that I can now (finally!) spin on a drop spindle. :-D


I have one cotton plant this year - it's kind of fun even though I don't especially like spinning cotton. I took pictures of two of the flowers and one boll:



It looks like I'll have a little bit of cotton this year!

Still spinnin' away...

I've really been into spinning lately. Maybe next weekend I'll get back to weaving. :-)

Here is a picture of the Bulky Pinkie with the spindle attachment installed:

Nice-to-spin Coopworth:
Though the setup worked pretty well, I didn't like having the spindle that low so I've put it back on the Pedal Pusher. Here's a better picture of it on the PP (sorry it's a bit out-of-focus again):


I put the delta flyer back on the Pinkie and started spinning this Romney batt:
Since the batt is in layers, I thought I'd try rolling them up and trying to draft like rolags, but it didn't work well at all. I'm probably going to have to strip it instead. This batt is very harsh-feeling, and there seems to be quite a few nepps in it. :-( I'm going to do a 4-ply with it and count it as practice, unless it ends up a lot better finished than it is now.


I also finished the black super-sooooft alpaca on the Spindolyn, and started the gray to ply with it - YUCK.

The gray is 'hairy'! Though the hairs aren't stiff, there are a LOT of them and they stick out all over the spun yarn, and not in a good way. I'm hating spinning it. Not sure what I'll end up doing with it, but thankfully there is not much there so I don't feel too bad about giving it to the birds next spring (unless I think of something else to do with it).

I sat down at the Polonaise to spend an half-hour spinning on her - I was going to rotate amongst all the wheels today - and the next thing I knew "The Mummy Returns" was over and 2 hours had gone by! I was really hoping to get to the Pedal Pusher too - I really need the spindle practice. But... we just discovered DH's computer has been infected by a trojan/virus so I'm helping him with that (always always ALWAYS update your anti-virus program daily; and check that your firewall is running and run at least two trojan/virus checkers every so often - weekly is usually good enough).


The big news is - I bought my first fleece!!



It's Navajo-churro lamb. If how much I was able to get done yesterday just picking out locks (it's hard to see the locks in a lot of it), shaking out the v-m, putting them in netting to soak (no soap) is any indication, it's going to take me YEARS to get it ready to spin - if I'm only spinning from the locks (current plan). Luckily I was smart enough to split the fleece with a friend, so I don't have to do it all. But it does remind me why I buy my spinning fiber mostly-ready-to-spin. This will be a good learning experience, but not something I will do very often.