SAFF 2015 part one

Dear friend J and I had a lovely SAFF weekend...

here are some photos...

first up an enlightening course on making yarns for fractal spinning...Esther Rodgers inspired me to actually try to use my acquired drum carder...

Of course I forgot to bring my wheel. The woman sitting next to me just "happened" to have an extra Kromski in her car...many thanks to Cindy!

Of course, her are some sheepy kisses

Burn Test or...I am still learning to spin or...we pass our fiber knowledge down in ways we would never guess

So in this prior post I described acquiring some unknown fiber (as well as a new wheel and a drum carder...)

Here is a photo of some unknown fiber that was in the acquisition

I really couldn't tell what it was, other than very very soft.  I spun up a bit; if it was wool I felt that it had a lot of short clips in it.  Despite the softness I felt that it would only make a really thick and thin kind of yarn (not my preference). The staple length is very short...2 or 3 inches. My guess was cormo but the short clips/flecks are lighter in color.

Now, this autumn I took on a large task and taught a  course on for Life Long Learning of Hilton Head this fall.  The topic: What We Wore : Home Based Cloth Production Prior to the Industrial Revolution.  Here's a couple photos of me trying to be erudite

(I am hardly a weaver, I'm sure I'm laughing at a blunder, at least two women in the audience were experienced weavers).

In the process of prepping for this lecture I pulled out a stray boat shuttle that I received as part of the acquisition.  

I used to weave a little and always thought that boat shuttles were pretty clever...

and when I got it out I realized what the former owner (who has now passed) had spun the mystery fiber that is on the shuttle

Nice huh?

We pass our fiber knowledge down in ways we would never guess...my lesson: go back and get better at spinning!


So, I decided to do the burn test to analyze the fiber, directions here: 

Yep, burns and smells like wool...that may be the most I'll ever know!

FO: Sacre Coeur

I finished Sacre Coeur and I may have a new shawl model, my friend Cheryl

as well as a new favorite designer,  Nim Teasdale. This is a free pattern

I used one strand of Malabrigo Lace, which I thought might be too mushy-felty so I combined it with a strand of Habu silk stainless in lighter pink, and of course added the beads per the pattern.  This was enjoyable to knit and I would recommend the pattern, which is a crescent shaped, top down, modular pattern. Be sure to peruse Nim's other patterns, very lovely ...

Bunny Planet...Yep, I did it

Why yes, I've gone and done it. There are bunnies in the house.

I looked back at Ravelry; I have been a member of the Angora Bunny group since 2009 meaning that I was thinking about it even before the minor commitment of even joining the group!

So my friend new friend and farmer Heidi brought over 6 bunnies one sunday last month. My neice was pretty excited too. Eventually she and I decided on two sisters,  white and reddish/fawn.

Preparation/ cage assembly:

Names: Rosa and Blanca.

Both cats and bunnies are nonplussed with each other. Here, Fiona climbs over Blanca. 

Handfeeding is recommended by my local animal training/operant conditioning expert, (that would be Malmaid), to make friends. 

Thus far I have been combing them out to get fur and there has been a small amount of trimming. They are living in my kitchen (yes I know that might be yucky) so there is a lot of floor mopping going on.  I live somewhere HOT.  But I LOVE having them in the kitchen where we can talk.  They are much for comfortable / less nervous now and approach me for treats when I walk in the kitchen.  They will be out on my porch when the weather here in SC cools.  It may be a while till I have enough to spin!


And...yes, it's Labor Day.  Just when I feel the world is going to hell in a handbasket, I see an image like this and see how far we've come (compare this little one's expression with my niece's above).  This image was taken in Newberry, SC 100 years ago.  Thank you to Lewis Hine for using photography to change our world for the better.

Felting and Eco Dyeing Chez Margo

My dear friend Margo over at HermajestyMargo lives nearby.  Her blog is at HermajestyMargo. She does beautiful work. She invited myself and several other friends for a day of felting and ecodyeing. Here are some photos:

the upstairss studio

outdoor dye shed

(It's a bullet steamer)

Margo has two books on felting on Amazon!

My old-new Louet S 15

I was lucky; I "came into" a new wheel. I knew someone who new someone who was getting rid of her Mom's fiber equipment. I visited and purchased...

Louet drum carder

Something with alot of 2nd cuts but horribly soft...cormo?

Clemes and Clemes carders

I am the proud new owner of a Louet S 15 wheel, no idea of the date. This is a bobbin lead spinning wheel.  According to Babe's Fiber Garden,  

If whorl is rigidly connected to bobbin, it's bobbin lead wheel. In this case a brake is applied to flyer whorl and this arrangement is called Irish, or German tension. Bobbin lead wheels are better suited for spinning heavier weight yarns, they usually have quite powerful take up, and fine adjustments are somehow tricky. As you spin, you hold yarn under tension and bobbin and flyer rotate together. As soon as you relax your tension and let yarn go, flyer stalls because of the brake, and bobbin continues to rotate, and yarn gets wound on the bobbin.

If whorl is rigidly connected to flyer it is flyer lead wheel, then the brake is applied to bobbin whorl and it's called Scotch tension (Babe calls it wonder tension). These wheels are very versatile, you can spin any weight of yarn on Scotch tension wheel; as wheel size and orifice size would allow. As long as you hold yarn under tension, flyer and bobbin rotate in sync. As soon as tension is released, bobbin slows down and flyer continues to rotate at the same speed, thus the yarn gets wound on the bobbin. Scotch tension is very sensitive and it allows you to spin very fine yarn on Scotch tension, or flyer lead wheels.

Double drive is a differential speed arrangement. Double drive wheel has drive band go twice around wheel - one time around the flyer whorl and second time around the bobbin whorl. This arrangement causes the flyer and bobbin to rotate at different speed all the time (they have to be different diameter, or there will be no take up) and provides very steady take up. Many people find double drive wheel tricky to handle and these are definitely more difficult to build.

Yes, it's true, I should have learned all this some years ago!  OK, so apparently I have a very different wheel than my Ashford...can't wait to try it, perhaps it will be good for plying!  I have a "footman replacement kit" ready to go and then I may be in business.  I later figured out that the yarn winder mounts on top of the wheel...clever...