A Few Thoughts About Ren Fest, the MN Gem & Mineral Show, and Spinning Wheels

DH and I had a lovely final day of Renaissance Festival. The Fest itself does go for another week, but we'll be at the MN Gem and Mineral Show this coming Sunday instead of driving out to the far Western suburbs of the Metro area. 

Having the Gem & Mineral Show at the State 
Fairgrounds makes it SUPER convenient for 
us to get to, and quite a quick drive. They use 
the "Dairy Building" which allows plenty of space, 
and also has a generous exterior "field" where 
their outside vendors can set up their stalls. 

I had hoped to pick up my scarf yesterday, but Kate didn't have it completed yet. She'll contact me when it's ready and we'll arrange for a delivery or a mail shipment. We did get a chance to chat for a bit, though. Apparently she recently purchased a spinning wheel - I don't know whether it's one of the newer electric models or the old-fashioned foot operated ones that I prefer, but I suspect I'll find out. Kate and I are clicking well as friends - sharing many aspects of her love for fiber and fabric. In any case, she's finding spinning to be a challenge - which it usually is for the first sweater or two (or six - LOL). It's not quite as easy as sitting down with a handful of fleece and ending up with a beautifully even yarn. 

My first spinning wheel was similar to this one, 
you would be seated and use the large center 
pedal to move the wheel and that movement would 
direct twist into the wool (or other material such as 
silk or cotton). I still have all of my wheels - I have 
four of them - and each one is quite different. 

Anyway, it's back to the standard work week today. We did purchase our season tickets for Ren Fest at the box office yesterday. They don't sell the season tickets at their deepest discounts until the final two weeks of the current Fest. So we got our tickets purchased for next year, and I'm already missing people whom I only see on Sundays in August and September - LOL. 

My largest wheel is this style - a Rachel Brown Rio Grande 
Spinning Wheel. I adore this wheel. It's smooth as silk to 
operate and you can really move some serious fiber. They use 
this style of wheel at Tierra Wools near Ghost Ranch, New 
Mexico. They make glorious wraps, ruanas and ponchos there 
using this wheel. 

I had been wanting some onion rings, but it came down to a choice between a bowl of Pho or onion rings and I chose the Pho. I didn't have enough tummy room for both treats, so I skipped the rings. The Pho was delicious, as always, so I think it was a good choice. And the scale agreed with me this morning when it said I was down from yesterday's weight, although not by much. Since I'm at my ideal weight range these days, that pleased me. 

The third spinning wheel I own is a Rick Reeves 
Castle-style wheel quite similar to this one. Rick 
eventually sold his company to Schact, and 
they produce wonderful wheels, but not this 
specific style. I love the portability of this wheel. 
It's also extremely versatile, handling anything 
from heavy fleece to linen flax. 

So, I'm out of here. Time for breakfast and then I head to the shop. I hope you had a great weekend too, and that this week that we're all starting out today will be filled with joy and accomplishments (they don't have to be HUGE accomplishments - just doing something simple like keeping the kitchen clean or brushing the dog/cat every day counts as an accomplishment). Don't over-complicate your life - LOL. Slava Ukraini. 

Once More Down A Rabbit Hole - Life, Love and A Bit of History

It's my "day off" and I have hats on the brain. I have one more thing and a signature to put onto the holiday cards and then they are ready to mail out, so I'm quite close to completion on that as well. It seems that things are progressing well, but it's December 2nd and I have gifts to make for the holidays. They'll be completed on time, I have no doubt, but that knitting rabbit hole is a deep one. Every question I research raises more questions and presents more projects for me to try. 

We all go down various rabbit holes in our lives, 
although we don't always admit to it. I tend to 
dive in head-first, rather than put careful steps 
down to explore. 

In looking up "mundane" things like fingerless gloves and hats and scarves, I also came across sweaters I wanted to try and stitches where I thought "I think I can figure out how to do these". The last time I got caught in a whirlpool this strong was when I dove into Tolkien when I was starting to write again. I have never regretted that particular rabbit hole, in fact I return to it every now and again. I just have to remind myself sometimes that writing is really an activity of self-satisfaction and that I'm not writing FOR anyone, I'm writing to scratch that itch. 

There are some really cute fingerless gloves
knitting patterns out there. I'm considering 
making at least one set of these for a friend 
for a holiday gift. But, I have other things I 
have to make first. 

An earlier rabbit hole that opened up in front of me was for fiber arts - spinning and making yarns of varying weights. I had to put that down when my hands betrayed me more than twenty-five years ago, but I also was in a quandry - what do I do with the yarns I've made? I do have the one shawl on the stationary pin loom, and I'm working slowly on that. I love how it's turning out, but DH is probably correct - it's going to be two years before it is off the loom. That's OK, but it is a long time. The only other option was knitting. I wasn't a knitter, so I crocheted one sweater from yarn I had spun. Although I wore it (once), it was a disaster. The yarn was too thick and the sweater was bulky enough to substitute for armor. It left me with a dilemma of how to use the yarn I was spinning. 

Among the four spinning wheels that I 
own is this one - the Rio Grande Spinning 
Wheel, invented by Rachel Brown. It's a 
gorgeous wheel, quite large, and I first fell 
in love when them when I toured Tierra 
Wools in northern New Mexico near 
Ghost Ranch (famous because of Georgia 
O'Keeffe). This spinning wheel is amazing and 
versatile and so very easy to use. I love it. 

But, life progresses and rabbit holes close, then open, then close and then open again. I'm back to fibre arts again. I haven't sat down with any of my spinning wheels yet, but I'm knitting and happy to research stitches and projects and watch lots of YouTube videos. I have patterns I want to make and sitting at the knitting machine gives me great joy. So ... this rabbit hole, a well loved and familiar place, is as comfortable for me as Badger's hole beneath the tree in "Wind in the Willows". Grab a cup of tea and tell me about your rabbit holes. I know we all have them. 

Have an excellent day, stay safe, be kind and please wear your mask. I'll be back tomorrow. 

A New Toy - So Exciting, and What Were Your High School Songs?

Welcome to a new month. We're having an early Fall this year, probably about one full week ahead of normal schedule, so our leaves should be peaking right about now. I wanted to drive around a bit yesterday and take photos to share with all of you, but I ended up too busy to take the extra time. After a very busy morning shopping at Target and my local grocery, I took a deep breath and decided to start cleaning Sewing Cabinet #3 - the set closest to the exterior wall. 

With the exception of the manual which is slightly 
different and updated, this is exactly what I had in 
my box. An LK-150 knitting machine with all of 
the various necessary parts. It's absolutely beautiful. 

This area has been a triage location for years - an "I'll put it down here and find a place for it later" place. Those are the nightmare places, no doubt. Before diving into cleaning, however, I opened my latest present to myself. This is my Holiday Gift for me, and I'm thrilled. I bought a knitting machine, and I wanted to open the package, make sure everything had arrived in good condition, and pull the instruction booklet for reading. 

I'm a TERRIBLE knitter, and I've never been able 
to master cable stitches at all. I knit Continental 
style because my mother taught me how to knit, so 
most of my American friends are already flummoxed 
by the fact that I hold my needles and yarn differently, 
but I'm also a really poor knitter and don't find the 
process enjoyable. I'm hopeful that the machine will 
allow me to knit items quickly with much better 
tension than I was ever able to achieve. 

It's beautiful. I started research on knitting machines a month or so ago. Most of the machines that were available twenty years ago aren't any more. The industry took a dive down in the 2000's, but there are still some manufacturers out there. I went onto a lot of websites and watched a lot of You-Tube videos. I came away from my research with the idea of either a Brother or a Silver Reed machine, and the Silver Reed was the one I really wanted. 

When the machine is assembled, it looks like 
this. The yarns are drawn up and over through 
a tensioning device, then into the large 
movable carriage in the front. The carriage 
puts the yarn onto the selected needles which 
occupy the bed of the machine, rather like 
the keys on a piano. 

There were some available on Ebay, but I was reluctant. I wanted a new one, not a used one, because I wanted to make sure everything necessary was in the package. I finally started doing a serious hunt for a new LK150 and found the manufacturer in China, still selling the original machine. I really didn't want to order from China, but Amazon had it available on their website, and I knew if there were problems, I could work with them. So, I gritted my teeth and ordered it on the 22nd with an expected delivery date of mid-November to mid-December. Imagine my shock when the Fed-Ex man came through the shop door late Tuesday with an unmistakable long box. I had my knitting machine within a week of my order! 

I also ordered several different books on 
machine knitting, none of which are available 
digitally. So, I'm adding four machine knitting 
books to my crafts library and not super 
happy about the fact that digital copies 
didn't exist. But I want to learn this 
equipment. It makes no sense to spin yarn if 
I can't use or sell what I spin. 

So before I started cleaning, I unpacked the machine. It doesn't have a case, so I replaced in into the box after making sure everything was there and in good condition. I grabbed a luggage strap to put around the box and keep it closed, and put it into Sewing Cabinet #1 - the narrow one. I also put a roll of Canadian heavyweight wool into that cabinet, wool I had bought to make a short cape for DH so he could be warm at Renaissance Festival. After that, I started cleaning. It's still going to take one more week of serious clean, but I'm happy with what I accomplished so far. I also found a bunch more exquisite wool and silk for spinning - enough that I started a second "Big Bag of Wool". I'll continue the project next week. I want my area clean and able to be worked in once again. 

Top 10 Songs of 1972

• 'Smoke on the Water' Deep Purple. ...
• 'You Wear It Well' Rod Stewart. ...
• 'Rocket Man' Elton John. ...
• 'All the Young Dudes' Mott the Hoople. ...
• 'School's Out' Alice Cooper. ...
• 'Ziggy Stardust' David Bowie. ...
• 'Heart of Gold' Neil Young. ...
• 'Tumbling Dice' The Rolling Stones

On a final note, a friend posted the query of "What were the top-10 songs when you graduated High School?" That interested me - but of course, I had to at least choose Rock Songs, because that's my genre. So here's the list of the Top 10 Rock Songs in 1972, the year I graduated High School. What were yours? It's rather fun to recall memories tied to the music. I'll be back tomorrow, please stay safe and wear your mask. 

Le Tour Is Awesome Today, and My Sewing Machine is Fixed

If you have any interest in Le Tour de France, but haven't been watching it due to life getting in the way (and the fact that it's happening in September instead of June/July), today and tomorrow are the days you want to turn on your television or watch from your computer. Today, in the Alps, we'll end on a difficult up-hill climb on a very steep slope. It's the hardest stage of the Tour this year and it's a killer of a climb. If you miss every other day, catch this one. Tomorrow it's mountain after mountain in the Alps for a serious battle on the slopes. 

Stage 17 of Le Tour de France doesn't 
have as many mountain peaks as tomorrow 
will, but just look at these peaks. Two 
beyond category peaks, with the finish at the 
summit of the second. Vicious!! 

DH spent most of yesterday working on the shingles for the third section of the woodshed. Two hours into the project he texted that he had to pull apart everything he had done because it was incorrect. That was the beginning of a messy day that only ended at almost 8:00 pm when the light was fading quickly. I'll try to get some photos of the shingling this afternoon if I can get any way to take one. Because of the location, it's hard for us to see the shingles, although out next door neighbor (a professional construction dude) told DH that his work looks very professional. Whoo-hoo! 

One-and-a-half weeks ago DH was starting work 
on the shingles. It's something he's never done 
before. He's actually learned a lot, and he's very 
meticulous in his building, but it's been very 
hard. The weather hasn't cooperated either. But 
he's almost through with the roof and this 
project is almost at an end. 

Apparently DH ran short of something he needed and did a quick hardware run in late afternoon, but he decided to just leave everything set up in the backyard and take a quick run over to Menards to get whatever it was he was short of. I have no idea what component he ran short of, but he was able to finish most of the roof yesterday and that will leave bits and pieces for Thursday or Fruday. Then he'll get the side panels on and we'll be moving wood on Sunday. Joy - I'll get filthy and far more familiar with bugs and insects of all varieties while moving logs from one part of the yard to another. Still, it's been the purpose of this structure, so I'll resign myself to getting filthy while hauling things from one place to another. 

Just a reminder of what my dear sewing machine 
looked like before I sent it off for repair (this is 
not my actual machine, but the same model). 
I'm going to be very happy to welcome it back 
home again. I'd better pick up some empty 
bobbins while I'm at the shop too, since I need some. 

My sewing machine has been returned to the shop from the factory, and I'll pick it up today. I'm absolutely thrilled that it's fixed. I still have Shelf #1 to clean, but I'll do that "en-masse" by taking everything off the shelf, then reorganizing and replacing it. I got my new wool combs in yesterday's shipping and they're in my trunk right now. They're rather dangerous, and I have to make sure I have a safe place for them, but it's one more step in returning to my spinning wheels. I hope to get at least one or two more rows woven on my shawl, too. Every chance I get, I sit down at my loom to get a bit more done. It's slow work, but I'm loving it. 

I just received my set of English wool combs yesterday. 
They are vicious and dangerous, so I need to make 
sure I have appropriate storage space for them. They're 
marvelous, something I just couldn't afford when I 
was spinning 30 years ago. But I have the funds 
now, and they are an essential tool (and they'll 
make a wonderful weapon, if needed - LOL). 

On that note, I'm heading to put the trash out and have breakfast, starting my day. Have an excellent Wednesday and I'll be back tomorrow and please, be kind to one another. 

Le Tour and Fibre Arts - Dreams All Around

Today is Day 7 of Le Tour de France, and it's a hilly up and down until the final 40Km which are more-or-less flat. We're heading into the Pyrenees for two days, so this is the wind-up for some serious peaks to come. The Race has prohibited spectator vehicles from the stages in the hopes of cutting down on the crowds in these days of Pandemic, but the crowds are still there - hiking far up the mountains. The Pyrenees are always crazy with clogged narrow passages and presses of spectators from all sides, so I'll be very curious to see how many spectators will climb the peaks in the days to come. It might be a nightmare, it's impossible to say for sure. 

There's an impressive Cat 1 peak right in the middle of today's stage,
but the ending is custom made for the sprinters. Sagan lost the
Green Jersey yesterday, and he may push to get it back today. 

If you're like me and adore the mountain stages of Le Tour, here are the days you want to be watching: 

Saturday and Sunday, September 4 & 5 - the Pyrenees
Friday, September 13th - the Massif Central (probably misspelled, sorry!) 
Sunday, September 15th - the beginning of the Alps
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, September 16-18 deep in the Alps

Of course, all of these dates depend on testing and virus results. The first rest day is on Monday, and the first tests of the riders and their support teams in that day. Not all teams may make it through to the end, and the race itself may not make it. But a lot depends on what happens in the Pyrenees and what the test results show. Everyone is being careful, but it may not be enough. 

One of the things I've been looking at are Inkle Loom
patterns. I have an Inkle loom that I've never used, in
my sewing storage cabinet. I also have a couple of
Charkha looms for spinning cotton. I had some cotton
fiber in my Big Fiber Bag, and I remember taking an
intensive workshop with Stephanie Gaustead a few
decades ago in cotton spinning. I enjoyed it, and it's
very portable. Fun. 

I'm having fun reading articles on spinning from years of past issues of "Spin Off" magazine. I'm getting my money's worth from my digital subscription. My evenings have been spent with You Tube videos of fiber equipment or usage, and I'm relearning things I knew more than twenty years ago. I haven't allowed myself to grab a spindle and some wool yet, but I will. It's only a matter of time. I'm super excited to get back into fabric and fiber arts once again. It'll be a return to my roots, so to speak. Once I have my life to myself again, and don't have to go work every day, I can really explore fiber arts once again. I know I'll be able to work something out where I can use my various skills and bring them together into a cohesive whole. Why not? I have a ton of stuff, now I have to start using it. 

Have a wonderful Friday. We're cool here right now, so it would have been a wonderful few days at the State Fair with my BFF, Sharon. I miss it so much, but I'm not idle - I'm doing things, just not catching up with life in Colorado. Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow. 

Back and Forth and Back Once Again - Yesterday Was Frustrating

Yesterday was a day of fits and starts, retracing steps, and unavoidable delays. All told, when I finally was able to get to my sewing cabinet to continue my cleaning, it was already mid-afternoon. The schedule was the usual - laundry, shopping, and cleaning. The reality had unexpected bumps in the road. 

Target is originally a Minnesota company. I have
one ten minutes north of me, and a smaller one
(the original Target store in the world) seven
minutes south of me. I usually go to the northern
one - it's larger with a bigger selection. 

The first stop was Target. I needed a new set of earbuds for my laptop, and DH needed a new calculator - "one with larger buttons". I got what I needed, wandered through the office supply and the school supply parts of the store (no calculators available except super-duper ones - like buying a hydrogn bomb instead of a July 4th sparkler), so I left Target without the calculator. 

"Oh," I thought, as I unloaded the car from Target (is it even possible to walk out of there without several bags of stuff?). "The office supply company is in the same shopping center as the grocer. After I get this next load into the washer, I'll get a calculator there." The best ideas ... yeah. 

Office Depot is a mile from my home in the same shopping
center as my local grocery. Unfortunately, every shop in
the center was out of power. There is construction occurring
to the west, and I suspect an electrical line was cut by
mistake. 

Driving up, I parked and walked to the door of Office Depot, only to see a sign that they were closed due to a power outage. Back in the car to go to the grocer at the other end of the complex, and they were turning people away at the door - no power there either. Home again instead. 

Putting the Target purchases away, I realized I had forgotten one item that I needed before next week, so it was off, again, to Target where I purchased my single item and headed back home. I decided to take one more look at the grocer, but no - power was still out. 

By the time I was able to clean up some more, I only had an hour of
so of time available. I ended up cleaning the pedal portion of my
sewing machine, which now looks MUCH better than it has for
years. 

I settled down and tried to relax at home for a bit, finally phoning the grocer around 12:30 pm. The gentleman I spoke with said they thankfully finally had power once again, so off I went, for the third time. I found an inexpensive calculator at Office Depot that fit DH's criteria, and headed over to buy groceries for the week, buying a lot of wonderful fruit which always makes me happy at this time of the year. 

I added two more exquisite pieces of wool fabric to my "Wool" bag on
the far left of the upper shelf, and more calico to my calico pile in the
center. I did a bit more rearranging. I'm still not 100% happy with it,
but it's getting there and I'm thrilled with the idea of being able to work
with fiber and fabric once again. 

Finally, when I got to my sewing cabinet, I had approximately an hour to spend, so I couldn't tackle the bottom shelf. That'll require a greater time span. I hit the rest of the floor instead, clearing out the pedal portion of my old pedal Singer machine. I found several more large pieces of wool fabric which I added to the bag on the top shelf, some more calico for that pile, and some beautifully dyed merino which moved over to the spinning pile. The patterns were stacked neatly, and the books that I pulled out of there ended up combining with last week's odd books and magazines to make Box #3 of books on textiles, weaving, knitting, spinning, dying, etc. So I didn't get a lot done, but what I did was good. 

I spent the evening listening to my Colorado Avalanche get their victory over the Dallas Stars, pushing their game into a one-game playoff for who moves on in the Stanley Cup, and watching many You-Tube videos on how to use an Inkle Loom. I know I have one of these in Sewing Cabinet #3 - the one I haven't even started work on yet. I hope to get to that by next year - LOL. Still - baby steps. I'm happy with where I'm at right now. Next week - Shelf #1 - a total mess of small parts and things that I need smaller boxes from the shop to be able to consolidate effectively. 

Today we have a hilly ride up to a second mountain-top finish. We're
getting closer to the Pyrenees, and today's finish is on a mountain
that hasn't been part of Le Tour for more than 30 years. It'll be
new territory for almost all of the riders. 

Today's stage of Tour de France piles three climbs at the end with a mountaintop finish. The last 8 km of the ride are a grind up Mt Aigoual, after the riders have already pushed up through a Cat 3 and a Cat 1. Strong legs will take the day today. 

Have a glorious Thursday and be kind to each other. I'll be back tomorrow. 

Errands, Cleaning, Corrections and Laundry - How Unexciting

My day off today is filled with errands and junk. *sigh* I hope to be able to continue cleaning my Sewing Cabinet, but might not get as much done with that as I hoped. Still, I'll tackle what I can - it won't clean itself. (I'm sure we're all thinking back to the original Sleeping Beauty movie where the three fairies just waved their wands and the housework was done. I don't have a wand, and I'm no fairy.)  

Who could forget the original three fairies in "Sleeping Beauty". Flora,
Fauna and Merriweather were the perfect guardians, able to raise
a single baby into adulthood with the help of all of the birds and
animals of the forest. However, whoever designed those hats
should be shot! OMG!!!!

I picked up DH's prescriptions from our pharmacy yesterday and brought them home. DH had a melt down - apparently they filled the wrong prescription. But I knew I had texted them the correct number (even found the original text in my phone to prove it). Apparently there's only a single digit difference between the two prescriptions. I get to return to the pharmacy today, return the incorrect one, get the proper one, and get a refund. Of course, in two weeks he's actually going to need the incorrect one, but it's one that his insurance is touchy about, so it's better to return it than to keep it. 

When I was spinning in the 1980's, I had a subscription
to "Spin Off" and attended their annual SOAR
conferences (Spin Off Autumn Retreat). I learned so
much from the magazine. I was delighted to see
that they still publish and I purchased a digital
subscription. Not as convenient as paper, perhaps,
but no bookshelf space needed either. 

I did a hunt on an old magazine that I had loved a couple of decades ago, and found, to my delight, that it was still being published and was available in digital form. So, "Spin Off" is once again part of my life, and I'm busy reading about breeds of sheep (and other animals with fur for spinning like alpaca and long-haired goats). I'm diving back into a part of my life that I feared was behind a door forever, but the new medications my Dermatologist has me on have cleaned up my hands to the point where fleece and a spinning wheel are a possibility again, and I'm deliriously happy about that. 

Today we move away from the Alps and into the center, moving down
 all of the way from Gap to Privas. It will be a sprinter's dream stage
for most of the route, with a hard fought finish for the Green jersey.   

Finally, today is Stage 5 for Le Tour de France as we cut away from the Alps. We get a nice sprint ending today on a slight incline, so it should be a nice battle for the stage win. Julian Alaphilippe is still in Yellow as the overall race leader, and baring unforeseen circumstances, should still hold the podium today. I highly suspect that Sagan will retain his green jersey, too. This should be a sprint ending just made for his style of riding. 

Have a great Wednesday. I'll be back tomorrow with clean clothes, a stocked larder, and the correct prescriptions accomplished. Be safe, be well and please, wear your mask. 

Sewing Cabinet Clean Day #2 - I Saw Floor!

My day off was spent continuing my deep clean of my Sewing Closet, and I expanded a bit into the separate, smaller closet on the right which has my full-length mirror and used to hold my mannequin (which currently stands in front of the third cabinet to the left which I won't be cleaning for quite a while yet). 

To see what this looked like before I cleared the top
shelf, you'll have to go back a week in my blog posts.
Once that top shelf was emptied, I started clearing
the pile of fabrics and fleeces to the left of the sewing
machine table. 

I started by pulling everything off the top shelf. Although there wasn't a lot of stuff on the shelf, there was quite enough to keep me busy, and I combined it with dredging down to floor level next to my sewing machine table, and a small clean of the smaller cabinet with the mirror. I did pull a few more sewing books from the small right-hand cabinet - some of my mother's needlepoint books (written in German, of course, so illustrations only for me if I keep them), as well as several excellent sewing and dying books I had collected over the years. The books went down into the craft room to join the two boxes of books I had pulled together last week. 

The side closet is quite narrow. I do have to pull all
of this stuff out and either give it away or put it
back properly, so that I can use it for my mannequin
once again, but that wasn't on the agenda for now. 

The majority of items on the shelving of the mirrored closet are off-season storage in the boxes, and photo albums on the very top shelf. I rearranged the shelves which was all that was needed just now. I'll return to this closet at a later date. Then I returned to the main closet once again. 

I started putting fabric into the shelving, rearranging
to have the fabrics I use more frequently on the second
shelf, those I don't use often on the top. I bagged up
my fine woolen fabrics to help moth-proof them and put
them on the upper shelf at the far left. I have some
wonderful Pendleton woolens that I would like to
keep intact. 

I was finding a lot more wool and fleece than I thought I had. I knew I had the dark brown Romney fleece - a gift from the late 1980's from DH, but I also found lots of exotics - angora, merino wool, and even a small bit of qiviut (yes this is one of the few words that starts with Q but doesn't follow with U). Qiviut is the inner hair of the Musk Ox which is picked from the bushes they walk through in the Arctic. It's amazingly soft, incredibly warm, and VERY expensive. The fact that I have a small sample of this fiber is amazing and precious. 

On the side of the sewing machine table, I cleaned
down to the floor level. You can see one of my larger
hand spindles leaning in the corner at the back. The
large blanket bag that I'm now devoting to spinning
fibres is partially cut off on the bottom right. I think
a good vacuuming is on next week's agenda. 

I decided to grab one of my large zip bags for quilt storage from my linen closet and devote it to spinning materials instead. I ended up with a large amount of cleaned wool and fleece. The majority of my afternoon was taken up by cleaning and washing that dark brown Romney fleece DH had bought for me. It's lovely wool and it will spin beautifully. The new medication my Dermatologist has me on is working like a dream, and I'm hoping to be able to actually spin again. I miss that craft quite a lot. 

My spinning wools, silks and specialty fibers are now
protected in the large quilt protector zip bag. I had the
brown Romney fleece still drying in the laundry
room (it wasn't dry until early this morning, but
will be added to this storage container next week).
I have two more fleeces to wash and card before
they can be spun. I'm really looking forward to
working with fleece again. 

By the end of the day, I had burrowed down to the floor in the closet (next week will be a serious vacuum after I clear the front of the sewing machine stand) and I was sad to have to replace items onto the floor there once again, but I know it's temporary. I have one or two weeks of cleaning left for this cabinet, and I have two more fleeces that I need to clean and wash before storage. I guess I won't be bored on my upcoming Wednesdays - LOL. 

Have a wonderful day, be kind, and please, stay safe. I'll be back tomorrow. 

Happy Year of the Goat (Sheep or Ram)

It's Lunar New Year, and so out with the horse and in with the goat. I'm very fond of goats and sheep. I was a spinner for many years and did quite a lot with different wool and other materials. I still own my lovely spinning wheels, but rarely spin any more. I just can't bring myself to sell my wheels, though. They're beautiful to look at and I own each one because it does a particular task better than the others. But even though I can integrate many of my artforms with others, I haven't figured out a good way to integrate my spinning with my enamel work or drawing or even beading. Yet. The possibility still exists.....

There is something so relaxing about spinning on a good wheel. This is a
Rio Grande Wheel. I actually own one of these and it's a wonderful wheel. Currently
it sits in my spare bedroom. It's big, so it doesn't travel around with me.
I have other wheels for travel. But it's smooth and very versatile. 

In any case, before I run off to the gym for the morning's workout, here are some goats, sheep and wool pictures for all of you on this new Lunar New Year.

On the other side of my mechanical spinning wheels is this beauty. This
is a Louet portable wheel, often called a "hatbox" wheel. You have to
treadle a lot faster to accomplish the same work as a larger wheel, but
I survived an intensive 3-day working with silk workshop with this
wheel. It traveled on the plane with me under my seat, although I'm
not sure it would meet current size regulations.

One of the things I loved the most was taking my hand-spun and dying it
into a variety of wonderful colors. I learned to dye through workshops
with Trudy van Stralen and still have a lot of the components necessary
for natural dyes that I purchased from her. She was such fun! 

Trudy's goal, at the time that I knew her, was to
establish natural dye recipes that would create
the same colors again and again. She was an expert,
unafraid to experiment. She later became the President
of Louet North America which is now headed by her son. 

And, of course I have drop spindles. Lots of them. I still
really enjoy spinning on a drop spindle. There's so much
that can be done with such a small, simple product. 

So farewell Year of the Horse and hello Year of the Goat (or sheep or ram).
I hope each of you have a wonderful year ahead of you. 

So there we have it. Amazing what a simple New Year's wish led to. I haven't thought about my spinning experiences and friends for such a long time. It was a delightful trip through memories for me today. Have a wonderful Thursday. I'm off to the gym.