2 skeins done, and lots to go

I plyed up the singles from the Shetland fleece I have been working on, and the the net results so far are 5.5 oz and about 215 yards done up into two skeins. I never weighed the washed fleece, so I am only guessing that there are about 1.5 pounds left to card and spin. Here is it together.

 And here is a closeup.

I'm not sure if I am going to try dying the finished yarn or not, but I'll probably wait until more of it is finished and I have a project in mind.

I returned the drum carder and I almost bought one on ebay today, but was outbid in the last 20 minutes.   Probably a good thing, because the savings were not considerable over a new one, and there would be no recourse if anything was wrong with it when it arrived.   I can wait.....it is not like I don't have anything to work on..............

Now back to some knitting..........

Another Pyramid o' Fiber!

I am loving having this drum carder at the ready....at least for the last week.  It goes home, or to the next lucky borrower this Sunday, so I was motivated to finish off the romney wool.

   It turned out so much better than the rambouillet/teeswater cross.   Not due the fiber itself, but to the fact that I think I slightly felted the dark brown wool in the scouring process.

The bottom skein was the first skein from the batch, and the top skein has the addition of some mohair and sari silk.   It looks softer in the photo than it actually is, though.   Feeling more like shetland type wool, its future is unknown.   I do have enough singles left to make another plain skein, so maybe a hat???.

 I was so much more hands off for the romney and the results are fluffy, soft and luscious. Here is a washed lock of fiber with its lovely crimp.

and its resulting pyramid o' fiber!

extreme closeup of a carded batt:

I am holding off starting to spin it until Sunday's Spinning Meetup where everyone can ooooh and ahhhhh!   I nearly bought a carder on Ravelry this week, but I had some concerns about its condition and the price.    Once I get the tax refund.........all bets are off.

Carding with a Tool!

The Olympics are over and I chose not to compete.   It is not that I wasn't doing anything for these last 16 days, it is just that I didn't want to put any pressure on myself.  I guess I just wimped out.    I didn't finish any of my projects, but am plodding along on the squares for my GAAA.   You know, knit one row, tink one row, knit 1/2 row, tink 1 1/2 rows.    And so it goes.   At this rate it's like paying off a credit card balance by paying the minimum payment each month:   it'll take 247 years (or so) to pay it off.  

I have borrowed a drum carder from fellow spinner, Lynn, to finish off my fiber

 from last month's shipment before I start on the fiber I got last week.   OK, I opened the inner plastic bag, and it is getting its first cold soak.  And I realized that THIS month's fiber is going out in another 10 days!   Yikes.  It is so soft and lanolin-y and hopefully most of the yuck will come out with the soak.

 The drum carder, a Strauch petite, is one hefty tool, and really does the job of blending the fiber into batts.   What starts out as this:

  ends up like this: a pyramid of batts, ready for spinning.

What could be done in about 10 rolags of hand carding can be carded into a single batt of about 1/2 oz with the drum carder.  What a timesaver, so much so that I feel a major purchase coming on.........    I had a 15 minute lesson Sunday at spinning group ( we are actually "multicraftual") and Sunday night I made 2 more batts on it, while watching the terrible new show, Marriage Ref, which came on after the Olympics closing ceremony.    Perfect background noise, and I am so glad I didn't expect to be entertained by the show! 

  Monday, I made 4 more batts with the rest on Tuesday evening.    I even went crazy on the last two, by blending in some natural mohair and some shredded sari silk.   See how pretty! On the pyramid they are the top two.

The flashes of color make me so happy.    Maybe I will ply with the plain batts, to maximize the yardage.

Finished Squares/Finished Yarn

Two more squares are finished, washed and blocked:

Judy Sumner square with spider and flies:   The little fly at the top left doesn't show up too well...I should have used a contrast color.   I really liked the lace of the web, and I think it would make a great lacy scarf on larger needles.....hmmmmm.

Ann Strong square with pomegranates:

That makes 7 finished squares and I am now working on my 8th, which is Meredith K Morioka on page 8 and 9 of the book.   I am only an inch in now, so I will wait to show you all til later.   Once I finish this square I will be officially 1/3 finished!   Imagine that.   I have grown a lot since the beginning of this project, but especially in my mental ability to rip back to correct an error instead of plowing on and accepting it.   It is making all the difference in the final result.   So my 1/3 finished is not quite.....since I will most likely remake a few of the first squares with obvious mistakes..

Spinning:

Mostly I have been sitting on my hands when JulieSpins has posted updates to her Etsy shop.    But I couldn't resist this one:    Falkland wool in the Color: Magenta Madness and my goal was worsted weight yarn for hat or mitts.

Singles:

Singles with Fiber:

2 Ply, washed, and dried.  The color here is a bit washed out.   The colors above are closer to reality!

OOOOH   PRETTY!!!

Re: the first BEEZY post.   Mom is a little embarrassed that I am posting those, because she dated a lot before she met my Dad.   I assured her that the whole collection is charming and shows her as a young girl full of life.   When you see her gray hair now, it is good to be reminded of the young girl inside her head who still lives.

I'm Baaaaack!

As the last post stated, Mom's house is cleaned out, sold, and turned over to the new owners.   I am glad that's over, but half my garage is full of the stuff we didn't throw out, but want to sell later at a garage sale......more work to come.   I have also started my adventures on ebay where I am selling off Dad's collection of Mineralogical Record magazines.   For the record, I am cologal817 on ebay....if you are a rock hound or mineral collector and want to keep it in the blogging family.   The oldest issue we have is from Vol 2 No. 2 from 1971 and is nearly complete to 2007 when Dad passed away.    I am starting out by listing single issues from the oldest first, and then when I get to the 1990's (unless I get tired of the process sooner),  I will sell off 6 issue volumes by year.   If you or anyone you know is interested, you know where to find me!

In mid January, my first shipment of the Naked Fiber Club arrived and here is a photo montage of the prep process so far.  This is what the water looked like after a 24 hour cold soak to get out the water soluble yuck.   My garden will thank me in the spring!

The locks were still intact after one hot water bath and still really tight.

I started out with a dog brush and it was a lot of work since the locks seemed glued together.   I was told on Ravelry to give the fiber one more hot soapy bath followed by several rinses and then a vinegar rinse.

That seemed to soften the fiber and after it was dry, I used my hand carders and it was so much easier.   I guess that even after the cold water soak, two hot washes were necessary to get out all of the lanolin.

I didn't photograph the carded fiber, but here is my first small bobbin of spun singles!

It is a good thing I am only getting 8 oz of raw fiber a month, because there are probably only 2 ounces on the bobbin, and my next shipment is coming next week!   Back to work on the hand carders with the rest of the fiber.

I thought I missed it!

I looked at the calendar today and thought my blogiversary slipped by, but no.....it is still coming up on the 16th. That will make two years in the blogging world, two years writing about knitting, of Ravelry, two years of spinning and two years of friends, family and new readers who have shared this adventure with me. It is still a week (give or take a day or two) away, so help me celebrate by reading through the archives and let me know what you still want to hear about.

There have been a few postings by other bloggers that blogs are "so yesterday" and no longer relevant, but how else can I track my life chronologically with words and photos and share it with you at the same time. How else can I focus on the good stuff (mostly) in my life, and have a perfect escape from the stress and anxieties of life? Are you reading blogs as regularly, are you posting in your own with the same frequency? Leave me a comment between now and the 17th and share a few thoughts on the matter. A prize awaits ( undecided at the moment) for a random poster or two. Thanks in advance for sharing in my world!

My First Fiber Club

I have been eying several of the clubs out there and hadn't joined any, but always looked at what was available. Several are for yarn, several for indie dyed fiber, several for natural fibers. One this week caught my eye, probably because I just finished spinning and have begun knitting the raw alpaca fiber I purchased this fall. (Finished the first Mitten and working on the matching one!)

So, I signed up for 3 months of the Naked Fiber Club by BadFaerie. This will give me 3 shipments of raw fleece weighing in at 8 oz each starting in January, which I will then wash, card, and spin. I won't know what fiber it will be (sheep, alpaca, mohair) until it arrives, but that is the best part of this kind of club- the surprise. It will give me more experience with different raw fibers without investing in a whole fleece. Not. There. Yet!

A gift to myself, because I deserve it. One that will keep on giving.

GAAA- Square no. 4

Square #4 is by Julie H Levy and is still one of the squares labeled "easy". The intertwining cables are flowing nicely, and the diamonds and bobbled cables remind me of my Grandma's Aran sweaters. Unlike the previous squares, this is nearly 12"wide unblocked, so I have to be careful that it doesn't grow when I wash and block it. I am using size 7 needles on this one, as recommended, but I am starting to think that maybe I should have gone down a size in all the squares, because the yarn is on the lighter side of worsted, not a heavy dense worsted that I was hoping for. When looking it up on Ravelry, several mentioned that the Araucania Nature Wool is more like a heavy DK weight than aran worsted. All the cabling and texture will make this a warm afghan, even if not a heavy one.

And in case you were wondering if I am spinning too, here is the first bobbin of Alpaca, that I washed, picked by hand, carded and spun. There is still quite a bit of VM in it, and it feels a bit greasy, so I will give the finished yarn a good scouring when I set the twist.

Alpaca on the Rocks

As promised, this Alpaca show did not disappoint. There were some different vendors this year, or at least ones I did not notice last year. Having learned so much in this past short year, I was more willing to consider raw fiber in larger quantities. I did not buy a whole fleece, but I did get approx. 10 oz of raw fiber. I was amazed what 10 oz of raw fiber looked like.......

Guess what this is???!!!

A pillowcase of picked and washed Alpaca Fiber, about 10 oz, donated by Keller from Jefferson Farms.

The photographs do not do justice to the beautiful color (rose grey with brown) or the exquisite softness of the fiber. I just couldn't keep my hands out of it,

so I washed it all, in 4 batches in the kitchen sink. Above is 1/2 of the unwashed fiber. I even carded up 5 rolags,

but I am saving up spinning it till it is all carded. I can tell already that it will be wonderful to spin, and I must decide what weight yarn it wants to be.

And that's not all!!!!!!!.......................

Three Meadows Ranch brought both fiber (which came home with me) and the animal (which did not)!!! This fiber was blended from the raw fiber into a heathery light brown. Here is the generous donor, Morning Angel:

on the left. With her two tone fiber, this is the blended result:

This fiber is not in roving form but a large batt weighing in at 8 oz. This too, is bad color....I must retake it outside.

I am not done yet....there's more!

Another meet up with my blogging friend, Becky, who bought the other batt of Morning Angel's fiber. She also arranged to buy a whole fleece from a real cutie who was grey and ivory.(edited to add: his name is Kiernan) That is the cutie standing tall right behind us! The camera didn't capture the color properly, but if you check out her blog when she gets the processed roving, I am sure there will be more photos.

Here is another photo:

More random Alpacas:

All these Alpacas were sheared this past spring, so with the cooler weather they will begin to grow their winter fleece, and the whole process starts all over again. How is that for a renewable resource???

Processing Alpaca Fiber...ooooooh

Just about a year ago, I blogged about going to Alpaca on the Rocks, where I enjoyed myself immensely: petting the animals, talking to the breeders, fondling the fibers and yarn, and dropping a few $$. One of the fibers: the Suri Alpaca raw fiber was a generous gift from a breeder when I told her I had no experience with Suri. It went from this:

to this after washing, carding, and spinning:

A second fiber I purchased was Huacaya Alpaca fiber in black. This was washed, but still unprocessed in any other way. I thought I would show the steps I took finally this week, to bring this fiber from its very natural state to spun.

Straight out of the bag, this is what it looked like. You could see the original curls and feel the softness. But it would be necessary to fluff out the fibers and line them up somewhat for even spinning. On Ravelry last year, I purchased from another Raveler a pair of Ashford Handcards and began to work this fiber. It is almost like brushing out a dog for smoothness.

Several passes on the cards is followed by rolling the batt into a rolag

From this stage, I spun on my wheel and these are how nice the singles look!

So, that is the process from start to finish. Of course, if you have raw DIRTY fiber, then there are the added steps of washing, rinsing, and drying the fiber to get to the point where you can begin to card it. I plan on making the singles into two ply fiber and then maybe knitting a black and white hat with the white alpaca above. I was bound and determined to finished this fiber up before this weekend because guess what.....Alpaca on the Rocks is here again and with all that I have learned this year, I may invest in lots more fiber!

Start to finish: right to left, without the live animal which did not fit on the ironing board!

After a 4 day weekend

I just wasn't satisfied having so much handspun fiber left over after finishing my first pair of handspun socks. I knew there was enough for at least one more sock, but would there be enough for 2 more??? Taking the scientific approach (please note: totally unlike me), I weighed each finished sock on my digital kitchen scale and a-ha, one weighed 61 grams and the other measured 45 grams! I knew one was heavier, but I was really surprised at the difference between the two. I then weighed the leftover handspun yarn and it weighed 100 grams, or just under 4 oz. I then rewound it into two balls of 50 grams each and felt I should start another pair!

As the yarn ran through my fingers to the ball-winder, I knew that this was the thinner yarn of the smaller sock, so I went down to a size 2 and cast on 56 stitches for another pair of plain socks. These too, I am doing 2 at a time on circs, so if I run out near the toes, I can at least be certain that the toes will match each other, if not the rest of the sock. I am really happy with the texture of this pair so far.

After the 4 day weekend, I should have more to show for my time, but relaxing and enjoying the sunshine was the original plan. I took several walks, watch several movies and finished up the
Targhee from JulieSpins. It is incredibly soft and squooshy in its finished skeins. I didn' measure yet the yardage but I must have at least 400 yards in the two skeins (plus the bitty one) in sock/fingering weight out of the 5 oz of fiber.

I just love how the colors played in this yarn as it was two plyed. The two skeins don't even look like they come from the same fiber,

but one skein will lead naturally into the other.

Now to plan a project.... another Ishbel, perhaps? Any other ideas out there? Until then, I will be satisfied just giving it a squeeze every now and then!

Fibery Progress

One finished project! YAY! These are my first handspun socks, in a 48 stitch plain sock, top down on size 2 needles, 2 at a time. Spun from Dragonfibers (merino, bamboo and nylon).

I was going for a normal weight sock, but I ended up with a heavy sock which will be nice with Crocs and boots this winter. I used a regular 3 ply for them and I thought I was spinning sooooooo thin. Live and learn, and the funny thing is that one sock is much lighter weight than the other. I have enough yarn left to probably knit a third sock to keep as a spare and it might match one or the other of the socks. I can't really remember whether I spun thinner at the end, or at the beginning. So much for conscious spinning and knitting.

Washed and skeined up, below is the finished yarn from the Pagewood Farms fiber, in the color Maple Leaf. The label only said "wool", but it was soft and lovely to spin. They are both 3 ply but notice the difference navajo plying makes with the colors in the smaller skein. Soon (?) to be mittens. Maybe I will put a crochet edging around the cuffs with the smaller skein......

The Target Practice socks are making progress. I did have to frog back the heel once, because it was totally wonky.

I am a little concerned about the size of the socks. I measured exactly and had even gone down to size 0 needles, but as you can see, they look a little big for a women's medium. Since these are my first short-row heels, maybe when I rejoin with the instep stitches, it draws up and gets a smaller length to the foot. Anyone have any experience with short row heels?? I am glad I didn't try to do these 2 at a time since I would have spent even more time frogging back. Tonight I may get to start on the tops and see how that pattern does it thing. To be continued.

And, last but certainly not least, is some spinning goodness developing on my wheel. As a reminder, this is the fiber: Targhee wool in the color, Bouquet from JulieSpins. I am quite addicted to her fiber as I have mentioned before.

The top bobbin is from the outside of the roving and the second bobbin is from the inside. It hardly looks like the same batch! I split the entire roving in half lengthwise, and will 2-ply it which should result somewhat in some stripes. Of course it is my perogative to change my mind and navajo ply it to maintain the variation of colors and make clearer stripes. Another to be continued.......