More of the Same

I don't think Abbie wanted to watch that channel!


Lately I find it hard to get motivated to do anything that is NOT fiber related. :) Rough isn't it? lol. The odd thing is that it's not bothering me as much as it used to. I guess that's progress, but who know's in what direction. I guess it depends on your point of view. I'm still trying to get the fleece in the shed washed up before the weather turns. We had a few (very nice) days of misty cool weather which allowed me to get some work done outside without wilting, but did slow down the drying process. As almost all of the net baggies I use for drying were full, I had to wait until today to wash again. The end of today will see another clean fleece drying in baggies on the deck, so that's progress.

I've been spinnning up a merino silk on my drop spindles. I think I'll ply it up with the green that I did before. I'm not sure though as I'm wondering if I wouldn't be better off plying it with another wool....to stretch out the pleasure. ;) I won't know until I actually do it as I'm not really that good at planning ahead.

I was starting to miss spinning on my wheel after a few days and decided to card up the "not so solid purple" so I could spin it up. Last weekend I watched the Deb Menz video on fiber prep and it really really helped me with the carder. The batts after the video were remarkably better than the before video bats. Before I would just pull apart the bats in strips to spin from, this time I rolled them and drew them out into pencil (or close to) roving then rolled into balls. The rolling of them into balls was a bit of a challenge as I tend to roll the balls too tight. (Well practice makes perfect and I've got lots to practice with.) It has enabled me to spin right along and move more smoothly and quickly, so I'm happy with that. And although I've gotten really good at joining, it's nice to not have to join fiber so often.

Here are three of the roving balls that I'm spinning from. I had much more but I didn't think to take a picture until I was down to the last three. It's been fun to watch the multiple colors of the fiber blend together and come out this lavendar. A happy accident if I do say so myself!






This is the same fiber spun up on the first bobbin. I'm currently working on bobbin #2 and will ply them together when done. I can't wait to wash out the finished skein to see if it's still soft after more of the lanolin is removed. It's still pretty greasy with lanolin and I'm curious to see how it comes out.




This final picture is of Salem "helping" me with picking out the fleece before washing. When I'm outside he's usually not far from me, but he has never gotten onto a raw fleece before. He'll bat at it as it moves around but usually stays off of it. I was suprised to look up and see him sleeping on the other end of it. He stayed there until I progressed to his end of it. I guess he decided I could use all the "help" I could get. hehe

Well I'm off to watch my favorite tv program and spin some more. There will have to be some dinner making during commercials I think as I didn't plan ahead as usual. (see....it's a life habit.)