Fiber Festival

I have to tell you all about a fiber event that I just returned from. Sorry - no pics yet - but I will post some.

A two day workshop in spinning silk taught by the incomparable Judith MacKenzie McCuin!

Sponsored by Carolina Homespun and held at the Point Bonita Lighthouse just north of San Francisco.

OMG - what a great time I had. I flew into SFO early on Friday morning and was picked up by Lann. We toodled on over to Carolina Homespun and we all got the YarnV loaded up with anything we thought might be helpful to have at the retreat. A quick trip to Trader Joe's for munchies and lunch and Morgaine and I were on our way out to the lighthouse.

We ate our lunch and then unpacked an incredible amount of stuff from the YarnV.

I took my personal stuff to the dorm and picked out my room. There were so few of us at the facility and no other groups there - so I got a room to myself. The bed was firm just as I like it - so I scored!

Nancy Finn - the genius behind the Chasing Rainbows Dyeworks brought some of her work to Morgaine and hung out for a while. Turns out that she and I know some of the same fiber people from the 80's. What a trip.

The spinners started arriving and we got to know each other over setting up our wheels and then over dinner.

We sat and spun and talked for quite a while - then headed off to bed about 10 or so. I slept very well, only woke up once and then dropped right back off.

The next two days was a blur of silk spinning - trying to cram more knowledge into my brain that it was ever designed to hold.

If you ever get the chance to take any class with Judith - take it. The amount of knowledge that woman drops in passing is incredible - I only wish that I had a video of the workshop - cause I know I only got about half of what she was saying.

It was so hard to leave - Judith was teaching another class right after this one on weaving - at the same location - sure wish I could have stayed - maybe it would motivate me to warp up one of my looms this year.

Now for the good news for you all - Carolina Homespun is doing it again - only bigger and better.

The Golden Gate Fiber Institute presents the Summer Intensive. 6 Instructors - 6 workshops - the only down side is that you can only pick two. I registered months ago - and can't remember what classes I signed up for - but it doesn't matter - cause any of these women have something to teach.

I'm not affiliated with Carolina Homespun or Judith - other than the friendships I feel like I formed this weekend -but I encourage anyone who is remotely interested in the July program to contact Morgaine - there are still openings.

Kiri finally done

No pictures yet, I just sewed in the ends last night.

At SOAR this year, I received a number of exotic fibers as samples from peace of yarn.

There was cashmere, cashmere/silk, ultra fine merino, angora, yak, camel down, etc...

About 1.5 ounces total for 10 different fibers - most of them white or off white.

When I got home, I scored an electric drum carder with a fine drum, so I carded all the white and off white exotic fibers together with some merino I already had. I added about 25% more in bleached tussah silk to get four ounces of yummy batts.

I spun it medium fine laceweight and the single came out slightly slubby in places, but pretty.

I already had 3/4 bobbin of very fine bleached tussah singles for a different project that I had stalled on - so I plyed those two together to get 1200 yards of a very pretty off white yarn - total weight a little less than 5 ounces.

I have knit the Forest Canopy Shawl 6 times so far and wanted to do a different one.I like my shawl knitting to be a memorizable pattern - written with a chart, but a small enough repeat to be able to knit without looking at the pattern every row every stitch. Kiri fit the bill perfectly.

So, in between the felted bags and the watch caps that I've made for holiday presents, I finally finished knitting the shawl. This was my take along knitting. Everyone at work has seen me knitting it and are waiting for me to wear it to work.

I have less than about 20 yards of the yarn left and did 20 repeats of the pattern rather than the 14 called for. I dressed it on to my 7 foot triangle loom to see if I was going to be able to block it on there like I've done all my other shawls and it fit, but a very soft block. Once I wet it down with a sprayer, the shawl sagged and I was afraid it was going to stretch all out of shape. As it is, it's very large on me and I love it.

I finished it last Friday and then sewed in the ends last night so that I could wear it to my guild meeting.

I'm hoping to get some pics of it soon

Fibers Through Time 2008 - Registration Opens

Whew! After a lot of hard work by a number of people, the registration information is now available for Fibers Through Time 2008. Presented by the Arizona Federation of Weaving and Spinning Guilds in April 2008.

Please take a look at the workshop information. The vendor info is not on the website yet, but from what I heard yesterday, it promises to be a great selection.

I am the registrar, if you have any questions please let me know and I will do what I can to help.

I'm very excited - our theme this conference is "Connections to the Past" and it promises to be a lot of fun.

April in Arizona is one of the best times to come - I hope to see you then.

Last day – Leaving SOAR…

It’s bittersweet on the last day. I am eager to get home to my family, but sad to leave the friendships I have made in the past few days. I always find that leaving SOAR and other immersion type of events and returning to ordinary life is hard for me. I don't return to work refreshed and ready to get busy. I almost resent work for taking me away from what I really want to be doing, instead of being grateful that what I do for a living provides the ability to go and do these things.



Shanty Creek is a beautiful setting - the leaves are turning colors that I rarely get to see in Arizona. The morning mist rising from the water this morning was so peaceful. I wish that I lived in a place that had the seasons so clearly delineated. I slept with the windows wide open and snuggled under the covers. On the last night I even wore my socks to bed to keep my feet warm - yum!

I took four classes during the retreat – Spinning for Lace with Margaret Stowe, Getting the Most Out of Hand Held Combs with Robin Russo, Kitchen Sink Batts with Janel Laidman and a great entrelac class with Kathryn Alexander - the name of which escapes me right now.

I learned a great deal in each class – not necessarily what I expected to learn, but valuable in any case. The staff of Interweave, and the Spin Off group in particular are once again to be commended in putting together an event that I will remember.

The best parts were seeing friends made during previous SOAR’s like Janel of Chameleon Colorworks and Spindlicity Magazine, Shirley of Lambspun, and Morgaine of Carolina Homespun; and then making a couple of wonderful new friends. I feel that I met a couple of kindred spirits in Connie and Steve of Spindlewood Spindles. I met them my first night there at dinner and we became instant friends. Their generosity of heart was appealing from the start and over the few days that we spent together, I felt like we were old friends reconnecting after a long time apart.

Funny that I make friends more easily with people who are vendors than participants, hmmm, I wonder why that is?

I also met Abby, I have been reading her blog for some time now and it’s cool to put a face with the name. She was very nice – down to earth and friendly. I ran into Stephanie a couple of times, got some good pictures with her and Janel in them from the panel discussion on Sunday morning.

Well, my bags are packed and the shuttle is on it's way. I'll spend all day traveling and be wiped out tonight.

(posted Monday - written Sunday)

SOAR 2007 - Day one

It feels strange to be blogging about SOAR when I haven't written anything up about OFFF from last month, but here goes anyway.

I arrived on Wednesday - I have only attended the retreat portion of SOAR so far and this year is no different. I like to get here the day before check in so that I am already settled in and know my way around when the market opens Thursday Mornings. Yes, one of the major draws for me is the shopping. Now that I know that the number of vendors here is is much less than OFFF or other major fiber festivals - I think the shopping will be a much less important part of the trip.

Actually that is exactly what happened yesterday. All day to shop the market and I came away with much less than ever before. I bought a couple of spindles, two more bobbins for the WW on my Gem, a couple of small doo dads and only two rovings. That's right - only two. One of them was one of the gorgeous Cashmere/silk dyed rovings that I got from Carolina Homespun at OFFF. Perhaps now that I have two of them, I may work up my courage to actually spin one.

I met some wonderful people at dinner Wednesday evening. Connie and Steve from Spindlewood Spindles. Steve makes square spindles and they are gorgeous. He and I talked about custom spindles so now I have to ask D's son if he still has any of that Koa wood that we sent him from Hawaii.

I've run into Janel, Patty and Morgaine - so nice to see people again from last year. Stephanie and I have bumped into each other a couple of times also. Last night I was in line to use the ladies room and she was struggling with the latch on the stall she was in. I told her that it would be on the internet by morning and here it is.....

I was able to sign up for all the classes I want and will actually take my camera with me today so that my next post may have photos.

It's nice and cool here, I get to wear my sock and my shawls. Yippee.

It's that time again... SOAR

I just finalized my lodging and shuttle trip for SOAR 2007. I'm very excited to think that it's right around the corner.

Last year's trip was so much fun - my second time - I was starting to feel like I knew what I was doing.

I didnt' get my registration in on time this year and had to wait on the standby list to see if I was going to be approved to go. Once I got that confirmation - I was thrilled.

Again this year, I am only going for the retreat weekend. Going to the whole thing is just too cost prohibitive. Someday, perhaps, I'll be able to attend the whole event, but for now I am just happy to take the retreat classes and hang out with everyone.

Hey, if you are going too, drop a note in the comments and we can meet there.

Portland Souvenirs

This post is long overdue - but I have been out of sorts lately due to the theft of my company laptop at work. Yes, at work, during working hours..... kinda creepy to think there is a thief with that much balls hanging out where I work.

ok, on to the swag...



Beautiful new spindle from Woodland Woolworks along with some gorgeous silk to spin on it. By the way - that place is very hard to come away with only 3 items. There was so much more that I wanted. Luckily for me, there was no equipment that needed me on the day we were there. I told the staff about the little wheel I purchased that is now living back in Oregon with Melissa.



more gorgeous silk - 2 ounces of hand dyed yummyness



These two skeins of Koigu KPPM for socks for me me me are from Knit Purl as my souvenir from the PDX Knit Bloggers Meet up

There is also two more skeins of Koigu that will not be posted until they are transformed into something else so that one of the readers of this blog will be surprised.

Socks for my sister

This is a chain plyed BFL dyed by Spunky Electric that I spun up last year. It knit up so nicely for these socks. I used my toe up recipe and did an interesting pattern on the instep and legs.

It's a K2P2 rib for 3 rows and then 2 rows of plain knit - repeated

This gave an interesting texture to the socks and made them very stretchy - I didn't get a close up of the pattern, but should have.

green silk

Remember this silk on the bobbin? I originally intended to ply it with some gorgeous dyed merino roving. When I took the bobbins and the roving to Yarn Yankers last weekend - the harsh light of day revealed that the two do not go together at all.

So, I plyed the bobbins together and ended up with this 790 yards of 100% silk.

From Blog photos

The weight is about 4 ounces - so about 3500 ypp. I am looking at shawl patterns to see what will bring out the shine and color of this.

From Blog photos

I love the teal accents in the green.

Friday - First week back - whew!

Well, the first week back and I survived. Work has been interesting. Lot's going on and perhaps some changes coming. I got some good feedback from a trusted source about the client's opinion of me and their valuation of my contribution. That made me feel good.

Sometimes I wonder when (if) people are going to realize that I'm not really as great as they think I am - cause I am such a good pretender. After a kick in the A--, I accept that I am good at what I do, I add value to the projects I work on - and the whole "pretender" thing is old f--ked up thinking that trys to get me sick again. I can catch this whole action pretty quickly now, but it used to affect me for days.

It's so good with my son right now. I wish it could stay like this all the time - and maybe it can. He's working and seeing a great gal. I know that success takes work. D and his g/f said something last night about how much he loves me - how much being here means to him. I know it's so important to me. He kisses me goodbye before he leaves for work in the morning. OK, that may not seem like such a big deal, but it is to me.

From Blog photos

I have not started blocking the purple shawl so I thought I would share the pics of the green silk that I finished spinning on the cruise. Hard to get a true to color photo indoors with the flash, but the top photo above is closest to the right color on my monitor.

From Blog photos

Here is the next spinning project - This is superwash I got from Royale Hare at SOAR '06. It's spinning up pretty fine - not sure exactly what I will use it for, but I have 12 ounces of it.

I also finished plying the blue yarn for Mom's sweater last night. There is 16 ounces of it. I still need to spin up the multicolored yarn for that project and haven't even started it. I am still debating whether to re-dye the roving or not.

Guild was very interesting on Wednesday. Mary Walker gave a great presentation on Navajo rugs and weavers, then she evaluated Navajo rugs that people brought in. Very cool.

Optim

Here is 500+ yards of Optim, 4 ounces, from a roving I got at SOAR from Janel at Chameleon Colorworks.

It's so pretty,I'm not sure what I am going to make out of it - I think I will let it age in my stash for a little while.

swatching

I have been working on the design of a yarn from my SOAR purchases.

The chocolate polworth, the brown and orange silk - the cashmere/alpaca blend... what to do, what to do.

so I did something different this time. I sampled. I spun up a bobbin of the cashmere/alpaca, a bobbin of the polworth and a little bit of the silk. I tried plying the three together, that didn't thrill me - so I tried two plys of the three combinations. Didn't really care for any of those either. The silk was too much contrast to the polworth and got lost in the cashmere tweediness.

I went to the drum carder and blended some of the silk with the polworth and spun up a bobbin of that. Back to sampling. Plyed all possible combinations of the three bobbins and then knit a test swatch of each sample. This is a picture of the test swatch.

6 different yarns and I like the one on the right side the best. This picture doesn't show the silk shine, but the right hand yarn is the polworth plyed with the polworth/silk blend.



This skein is about 6.75 ounces and over 800 yards of pretty pretty yarn.

Preparation for SOAR

Ok, I am starting to lay out all that I need to take to SOAR with me. I have to take my really big duffle bag that I got in Hawaii earlier this year, in case I get to bring back another wonderful fleece. I lucked out last year cause my friend Alicia drove to SOAR and was able to cart some of my additional purchases back to Phoenix with her.

Now, do I need to take my swift? I have already decided that the drum carder and the combs can stay home, the ball winder is going as is the lazy kate and the niddy noddy.

I have 3 knitting projects and 2 books to read - that should be enough? Oh my gosh - the spinning wheel - I have to break it down and put it in the suitcase. Hand cards - yes, I need the hand cards.....

The cat isn't going. Hey, I haven't packed any clothes yet. Or my laptop. I wonder if I should pack my coat? I hardly used it last time.


http://www.interweave.com/spin/events/soar/default.asp

Polworth and silk - half way done

This is the charcoal polworth and the dyed silk from a couple of weekends ago.

I've been spinning the silk for what seems like forever and finally got to start the plying yesterday.

1070 yards and 4 ounces so far with 4 more ounce to ply up. I think it's gorgeous - not at all what I wanted, but pretty nevertheless.

I was really wanting the silk to be dark saturated colors, but the violet was lighter than I thought it would be and the silk roving didn't get dyed in places in the middle of the roving. The Burgundy turned out to be a very red brown and the dark green is nice - but the violet really throws off my autumn colors plan. Don't know what I was thinking with that.

I will ply up the remaining and look for a beginners lace pattern for a lacy shawl to knit with this.

Or, it really looks like the long color repeats might be nice for a woven piece - I'd have to sett this closer than I've ever woven before, but it might be the incentive I need to get the Macomber set up for a warp.

Bulky grey polworth

Here is 24 ounces - over 700 yards of very bulky light grey polworth. 6 skeins of 4 ounces which average 120 yards each.

This is about 6 wpi and was fun to spin once I let go of trying to control the size of the yarn and let the wheel pull it out of my hand.

I'm hoping that I have enough for a sweater or vest - I think I heard that it takes a pound of yarn for a sweater so I should have enough.

Finished plying the polworth laceweight

Woo hoo! I finally finished plying the polworth laceweight and it is beautiful!

This is 1500 yards of yummy grey yarn. It's a hefty 6.5 ounce skein - I was barely able to ply the whole thing onto my Louet S-10 bobbin.

The yarn is nice, but I don't think it's the best use of the polworth. This grist doesn't show off the softness of the wool as much as I would like.

I can put it against my neck and it's not itchy, but the cloudlike softness of the carded fiber is not evident.

I will probably knit this into a lacy shawl. I haven't knit any lace other than the feather and fan pattern, so this may be the opportunity to pull out some of the stitch patterns I have been dreaming over and see if I can find one with an easy repeat to memorize.

I hate reading charts or patterns. Much better if I can find a pattern I can remember.

plying the grey polworth

Plying and plying and plying some more. The never ending cobweb weight polworth grey singles. This is 6.5 ounces of the light grey polworth that I purchased from Rovings.com at SOAR last year.

I have to ply this on my Louet S-10, even though the ratios on it are lower, because the bobbins are the only thing I have that will hold this entire ball plyed back on itself.



It filled the Majacraft bobbin to within 1/4" of the top, so I had to find something with a bigger bobbin to ply this onto.


This is not plyed tightly enough, I have to watch it very carefully to ensure that I have enough twist prior to letting it wind onto the bobbin. The singles are very stale to prevent tangling while plying from a ball, this makes it impossible to check for balanced plying by just looking at the way the yarn hangs.

I should have taken a piece for a sample before I started, but did not.

Light grey polworth

Here is the grey polworth from Rovings that I got at SOAR last year. It's a varigated grey washed fleece with a staple length of about 5-6". I fell in love with this and stood in line for an hour to pay for it.

I've spun quite a bit of it up. The down side to this fiber is that I can't quite make up my mind what to make of it. I have drum carded it, combed it, spun it thick, spun it thin and no matter what, it comes out beautiful. I use it in many of my batts and it blended well with every fiber I put it with All this sampling has not led me to a decision.

It is so fabulous that I feel that I should design something wonderful to make with it, but, I do get bored spinning the grey.



Here is 6.5 ounces that wraps to 35 wpi in a 2 ply. This is just the singles. I am trying to decide if I am going to ply it back on itself or find something to ply it with.

Spinning the polworth

This does not show the color or fineness of the yarn very well - I started out thinking that I might use this for the longest thread competition, but each sample I've spun is a maximum of 125 yards to 10 grams. Not nearly fine enough to even place in the top 10.

I decided that I would keep spinning this very fine. I think that I can ply it either back on itself or with a very fine silk thread.

I am torn between plying it on itself and using it as weft to weave a twill fabric with the grey polworth/silk/ alpaca/cashmere yarn I spun earlier this year, or to ply it with silk and knit a beautiful drapey shawl with it. A dark green and purple silk thread would be gorgeous with this dark charcoal yarn.

My favorite picture from SOAR last year

I can't believe that it's taken me almost a year to post this picture. But then again, I didn't have this blog last year.
From the left we have Alicia, myself, and Fudge. We had the best time at SOAR in 2005 and I can't wait for this year.

Spook is going with me this year and I don't think Alicia or Fudge are going. I hope it's as much fun. It's different for me when I am not sure if I will know anyone there or not.