Wonderwool 2011

Hi Folks
I had a great time last Saturday with Anj, Shirley and Erin as we went to Wonderwool Wales in Builth Wells Wales.

It was a fabulous time, I think I visited all the stalls 3 times, but was very careful when it came to purchasing (which makes a change)and bought just a few items that caught my eye. I seriously had to fight off the urge to buy a Timbertops Beaver spinning wheel, that my friend Joan at Woodland Turnery had restored beautifully (it had suffered at the claws of a cat). Which one takes precedent wheel or cat? Mmmm the cat has to go. Anyway another wheel would not have fitted into Chez Nous here in Bristol, so off I went to find something to take my mind off of it.

I bought a colour wheel in an effort to understand colours and how to use them porperly when dying and choosing which colour goes with which, also some luxury yarns that I can dye and hopefully use to make something nice for my Mum for winter. I'm no great knitter or crocheter but I will find a small scarflette to crochet in cashmere. I bought some Wenslwydale roving from Wensledale, some nice dyed roving and some roving from a lady who wasn't at the show but had left it to be sold through the British Coloured Sheep Breeders Association, a really nice bunch of people who's group I used to belong to many years ago (and yes I have rejoined). I wanted to buy a fleece from the missing lady Lesley Wickham as I know her fleeces are excellent quality - still some pencil roving will do for now. I also bought some black Alpaca from a man from Pembroke who informed me that the poor animal was no longer alive as it had been mauled by a dog owned by the alpaca's new owner. A very sorry tale and a sad ending to a beautiful young alpaca with an amazing fleece.

So that's it all over for another year, but I have plenty to see and do in the coming year, a visit to a farm to choose some fleece, a fleece fair in June an agricultural show to do some demoing and Fibrefest straight after the demo (same week)so I'm going to be nicely busy.
I hope April is turning out nicely for all of you wherever you are.

Hugz

Keith x

Gnasher is here!

Would you belive it, 2 days after our January meeting the wool picker, aptly named "Gnasher" arrived. What a beast it is, 271 sharpened teeth that catch you totally unawares (as I found out, but do the job it was intended to do. It pulls apart the washed staples making it easier to card.
I tried my rooed Shetland fleece and found that it reduced it to a mass of little balls making carding impossible - completely fulls of neps. So then I had a go with my Black Romney and found it worked very well, producing a mass of fluffy wool that carded well and spun up a dream.
Yesterday I introduced "Gnasher" to the rest of the gang and they got to try out some fleece. They first tried a white medium staple one but that seemed to ball as well, plus it had some secong cuts, which we all know is a waste of time. Chris tried her Norfolk Horn lfeece and went home with a bag full of fluffed up loveliness.
So what have we deduced from our efforts so far? It would seem that it is no good with very short fleece, don't overload it and just go steady with it. Also you must wear the protective apron, use the pusher and the brush to clean it. We will see how it goes.
This week was full of disappointment for me as I found out that the Somerset FleeceFair is on the 18th of June and the Easton Arts Fair is on the 18/19th June. Aaarrrgggghhh!!! I loved the fleece fair last year and also enjoyed our contribution to the local Arts fair last year as well. So the others will toddle off to Hatch Beauchamp on the 18th and Team SpinDyeWeavers will represent us at the Arts fair on the 19th. I'm sure they will have a great time. Me? I will be away.

That's just about all for now folks
See ya soon.

OOOH I forgot!

I meant to thank Rosemary who brought along some Quivit (Muskox Down, she had some varying bags, one of down that had been taken off the fences in Alaska and some that had been shorn. Personally I would go for the off the fence stuff as it was soft and fluffy with little guard hair. The shorn stuff was as it came off the beast complete with guard hairs which are very prickly and thick. We had a go at dehairing which wasn't too bad and I also carded some on my cotton cards to produce a soft fluffy but short rolag. The hair did ensure a lot of fun with the first comment being it was very 'pubic'. The ensuing jokes and comments from that went on for ages and led us to some in-depth discussions, which I won't publish on here.
Anj has taken a small bag of the 'hairy stuff' home to have a go with. me I'm just glad I've managed to handle Quivit which is something I've wanted to do for ages.
Byee :0)

Our first main meeting of the new year

Hi Folks
Yesterday we had our first main meeting of the year and it was really good. The members of SpinDyeWeavers are great people turning up on a freezing morning to sit and spin,dye and chew the fat. Rosemary who lives nearer to Cheddar than Bristol came along and showed us what a demon dyer she is, creating great colour combinations. I dyed a modest amount of Falkland roving in the colours of 'Spring is Sprung', (yellows and greens)to those who haven't seen my previous posts, and this is to be inserted into my current weaving project. I brought it down to show my feeble attempt so far but was encouraged by my peers who liked the differing textures using 'pick-up' sticks.
Thank you to the wonderful Anj who gave me an idea as to what to do with the Wensly/Merino that has taken me an age to spin and ply from the fleece. I have about 800 yards of soft bulky yarn and she suggested dying it and weaving a blanket for the car, so that's what I'm gonna do.
I had hoped the wool picker would have been here ready for us to gawp at and have a go with, but it wasn't. I received a messaged from the maker to say it will be here within the next 2 days. Well at least it will be here this month, ready for the mid Feb meeting.
Well that's about all for now, I'm gonna go and make the lunch for today Pork Loin Steaks with our fave veggie the Butternut Squash.
Take care folks
Hugs
Keith x

OOOPS I DONE IT AGAIN !!!****

Hi Folks

Yes it's me, I'm still here and yet again I've repeated myself by starting a blog and not keeping it up. The last time I had a message from someone and didn't know it was there for a year - BAD BOY!

SO! will I get it right this time? Well I'm not promising anything, but I will do my best to try and say something at least once a month. My life isn't that exciting to be able to chat away every day with something new to excite people with and I tend not to rant about day to day things as others often do. Yes I do get a bit uppity about things that go on in the world, but I usually keep my uppity bits to myself unless I'm well angry and then you can look out....

OK, what's happening at the moment at chez nous in Lawrence Hill Bristol. Well I went and had an operation just before Christmas, all went well with no major problems so far, and Christmas went OK too. We had our usual quiet, no fuss,and relaxing time which for me is the way it should be now.
Due to the weather and me not being allowed to drive, everybody received their presents by post and they arrived on time. Suffice to say the grandsons were happy with their video games Call of Duty Black Ops and Mario(the latest one) plus stocking fillers. My daughter was given Kylie's Sexy Darling perfume (by me) and it's very nice apparently, in fact it was worthy of being worn that day to a party, (well you never know how things are going to smell on some people, many years ago I gave my then wife some Charlie perfume which was very popular at the time and meant to be very good, but on her it smelt like the local Tomcat had just passed throught the house making his mark on everything)!!! SEE you just can't tell.....
My darling huzbear bought me a stand for my new loom and then surprized me with an Ipod Touch. Very naughty of him, but it is nice.

What's happening in my craft world???

Well I bought myself a Kromski Harp Loom all 32" of it. I decided that not being the world's best and most prolofic knitter is a bit of a problem when you have loads of handspun yarm slowly taking over the bedroom. So I have my loom and as I said before Andy bought me the stand for it. It is now fully warped up with some 4ply Merino superwash yarn and I'm going to weave (hopefully) a baby blanket using my "Spring has Sprung" merino yarm dyed in daffodil colours. Wish me luck coz I'm gonna need it!

Well! What happened to this year??

Hi Folks

I bet you're wondering what happenned to me between June and now. Well not a lot really, apart from spinning and dyeing and getting along with life in general. Why I forgot about my blog I don't really know, as I was really getting in to it. Since I last spoke I have got my car from Motability, which is really nice, very comfortable and quiet and gets me from A-B in style.



We haven't used it a great deal but it does allow me to pay people back for the lifts they have given me especially to Spinning Weal in Clevedon where we meet up with other like minded folks and have a good old "Spin In" for about 3 hours. 'Tis great fun and we are thankful to Sarah and David for their time and premises.
Our weather has not been so good of late and I think summer is well and truly over, but I don't mind as it brings in Autumn which is always a good time of year with plenty of colour and hopefully a little late sun. We haven't had a holiday but are going away in late October, just to get away from the 4 walls, hopefuly I will have some nice pics for you to see.
Well that's all fo now folks - sorry I can't be more interesting.

Keith x

Fleece, Fleece and more wonderful Fleece !!!!

Oh boy what a day!
We went to the Somerset Guild's annual Fleece Fair at Hatch Beauchamp Somerset. It was a fantastic collection of wonderful fresh fleeces, the perfume (definately of sheep) was breathtaking and within just a couple of minutes you had enough lanolin on your hands to keep them soft for a year.
So what did I buy?
Well first on the list was a Black Blue Face Leicester (shearling ewe). This wasn't my initial choice as the one I wanted on display was sold. But the farmer went and got me this one from his van, and beautiful it is. There will be a need for some work, but hey that's what it' all about.

The next buy was 750g of Coloured Romney ( a beautiful dark grey to black). Very soft and open, with loads of lanolin.

Then I bought some taster of Kerry Hill about 300g, something I've always wanted to try. White and open when washed should spin quite easily.

Just around the corner I noticed some Shetland fleeces displayed by the Shetland Sheep Society. They were all in separate paper carrier bags ( good presentation) and the two reps could tell you anything you wanted about the fleeces. I picked up a bag of Moorit Shetland that had been rooed not shorn. It's beautifully clean and soft and the owner of the sheep Jean Curtis was there to tell me all about 'Princess' whose fleece it was.

We decided as a group Gill, Chris and me to buy a fleece for the group, and so I bought a 3kg Shropshire fleece to share. Nice and open and soft. Probably good to dye too.

We had tea and cake while we were there and who should suddenly appear but Anj, Shirley and Erin. Anj still suffering from her car crash, but still able to enjoy her hobby and shopping for fleece.
On our way back we stopped in Clevedon by the park and seafront for tea and cake again, but this time to chat about our purchases and get over the "Fleece Fever". It was sunny and warm and it wasn't until later that I realised that I had caught the sun ( or rather it had caught me ) on my head - not too bad, but it will be tender for a couple of days.
I get my car this week - yes I am excited, all I need is a long sticker saying "driven by the Babylon Whore"! as it is coloured Babylon Red......

Well that's all for now folks, will speak soon.

Byeeee

Keith