Fiberjoy

An early morning walk last Wednesday with the grandkids. Two block and we reached the stairs that students used to climb daily to get to the old school. Originally the high school for Scotts Mills, then after unification it became the elementary school until a new one was built in 1975 on the outskirts of town. It is now privately owned. Many times Ed and I have wished we’d known when it was put up for sale. We were only about a year too late!

“Come on!”

Feather is racing ahead up the steps undaunted by the rough unevenness.
See the open door at the bottom corner of the gym? That was the barn part of the gym where the kids who rode horses to school put them during the school day.   The pasture below the gym/barn was fenced so the horses were free to graze.

Finally! The top of the stairs overlooking the town.

Past the school and the church and on down to the County Park with Feather in the lead. The creek is high from all the late snow runoff.

And now to the swings!

One dilemma of not blogging regularly is forgetting to post finished items, at least in a timely manner, then overwhelming someone’s bandwidth with trying to catch up.

Having struggled to the end of Llama I recently dug through my stash for something soothing and fun to spin and found just the bundle:  Holiday Yarn superwash BFL – colorway Empire Apple, that Tsock Tsarina and Gywniver, aka Lisa and Jennifer, gave me at the end of Sock Summit ’09.
A few evenings from this to

406 yards of 2-ply yarn. What’s it going to be?

We’ll see!

Remember the Phang spindle I wrote about early in December, the hand spindle that a certain Janet had carved, using onlya simple knife,  whilst walking in the woods? The spindle is her interpretation of the Ladakh phang – pronounced to closely rhyme with song, if I understand correctly. There’s a great discussion about them on the Spindle Lore forum in Ravelry. (Speaking of which, does anyone else get so far behind there that, other than a quick dash to grab a pattern or a link, you avoid stopping by Ravelry for fear that a day will blur into oblivion trying to catch up?)

I finished spinning the wool Janet had sent with the phang. Wanting to keep the length of the single, I wound it off onto a bobbin for ease of plying. Pam  gifted some grey Pygora to ply with the wool single. Brilliant! Pygora and phang were a happy union of fiber and spindle. I’m stunned to realize that I don’t have a picture of the finished yarn on this computer.

With these two yarns finished and quietly waiting to be made into something, the spinning bug continues to whine in my ear. How could I resist when I saw this for sale? Even lovelier in real life. This will be the next fiber on my wheel. Seriously, it’s taking all the self-control I can muster not to dive in and spin it.

Knitting this shirt has taken top priority.

Pattern: Buttercup by Heidi Kirrmaier
Yarn: Abstract Fiber Mighty Sock, Koi Pond
I fell in love with the cheerful colors and drape of this 50/50 superwash merino/tencel yarn. It pleasantly slips through the hands and along the needles.

The Grandkids, Faith and Wesley will be arriving tomorrow for a week long stay with us. I need to get busy and clean the house, tidy up project areas and put tempting needle items out of reach of young hands, then do some last minute meal planning and shopping. A busy week ahead is in forecast!

Hurray, I’m thrilled to my toes that I got into my #1 choice of a Sock Summit class! Socks Exotica: Silk, Cashmere and Friends taught by Judith MacKenzie. I can justify taking leave of our booth for one 3 hour class which meant carefully choosing the class that would best meet my needs and as I’m focusing more on the desire to be a spinning teacher I put blinders on for all the so very enticing knitting classes.

Yesterday was the monthly Spinning Group day. I hadn’t been in a few months but decided not to let the noon Sock Summit registration deter my going. The sunshine and soft air seemed to set a glow to the abundant unfurling leaves, grasses and flowers, a day meant to be spent outside, at least enough to drink in the beauty. The day an oasis of calm spinning in the midst of busyness. Happily a new spinning project has been started, one that doesn’t involve hours of picking out vm. Shortly before noon the host, Sharon, graciously let me use her computer to register for the class. Ten minutes and back to spinning, it was that seamless and smooth of a registration.

Llama yarn is spun, dyed with Landscaped Dyes and ready to be woven into a rug. I’d love to warp the loom this weekend. What, is there a better way to spend Mother’s Day?!
Sadly,  Woodland Woolworks is shutting their doors. Though I rarely made the journey across the valley to shop there, I did love being able to select the yarns in person when I had a specific weaving project in mind. More often I access their extensive inventory online and I will greatly miss the convenience. Most of all I’m sad that they weren’t able to hold their own in what seems to be a highly competitive market. Items always arrived within a couple days of placing the order and, as a business we loved working with Diane and her staff! We are terribly disappointed that they won’t be sharing the booth with us at Black Sheep as they did last year. Instead Diane has arranged for Sweet Grass Wool to take her place in the booth. I’m thankful that Diane selected Patty whom I have met and enjoyed chatting with several times, and I love her spinning fibers!

One day Ed was having a non-productive day in the shop where everything he touched either dropped to the ground or ended up in the firebox. Around mid-morning he called it quits and we decided to make good use of the day and drove over to Yamhill to visit Woolworks. At Ed’s encouragement (almost insistence) I came home with far more than I had imagined possible.
If it fit in the back seat of the car I should be able to find a spot in the house for it. Right?

I’d been wanting a Glimakra Julia since testing one at Black Sheep Gathering 2 years ago and when Ed saw this demo loom at the store he knew it was time. I’m looking forward to weaving the generous warp that is on it. Crazy but when we put it back together we accidentally switched the two main bars for the warp and cloth beams. It wasn’t until I tried tightening the warp that I realized the ratchet gears face the wrong way. Another project I’d like to tackle this weekend.

Over two months ago a customer wrote asking if Ed could make her an Aegean using Viking Runes, aka Futhark. She’d gotten the idea when reading Elsebeth Lavold’s Viking Patterns for Knitting. We ordered the book and after looking at the pictures did some online researching and came up with more ideas, including a pre-Greek alphabet (of course that word didn’t yet exist!) which was found on Crete, and an ancient form of Turkish writings which is totally exciting to me. Except that many of the symbols are curved which doesn’t work so well for marking on wood. Last week Ed was finally able to make two of these spindles; one with Viking Runes, the other with pre-Greek symbols.

Holly Aegean Anglosaxon Runes (futhark) reading from middle outward: Joy, Earth, Chalice

Holly Aegean with Pre-Greek, known as Linear B, symbols spelling SPIN