Is it summer yet?

The last few days have seen us bathed in lovely warm sunshine and we have been getting out the t shirts and dusting down the barbie. Today though it's grey skies and rain so winter appears to be back.

Yesterday I took advantage of the sunshine and took daughter and grandaughter to Temple Newsam House to see the new lambs and other fluffy feathered creatures. GD was not overly inpressed with the animals but was in her element in the playgound especially on the swings. Note the look of concentration! That means she is enjoying herself!


When D and I had had enough , we decided to get an ice cream but lo and behold Leeds City Council, in their wisdom, have decided that they are only going to sell ice cream at weekends. So we had to make do with tea. Not the same at all on a hot day. We live in crazy times!


Back to the spinning now and I am plying my Alpaca and silk yarn. I am very pleased with the way it's turned out. Even though some of it is very fine, it is very strong and I can't break it easily with my hands. I hope to use it to weave, so the stronger the better. Will take a photo for posting next time.



Next project is to spin some cotton sliver using the fastest ratio! Will I be able to keep up?

Busy days out

A second visit to the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester on Friday to see the Indigo exhibition. Our first visit was a bit rushed but this time we had time to sit and watch the video presentation and to look more closely at the exhibits.


There were some real gems but my favourite bit of all was the basket of samples that you could pick up. Oh that indigo smell! It's better than chocolate!


Ideas to follow up were making a warp to dye and try IKAT weaving on my new loom, and to find out about aqua leaf indigo dyeing that gives a beautiful turquoise colour. I'm also going to try using starch paste as a resist to dye some fabric for a quilted cushion.


I resisted buying Jenny Balfour-Paul's book, but it will go on my birthday and Christmas wish list.


Saturday was York, once around the walls and then to the City Screen to see the live broadcast from the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Juan Diego Florez may be short, but he has a lovely voice!


So Sunday was resting the sore feet and getting to grips with spinning some Alpaca/silk blend tops I've had for a while. I decided to use the fast flier on my Lendrum wheel to make a fine yarn, but with a high twist. Not easy, but I did get the rhythm going after a while. The secret appears to be to get the fibre prepared so that drafting is kept to a minimum, almost like threading the fibre onto the bobbin. I found that trying to draft was frustrating and the yarn was very uneven. I'm not sure Mabel Ross would approve of my methods.



Another mental note, plan before you start and work out exactly what you need to do. Is it too late to change after a lifetime of, oh it will be alright.

Just the start

It's scary when you realise that you are approaching the end of your 6th decade and wonder where all that time has gone and what you've achieved. I don't think I've done too badly, could perhaps have done more to help others at times, but there's always tomorrow!

One thing I have done is learn to hand spin and weave and over the last few years these skills have done wonders for my self esteem and have kept me sane.

This is my first post on this blog and I hope to keep it up to date with details of my work and some of the other stuff I get up to from time to time.

My latest spinning project is making a reasonably robust yarn from a commercially died wool roving in order to knit a shawl. I was attracted to the colours, described as Caribean Skies, a range of beautiful blues, through blue green to lilac. See the photo above.

I have spun it semi worsted straight from the roving and have plied it to get the maximum range of colours and shades. I have almost completed the yarn so the next step will be to wash it and then I can start knitting.

Although the colours are lovely, the quality of the roving left a lot to be desired. It was expensive and it has proved to be very poor value for money. It turned out to be a blend of different fleeces, so contained lots of different staple lengths which made it difficult to spin. There was also a lot of grass seed and other plant debris mixed in with it.

It's very sad that the quality of commercially produced rovings can be so poor, but we live and learn! So the lesson for today is, next time, I'll be choosing more carefully and I'll be doing my own dyeing!