3 posts tagged “master spinning”

Wonder of wonders, our farrier has found us another horse.  We went to look at her today.  She is a thoroughbred (did I say I didn't want another thoroughbred?) and is a bit smaller than our Sass, but every bit as lovely.  She is very friendly, unlike Sass, and has been in training for dressage in the past.  We are picking her up tomorrow to see how she fits with Bud.  I will post pictures soon.

This has been a weird week.  I know it is the anti-climax to the incredible vacation we just returned from.  Our vacation schedule went like this:  Some one tells you to get in the car, you get in the car.  Some one tells you to eat, you eat.  It went on like that for a week.  Food every time you turned around, and not crappy food, really really really good food.  Today dh made a lovely smoked pork shoulder that we shared with my sister and her husband.  Along with fresh sweet corn.  Ymmmm.  It was good, so back into cooking for ourselves.  Kind of a drag.

Next week will begin the work on THE FARM.  Well, it isn't really a farm yet, but who knows?  I need to find a surveyor and some one willing to lease it for farming and find out about wells and drainage and electricity and and and.  Did we bite off too much???  Maybe.  We'll just  have to see.

Work continues on Level 4 of the Master Spinners class.  I now feel really comfortable with a spinning technique called longdraw.  This one has always baffled me a bit, but now I think I have the fundamentals down.  I have quite a fair bit of my book done already, well maybe 20 percent if you don't count the 150 hour project.  I ordered the wool for it today.  I am planning on doing a very extensive blended color wheel with tints and shades of the primary and secondary colors as well as blends of the tertiary colors.  Not sure how I will present it yet, but I'm sure I'll think of something.

Here are some shots of my recent visit to Olds, Alberta for my Level 4 Master Spinners Class.  #1 is my distaff dressed with flax.  #2 is Karly R and Arlene C working at the dye pot.  # 3 is our bundles of yarn for our color wheel, dyed with a percentage dye method.  #4 is a class picture, #5 show some lovely bromeliads blooming in the buildings atrium, #6 is the result of crockpot rainbow dyeing, and #6 shows the result of some burn tests.

I am back from my level 4 master spinners course in Olds, Alberta.  What a beautiful place.  Exactly what you'd expect a grass prairie to look like.  Amazing!!  Sky for miles and off to the west the Rockies jump off the horizon like so many jagged teeth.

The class went really well.  Our instructor made a very welcoming and wonderful learning environment for all 8 of us students.  I am the only one from my original class but Mary L and Angela S from last year at Gibson's made it to this class.  Lovely women in the class.  Everyone a delight.  But I have to say, by Wednesday my brain was full!!

Flax, bison, reeling silk, percentage and timed dyeing, cotton and the dreaded long draw were skills to work on.  Flax is a wondrous fiber to spin and then we went to the other extreme in length with cotton.  Burn tests were done.  A good way to identify fibers.  One of the nice things about this class was that I finally feel that I am turning into a competent spinner.  Not great by any means, but a solid handle on things. 

I also bought a beautiful black shetland lamb fleece that was part of the wool show.  Nearly jet black and so pretty.  I will post pix in the near future.