Fiber-ing in the Frigid Air

I ventured out to the Rockport Library yesterday and met three lovely ladies at the Tuesday Fiber Group. . . a quilter, two knitters, and me. It was just what I needed. They shared these fun photos recently taken by a Snow Bird friend (somewhere in Florida), who participated in a yarn bombing. They did Matisse proud, don't you think?

Projects On The Road: a new phase for Walking Wool

Little Bear, waiting for her stuffing.

Like the Design, not the end result so much, for a hat.
Better as a bowl to hold fibery things. (That's the jewelry-making stash in the background. More good things to come from it.)

Tiny Sweater, for hanging up and oggling. 

Special Chunky Handspun Hat, made with love, and llama and shetland fleece found in New England.

Fun Stripey Chunky Mitten, soon to have a mate. Sorbet colors! 

Making Friends (is the best!).

Felted Birdie catches the worm, or your heart.

Berroco scarf in handspun yarn from a BASD swap.

Barre Ewe gets published in NOFA/Mass enewsletter

It was a pleasure to hook up Guild friend Betsy with Mindy Harris at NOFA/Mass. Mindy was looking for a story about wool and spinning as the editor of this monthly publication. Betsy has a knack for capturing the joy we all feel about the subject, and has written a number of articles already on spinning and more. Mindy also asked for photos, and I was pleased she liked Barre Ewe so much as to put it on the cover this month's issue. Other photos in the article of Betsy spinning and our Guild members showing off naturally dyed fibers were happily supplied to Mindy as well. Nice commentary by Julie Rawson about her love of knitting, too.

http://www.nofamass.org/news/pdfs/newsletter02_2011.pdf

Canada 2010

Our trip to Montreal and the Eastern Townships (North Hatley) was restful and good for what ailed us. The photos tell it all. Got much knitting and eating done, and no spinning, or sheep photography. But, relished good times with Jeff and Jeric walking and contemplating. It was a true escape for a couple of weeks.

Yikes, where does the time go?

Me in Florida, definitely not knitting.

I HAVE been spinning in spite of the silence on the blog . . . January was, well, a month, and ten days were spent trying to put it all behind me by kayaking the waterways of southwestern Florida with mom, the Kayak Queen of Windmill Village. Five knitting projects were packed in my suitcase, and guess how many were completed? One. Gee, paying the extra $20 to check my bag each way was REALLY worth it!



Nope, no knitting got done here, either.

Spinning has been really good for me during the start of the New Year. Almost done with the fall natural dyeing samples, and thinking about finishing up Jeric's fluff so that scarf can be finalized, once and for all. It is soooo warm and soft, at least the 1/2 I've completed.

Waiting to hear back from Storey about my book proposal. It just makes so much sense to me, so why shouldn't it to them?

Lots of great stuff going on with Wachusett Spinners Guild. We are really gearing up for the scheduled 2010 fiber season, and creating new events of our own.

If you haven't yet discovered it on your own, this is quite the little blog: http://www.fiberfarm.com/blog.

Happy Holidays

Making the rounds with the holiday phone calls, I was updated on Sara's new handknitted hat venture. She just delivered her first bulk order of 10 locally-grown, hand spun (and in some cases, hand-dyed with natural dyes), and hand-knitted Maine wool hats to her customer. A chief contributor to the Babydoll Southdown wool knitwear was this guy, Rollie the Ram, chief sire of the growing flock, the guy who started it all with Sara's Southdown's.

Rollie's flock are producing a beautiful fleece in colors of cream, oatmeal, and chocolate brown. His offspring are sweet, fuzzy creatures (including Little Bill in the photo above with me). So exciting to see Sara manfest yet another facet of her creativity and shepherding skills.

Pining for Signs of Sheep

It's December and so unseasonably warm that it makes me think I should be outdoors tracking sheep with my camera. Spinning and knitting are the typical activities this time of year. I've been getting to some of it, as I've been home much of this fall, regrouping on personal and professional levels. Lots of loss to absorb, and new directions to focus on. So, nothing like fiber to comfort the mind, body and soul during a stressful time as this.

Here's a photo taken at Overlook Farm/Heifer Project, Rutland MA.

Thanks to my friends in the Wachusett Spinners Guild I have twice-monthly meetings I plan to get back to. I miss their company very much! For four or five hours on a Sunday afternoon we enjoy spinning, show-and-tell of new discoveries, and tasty eats at one home or another. I haven't seen my gang since our early September natural dyeing workshop with Ellen Stone of Rhode Island. It was a superb long day at Dorothy's Shetland sheep farm, cooking up goldenrod and marigolds, experimenting with indigo, and learning about traditional dyeing practices as we perused Ellen's vast fiber sample rack. Our group has also done much work toward producing a Central MA Fiber Map, and I look forward to seeing where that stands and how we can share it with the general public in the near future (2010?).


In the interim my friend and teacher Christina at The Sheep Shack has kept me inspired with new yarns from Berroco and I've already whipped up some neat new projects. And, my spinning wheel has seen some action again just in the last week or two, as I've been working to ply the wool we dyed in September.


Early this fall some exciting news came in. Wearhouse, an upscale retail store in Great Barrington MA, expressed interest in selling my farm animal photographs. I am so grateful to Carrie for taking an interest in my work, and taking on a dozen or so enlargements of pigs, sheep, goats, and cows up to 20 x 26" framed and displayed in this beautiful setting. Sales are happening already, so I'm very encouraged!