Febuary Roving

This year I am going to try to stay one month ahead in my colors. January we did a red roving for Valentines Day and this Month I am doing a Green roving for St Patrick's Day. I have to admit I tend to Dye fibers when it is very cold outside. This year I have a pellet stove to help dry my fibers. They dry faster than outside in the summer and I don't sacrifice any fibers to the wind.

I try to remember to weigh the fiber before I start so I can measure the Dye more efficiently, however I do often forget. This is one of my dye pots on the stove. It was labeled Merino/Soy Blend however after it was rinsed, to my horror, it was all soy. Soy and wool use different dyes so after all the work the fiber was white. I like to Dye the blends with acid dye because when they dry I get white streaks (the Soy or Bamboo) through a deep color.The good news is I have a Lot of soy. I also saved the dye water (it was still very green) and took some Merino Nylon out of my stash.

Finally results! My February Blend contains Superwash merino, merino, Domestic wool, nylon, bamboo, Firestar and Green Angelina.

Super soft and sparkly, the perfect cure for the winter doldrums. Boy, I miss grass, right now I even miss mowing : )

Happy Spinning!
Loretta

January Roving

The January roving is finished! The contents are Merino, Super wash Merino, Mill ends, Soy silk, viscose and Firestar. What fun!

Some roving I spaced dyed just for fun.
And a 2 yard Niddy-Noddy my husband made for me last weekend.

I added 2 silk scarves to the dye pot. I think I will give one to my mother for Valentines day.

Ta Ta for now!

More Spindles

Hi everybody!
This week I have been busy making some new spindles. I just listed a new kit with a spindle and spindle bag. I love how soft the scotty bag feels.
Kim is coming home for winter break on Friday. We already have a dye day planned. I love blending colors together and I am running low on several colors. I am completely out of hand dyed firestar. I am really happy to have 2 pounds to dye on Sunday.

I still have 20 or so spindles to turn, but Kim will probably pour more before she heads back to school. And I need to make some stock for shows. We are hoping to do two spinning shows this spring.





I will put up pictures of the fibers on Monday.
And I think we will start some silk worms on Monday as well.
Ta for now
Loretta

New Winter Arrival

We have had a very busy week. Friday Dec 5 my husbands Bernese had 2 puppies with my Bichon Frise and yesterday we had a little baby Cria. She is the most adorable little thing.
Crias are Baby Llamas or alpacas . This is our little llama cria. I prefer the temperament of llamas to that of alpacas. We have had both we kept the llamas and the Alpacas found new homes.We currently have 4 adult llamas and 2 sheep. They all live together with 5 roosters, the roosters peck at the seeds the other animals drop. It is really funny watching the "herd" move from one pasture to the other. I never imagined the roosters would become part of the herd but they follow the llamas and sheep around. The herd seems to look out for all the members 2 and 4 legged.


This is my son Sam with our new addition. She doesn't yet have a name , please feel free to send your ideas. When we approach all of our llamas we either start by offering our hand for them to smell or our hair. Llama s are very social animals and are a real treat to have on the farm. In this picture you can see baby with momma in back and behind Mom is Dad's head.

More Cria Pictures.

I took my printer into Best Buy on Monday because it was having paper jamming issues. I hate to be without a printer, however they said it would be at the shop for 2 weeks. So I have changed our December sale to an extra sample of roving with each purchase.

Happy Spinning!

December Roving

Just a quick update, as we are getting ready to do 2 craft shows this weekend.
I wanted to share the roving of the month

Peppermint Twist
This is a blend of Super Merino, Soy silk, Bamboo, White Icicle top, and some Angelina.
Very sparkly and Fun.

And Pulled out into Roving!

More next week. Ta for now, Loretta

Busy November

We have had a very busy November filling wholesale orders. I am happy to announce that there is a new Yarn store in Iowa Falls, Iowa. THE OLD COUNTY YARN STORE is run by Cindy Maroney her winter hours are

Tues 10 am-2:30 pm, Wed-Fri 10 am –6pm and Sat from 10 Am-4 pm. If you happen to be driving by make sure to stop in and say hi.

This past month we have been playing with GLOW-in-the-Dark pigment powders. If you like to spin in the car these are really neat. They charge themselves with sunlight and glow for hours. This is a cloud swirl pattern. We never know how they will tun out and they are more fun because each one is one of a kind.

Taking Pictures in the dark is hard but really fun.


This is a shot of my kitchen table just before I start carding. With all the colors and different fibers to play with. I also weigh all of the fibers before I card so all the batts have the same percent of fibers.I wanted to make a jewel color blend. My kids refer to as clown Vomit.

I load each color into the carder.

Then I remove the batt and split it in half.

The tricky part! I run the split halves of the batt into the carder with the pink fibers on the right.
And tada!

Ok, I admit it I am addicted to sparkly fibers. I ordered several colors of Angelina on ETSY and I just ordered 2 pounds of White Icicle Top (also known as firestar) from Canada last week.
Later this week I will be carding up my December Blend, Peppermint Twist. I will post more pictures then.
Ta for now,
Loretta

Finally Free!

So in the past few months I have been raising puppies.
All of our puppies are now happy and settled in their new homes so I finally have time to devote to spinning. Yeah!








Last year at Christmas I promised my mother that I would do a craft show with her and Kim(my daughter), so we could have some quality bonding time, just us girls. So I spent the last 3 weeks making soap. I now have soap coming out my ears and my house smells like a department store perfume counter.
I am very thankful Kim is at college so I can use her room to dry the soaps.


But on to the fun stuff!
Saturday, Kim and I decorated the Christmas tree with roving and drop spindles. I have never EVER put up a tree before Thanksgiving but I wanted to make Christmas Cards. I think it is the prettiest tree we have ever had. What do you think?














On Sunday I went crazy with my drum carder. Kim requested that I do a Winter Blue roving for our etsy store. I didn't really have much blue dyed, but I did have Blue Bamboo that I had dyed this summer. I carded the bamboo first, it is a very fine fiber and carding it alone first gives better results in the final batt. I then ran the bamboo though the carder again this time with silver Angelina (I love Glitz).

Then I went though my stash just to see what I wanted to use for the white fibers. I chose a Merino Soy blend. The first batt off the carder was soo soft I spun it right away. I was very excited and carded 15 more batts before I realized what time it was. I have put 10 batts away for the shop, but I am very tempted to spin them all!

More soon, Loretta