I have some Baize Shetland wool that came as large batts. I’ve been tearing off strips to spin, but decided that it was inefficient to unroll the batts every time, so separated all of the batts into strips and wound them into loose “nests”.
To wrap the nest, I loosely wrap the wool strip around four fingers, then tuck the end in the middle. The nests stay together, and are easy to grab when it is time to spin.
I took a needle felting class! So cool, and much easier than I imagined. The instructor, Joyce Hazlerig, is phenomenal, and I came away with pockets overflowing with tips and tricks. In class we made cute little bearded gnomes.
The neatest thing about needle felting is that it combines with all my other fiber crafts. I can add needle felted embellishments to anything felt-able. (Insert maniacal mad inventor laugh here. Do picture both hands raised in triumph as well.)
I recently created a PDF pattern for a local yarn shop. It is the owner’s pattern, but they needed it taken from written shorthand to a sharable PDF. It is a cute little peachy amigurumi, and in testing the pattern, I made up 6 little peaches.
The pattern is by Anniewhere at NerdCraft. I’m very excited about the wool yarn I used for the body of the peach, because it was locally spun and dyed by Texas Prairie Fiber Co. I love using locally produced supplies! The leaves I made from my own handspun yarn, that I spun from Blue Faced Leicester and silk blended roving dyed by Frabjous Fibers. This turned out to be quite the collaborative project.
I did make each one into a keychain by sewing on some chain and attaching a split ring. I used hand-spun alpaca scraps from a naturally brown alpaca (Aimee) to sew on the chain. So each peach has a little brown stem.
The Texas summer is ramping up, and I don’t like walking when it is hot outside. Luckily, I have a large kitchen counter with room to walk circuits in the house. To keep the kitten occupied, I tied a ribbon to a small clip and clipped it on the back of my shirt.
The drier air is also better for my spinning, since heat, moisture, and pressure are the factors that felt wool. Missy the dog also thinks spinning time is kick the ball time, and it is amusing to watch her figure out the timing to drop the ball in my path so I can kick it before walking past. So yes, I walk the house spinning with a drop spindle, kicking the ball for the dog, trailing a ribbon for the cats. I am walking entertainment, but I’m getting in those steps!
My youngest gave me a box of yellow to orange dyed merino wool and I decided to spin it up separately rather than blend it (so many choices with these bundles of colors!)
I like the small bundles of wool because they transport easily; I can walk with the roving loosely around my fiber hand, or I can pop the fiber into a container in my purse so I can spin while waiting.
Critters and Craft 