Author: denisemor

Heather and Sunshine

Mighty gray and rainy outside this weekend, so rather than prune the Big Apple, I decided to create a more pleasing palette, with the help of the fiber stash.

I dove into my bags and bins of dyed wools, and pulled out a bunch of energizing shades-

from upper left: Citron, Blood Orange, Deep Water (Abundant Earth Wool Tinctures) on Esther and Violet on Border Leicester purchased from Jonasson Farm a few years back.

I love love love that violet color, and thought it would make a beautiful base color for a heathery mix of different hues. A few passes through the drum carder resulted in a blend that was so fun to spin- just watching the different shades pass through my fingers was a tonic.

I spun the singles on Mighty Red (who might be on the verge of getting a new name. I’m almost there). She’s got some good energy. Such a smooth and easy spinner.

I decided to make this a two-ply, and only have the one original bobbin for MR, so had to wind off onto storage bobbins. Sophie was happy to help out with that bit-

I remove her bobbin brake, and move the driveband over to drive the bobbin to use her as a winder. So now I’ve got two Sophie bobbins of Violet Heather singles ready to ply

I was so pleased with the result that I went back to the drum carder to whip up another batch- the same colors in different proportions

Sunshine with a side of blue sky, and dashes of infrared and ultraviolet getting all melty on the drum carder.

I think these two are going to coordinate fabulously

Perhaps in a sweater project?

Hmmmm. Something to think on this week.

Ps. Special thanks to The Man for shooting my the video clips for this post 🙂

Yarn & Seeds

Today we checked chicken butts and treated for mites and lice. But you don’t want to see pictures of chicken butts, so I’ll share some yarn and seeds 🙂

Squishy!

Blendy!

And full of packets of possibilities that came in the mail a couple days ago.

Got a start on the pruning this weekend as well (small fruit trees and roses). Maybe photos later, once my forearms recover. Hope to tackle the Big Apple next weekend, weather permitting.

That’s about it from the homestead.

Have a good week-

Last Week’s Batts

Are this weeks yarn!

Very blendy. That was fun. But I wasn’t inclined to spend time carding this weekend, so this week’s spin is going to be a fancy Polwarth/Silk blend that I purchased a couple years ago from The Artful Ewe in Port Gamble, WA.

I’ve not decided yet how I’m going to approach it, but I’d like to get some decent yardage from it, so I can maybe use it in a sweater yoke- thinking it might look nice against Fiona’s soft beige-y tones.

And in anticipation of seed starting later this month, I took some time today to do some housecleaning- hoop house cleaning, that is.

Thankfully the twinwall cleans up pretty easily. Little bit of simple green. little bit of elbow grease.

And we’re off to a fresh start!

Oh- and I ordered some dye plant seeds from Botanical Colors today- Madder, Dyer’s Chamomile, Marigold, and Black Knight Scabiosa. Been meaning to get some madder started for a long time now, so nice to have taken the first step. 🙂

Have a great week folks-

Still January

But just barely 🙂

February will mean pruning fruit trees and roses, and starting garden seeds.

But in January, while things are still dormant, I have an opportunity to push back against the blackberries.

I’ll never manage to eradicate them from our property, but I try to at least set them back a bit each winter, because it’s amazing how huge they can grow in just one season.

Beautiful blackberry-pulling weather here this weekend. Sunny and cool. I made quite a bit of progress.

Now its just wisteria and salmonberry duking it out along the back fence. If I didn’t intervene, who do you think would win the territory battle? Worthy adversaries, I’d say.

(oh hey! there’s some sheeps in the background there- hi sheeps!)

In wool news, I’ve got a new hat-of-the week, again with a new motif from the Alterknits book

Not quite done and dusted, as I played yarn chicken and and came up short, so had to rework the last couple rounds. Another strong pattern contender, tho- and easier to memorize than the one a couple weeks back.

And I’ve been playing at the carder again, blending up some pretty batts to get me back behind the wheel(s)

The ones on the left are multi on a grey base, and the one on the right is on white. Sunshine and shadow.

So that’s about it here- oh, except that I got a menacing message through my contact form from someone who claims to have hacked my site and downloaded the database. Apparently if I don’t pay them a bunch of bitcoin within 72 hours bad things will happen. I think it’s BS, but if FullyFleeced is down on Wed, (after their compliance deadline) I guess we’ll know I was wrong, eh? At least I’ve got a backup.

Have a great week everyone! 🙂