I’ve Been What?

Abby had memed me.  Since I’m still working on the next Cotswold post the timing is good for such a post.

Okay first the rules:

“The rules of the game get posted at the beginning. Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.”

1. What was I doing 10 years ago?

My nephew had just been born!  And man could he scream.  Turns out he had reflux.  My poor sister really learned the meaning of the term “sleep deprivation”.   I’m surprised she ever agreed to have another child.

Also, about six months previously I had adopted Patches, an Australian Shepherd, from my sister in law.  Ten years ago in June I was preparing to go to the first Camp Shirley put on by M. Shirley Chong.  I won’t go into the details but I learned a lot and found some long time friends there.  Sadly, Shirley is pretty much retired due to ill health but the lessons learned at camp live on through my dogs today and into the future.

2. What are 5 things on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):

A) Run reports for work (DONE!)

B) Update Geocaching Swiss Army Knife (GSAK) with the latest cache information and load information into GPSr’s. 

C) Groom dogs for going to the  CPE Nationals.  Tonails need trimmed, and coats need brushed in preparation for the trial.  Grooming to make sure that feet don’t slip on the equipment.

D) Make dinner <groan>  I never have any idea what to make for dinner.  At least today I have hamburger thawed out to  use.

E) Pack wheel for weekend.  I plan to take my Lendrum wheel with me and spend some time spinning when not either working the trial or running Danny.

3. Snacks I enjoy:

Ah, let’s see…..

Pretzels, good pretzels like they make in Shipshewana, IN.  Not too greasy, and not frozen/thawed bowling alley pretzels.

Chocolate, dark dark chocolate.  My current favorite is Green and Black’s Maya Gold.

Almond butter  I’m allergic to peanuts so almond butter is a godsend to replace peanut butter in my life.

Fresh baked bread-no matter what flavor.

4. Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

1) Pay off my debt and my house

2) Invest a sizable portion.

3) Sell paid off house and buy a house and pole barn in a nearby county.

4) Take care of my mom and mil to make sure their needs are met.

5) Quit my job and train dogs for a living, if only my own dogs.

6) By an RV set up specifically for traveling with the dogs.

5. Places I have lived:

Oh geez, compared to Abby I’m pretty boring. 

I lived the first 18 years of my life in Camby, IN, then went to college at Purdue University in West Lafayette, IN.

I then took off to grad school (the first time through) in El Paso, TX for three long years.  Other than me getting married during that time, I would prefer to forget most of it.  Then I move to the swamps of NE Illinois and love being back in the Midwest.  Once back I was able to finish my masters degree and really learned to spin well.

6. Peeps I want to know more about:

I have to think about this.  So many of the people I want to know more about have already been recently picked.

Cotswold – A Breed On The Brink

Cotswold Sheep always remind me of Chi.

Originally uploaded by sarah.eyre

Cotswold gets it’s name from the Cotswold area of England near the border of Wales. The name cotswold comes from the shelters or “cotes” for the sheep. There are several versions of the development of the breed. The breed as it stands today was imported into the US early in the 19th century and has been used to crossbreed to produce large framed lambs for market. The breed is also believed to be related to long wooled sheep the Romans brought up to England.

Longwools have been used over the years to produce fabrics for outerwear, upholstry and blankets as well as for floor coverings. As synthetic fibers have replaced wool for these uses, the importance of Cotswold and other longwool breeds has driven these breeds to become endangered. According to the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, Cotswold are considered a threatened livestock breed.

The sheep themselves are large, polled breed. Ewes weighing 200 pounds while the rams can be upwards of 300 pounds. The breed has naturally colored individuals within its gene pool with shades that range from black to light grey. The locks have been referred to as poor mans mohair because the fiber has a nice bit of luster.

Don’t be afraid of longwools, give cotswold a try and let it surprise you.

Vicuña, Guanaco and Paco-Vicuña – Turning Gold Into Yarn

I’m going to tackle this one fiber at a time so hang on for the ride.

Vicuña fiber that is coming into the US typically has a staple length less than 1″.

What you are seeing is 2/10 of an ounce of vicuña. This will be spun on a charka, which is particularly good for dealing with really short fibers.

This is the first vicuña yarn I made. Spun on a charka, plied on a light top whorl spindle. Not much yardage, but considering it costs around $300 oz you are not going to make a shawl out of it unless you have very deep pockets.

In contrast guanaco costs a paltry $30 oz.

This is a lighter colored dehaired guanaco, it also is a bit washed out by the flash and no matter how I adjusted it came out lighter than in real life. Its staple is longer, but more like somewhere between 1-2″ long.

Here is some spindle spun guanaco in the darker color. It turned out to be the perfect travel project as I could take a few tufts of guanaco and spin for a long time while at a dog show.

Just to compare, here is a picture of the guanaco (about 1 ounce skein) next to the tiny sample of vicuña.

Now you get a better idea about how much is there of each.

The prep for both the vicuña and guanaco is simply spinning directly from the “cloud” of fiber, You could card either one or blend it with another fiber, but for these yarns I chose not to.

The paco-vicuña was a gift from Toni. Yes the fiber than has been on walkabout. I guess all I need to do to scare something out of hiding is blog about it being missing.

I washed it and then decided to both comb and card samples of it similar to what I have been doing with my wool fleeces.

The samples were carded with cotton carders so I created no additional neps other than what was already there.

Not the smoothest preparation and there is a small number of guard hairs scattered throughout. I didn’t try to remove. If I was spinning for a project I certainly would try to remove them.

Here is the finished skein. Not terribly lumpy and bumpy, but hard to spin much thinner.

The combed fiber produced a lot of “waste”. And at $25 to $30 oz for raw it can add up to a considerable amount of weight. The preparation was much smoother and since it had a staple length of between 2 and 3 inches it was not that hard to comb and pull off a bit of top.

The yarn spun was a bit finer, not a whole lot as I used the same spindle, a Bosworth Featherweight, to spin both samples. If I took more time I could have spun much finer.

I’ve been overwhelmed with visits and comments since Stephanie Pearl-McPhee aka The Yarn Harlot posted about Sheepwreck in her blog. Thanks everyone for stopping by and visiting. And Steph thank YOU for coming to Madison.

Believe it or not, I originally planned to go to the Madison event. I live about 10 miles south of the Illinois/Wisconsin state line. It is quicker for me to drive US 12 to Madison, than to try and thread my way through Chicagoland traffic to get to Oak Lawn. I have traveled that route many times for flyball tournaments. And despite having grown up in Indianapolis, Madison feels more like home to me than the suburbs of Chicago. I think I just miss living in a college town.

Knitting “Camp” (actually it was officially a workshop) was very important to me. It was not sock knitting, but EPS (Elizabeth Percentage System). It was a safe camp for me to attend as it was a lot of stuff I knew already punctuated by things I didn’t. It also met my long time yearning to go to one of Meg’s camps. Will I go back? Perhaps one day, I have not decided yet. It is certainly worth it.

BTW, keep an eye on this link for some future news of the herding crew. Pictures will be updated on a periodic basis. (Yes they are Australian Shepherds not guinea pigs.)

Letters From Camp-Saying Our Goodbyes

Camp was over too soon.

Saturday night brought us Joyce Williams. So on Sunday she brought her own personal trunk show to wow us.

Look at the way those buttons are attached to each other.

Latvian braid flanking a color pattern.

Can you see how the stitches were picked up with the pattern continuing on.

Armenian knitting not intarsia.

Fair Isle sweater using corrugated ribbing.

If our minds were not already full on Saturday, they certainly were now.

Meg tirelessly explains sweater planning and construction in order to make the sweaters actually fit.

Too soon it was time to go and I said my goodbyes to Amy and Meg.

I’m so happy and thrilled to have been there. Annette, was right…I needed to go to camp.

Oh, I did not forget geocaching on the way home!

I mean, where else could you find out where the middle of Wisconsin is! This is the marker for the center of the state in Pittsville.

One last image I’ll leave you with. Elizabeth left many things behind, but this one struck me.

Yes the Babcock, WI Post Office. Many a package was sent to many a knitter through there.

Thanks again to Meg, Amy, Joyce, and the crew at Schoolhouse Press. Knitting camp exceeded my expectations, by many factors and in many ways.

Letters From Camp-A Visit to the Schoolhouse

Today went by way too fast. We asked many questions, some quite difficult.

In the morning Meg taught us many things about arm shaping. Suddenly at one point she stopped and saw what Amy Detjen was knitting.

Wow…yeah now thats a gansey!

After lunch we headed out to the warehouse of Schoolhouse Press.

So what is the first thing the geologist finds….rocks of course. Baraboo quartzite to be specific. Oh and tulips and blooming snowdrops between the boulders.

But the knitter and spinner in me woke up quickly and headed inside to behold the joys of wool. Here are the bundles of Icelandic wool.

And shuffling through stuff in the sweater room. It smelled of strong cedar and I felt the joy of each article that passed through my hands. From gloves to sweaters to beloved shawls and I even saw the Pi are Squared shawl. I also found out what was wrong with my Three Cornered Hat.

See the yarn, that’s Sheepsdown. Ooof…no wonder I had problems changing the yarn and the gauge for it. Hmmm….time to learn to spin a bulky yarn or ply lots of strands together.

Here is that wonderful Russian Stove that they use to heat the offices.

Joyce Williams has joined us. She and Amy are helping another camper with picking colors for a LOVELY Alice Starmore design.

After leaving there with my purchases (yes there were many) I decided to find a couple geocaches.

The worlds largest round barn. And I would have never known it was there except for geocaching. This fairgrounds holds the annual Central Wisconsin Fair. The grounds boasts of not only the round barn but also this building.

Here in the midwest we are proud of our local and county fairs no matter how big or small.

After that I headed back to finish what I had been feverishly working on all day.

Yes! The Shetland/Shetland Blend PI Shawl is done!!! (Cue Hallelujah Chorus.)  Despite it not being blocked yet I wore it to dinner.

So now I can focus my attention on my camp project, the mini yoke sweater. It should fit my alpaca teddy bear.

Tomorrow I have class in the morning then head home. It will be a day of goodbyes.

Letters From Camp-My First Knitting Class

Yes, I’ve been knitting for over 20 years and this is truly my first knitting class. Today I learned two more cast-ons including the dreaded long tail cast-on that has haunted me for these 20 odd years and a for of it for a good sock cast on.

First of all, I simply love this set up. There is a camera trained on Meg’s hands, there is a monitor for her to view what is showing as well as a TV for us to see what exactly she is doing. Pure joy for this visual learner. I can learn a lot from books, but sometimes you just need to see what she is doing!

This is a small camp. Amy (in purple of course) is here playing Meg’s right hand woman and den mother. You can see some of the other campers there. I’ll try and get better pictures of all of us tomorrow.

Late in the day this is what my workspace looks like. Bottled caffine at ready, lots of DPNs on standby and in active duty. A bunch of show and tell. Oh what’s that you ask…could it be….

Yes she who does not block did block my Ice Queen made from Abby Batts! Denny would be proud of me

Oh and I found my sad little nametag.

Yeah I know…and if I had read my welcome letter a little earlier than 2 nights before the workshop I would have been able to make something that looked a bit better and could be read easier.

Tonight after dinner I decided that my Shetland/Shetland Blend Pi Shawl needed serious attention. I am sooo close to getting it done…oh no there’s that blocking thing again!

Tomorrow, more instruction and then its off to Schoolhouse Press…to show and view sweaters and shawls! I’m sooooo very excited!

Letters From Camp-First Night

I just arrived tonight for an EPS workshop with Meg Swanson. No pictures yet, but the Shetland/Shetland shawl was worked on as well as a French Market Bag and some spinning.

On the way here I managed to pass through towns who’s names I had only heard. Babcock, Pittsville among others. Some may recognize their significance, if you don’t no worries, I will explain later. Right now I have to get ready for tomorrow.