Santa Cruz-A Rare Fiber Among Rare Breeds

Santa Cruz was quite the adventure. First of all I have to thank Jennifer Heverly from Spirit Trail Fibers for sharing with me some Santa Cruz fiber. Seriously, I never thought I would get my hands on some.

However I lost these samples in the depths of a bag somewhere. This has delayed me. Then I misplaced the bag of the rest of the fleece….sigh, excuses, excuses.

However, this past weekend I got some more from Deb Robson during a rare breeds class at Wisconsin Sheep & Wool festival. So I’ll share my samples spun here.

The locks are tiny and the staple length is short. Very short. I do believe that this is the shortest wool I have ever worked with. We are talking a 1″ staple length for the locks I got from Jennifer and 2″ from Deb. I’ve spun shorter fibers, but not wool.

I felt best about combing the fiber, however spinning worsted is not the best way to show the properties of this wool. Perhaps because it gave me the cleanest yarn. Combing 1-2″ locks is no picnic.

Carding was easier but you can see the vegetable matter. Neither of these fleeces were kept with handspinners in mind. One reason is that handspinners have not gotten their hands on it yet.

If more spinners out there would seek out these fibers I believe they would find them more forgiving than cormo with a 50% elasticity for carded fiber. But right now the fiber I have is best combed than carded due to the vegetable matter.

Now to just find that bag if Santa Cruz I misplaced….

Last weekend was Wisconsin Sheep & Wool. I too Deb Robson’s Rare Breeds class on Friday, watched fleece judging and bought fleeces on Saturday and then bought more fleeces on Sunday! Fleece was certainly the theme for this year.

I also spent time with Sara and Hans of The Woolgatherers trying to be helpful. I taught one person the park and draft method of spindle spinning and helped her choose a spindle. Most of the time though it was hot and I worked to keep myself hydrated.

Best of all I’m spinning again on this:

Yes that’s a Hansen Minispinner in cherry wood. Yes I sold a wheel to buy this one. No I did not sell one of my Reeves wheels.

I’ve decided that Shiloh needs to learn to retrieve. Not just retrieve dumbbells but shuttles. So I’ve started training him to do that. A little at a time

First Trial With A New Partner

Well, I’m still not spinning. Still having major pain issues with carpal tunnel and with my Achilles’ tendon.

This week was Shiloh’s turn to debut in rally. Poor guy didn’t know what to think.

I put him in CWAG’S so that I could treat him as we went along. Well, easier said than done. He got lots of treats though. He was concerned, looked around and tried to look under the ring gates at another dog in the other ring.

Heel position was only a suggestion for him. However under their rules he did quite well. Out of 4 runs he qualified 3 times.

The larger ribbons are from Ribbons qualifying run. I’m very proud if my cute puppy.

I’m very proud of Shiloh. He has gone from a neglected dog tied up in a backyard to a performance partner.

I Love You Man

Not much spinning getting done lately. Knitting and weaving yes, but not spinning. Part of the reason is I’m needing to swap out wheels for a while but there are a couple more reasons.
Two very needy dogs. One who is young and impulsive and another who has decided now that he not only wants my attention but to be trained.

Shiloh still has issues. He resource guards me from the other dogs occasionally and still hates his crate. He still pulls when going on a walk and considers harnesses as deadly.

He has proved to be an excellent Geocaching partner. Patient and easy on the trail. Its nice to have a dog who doesn’t wander off when we stop to grab a cache. He is also good with other dogs we come across.

Over the past couple months he has become more and more demanding. I would let him out and that would temporarily appease him or go upstairs to bed where he would just sigh and follow me. Did I mention he tries to hog the bed and that I have bruises from being stepped on by a not so light on his feet Aussie?

I was training him for a while but he want real comfortable in heel position. I backed off training and stopped taking him to the competition class. On and off I’ve played K9 Nosework games in boxes with him and he is quick and enjoys the challenge.

Whatever the reason, working Nosework with him seems to have flipped a switch in his brain. He became more and more demanding. Bolting into the basement whenever I would go downstairs and screaming in that oh so special Aussie way when I took someone else downstairs.

I finally decided to use his demands as a cue to go train him. I’m trying to catch him before he launches into his “I love you man” routine (complete with a loving lick). He also doesn’t know if I’ll be doing Nosework or Sue Ailsby Levels Training or heeling.

Now I’m getting some peace and a trained dog. Whoda thunk? But he still lets me know when it’s time to go to bed.

Looking On The Backside Of 2011

“Don’t let the door hit your backside on the way out.”

If I could say that to 2011 I would.  This has been a “memorable” year and I don’t mean that in a good way.  Actually the last two years have been less than good.  I want to change that in 2012.  Some of it was waaay out of my control.  I lost two good, highly trained dogs to cancer, lost my job, and generally didn’t do much.  But I did get a new job, finished a couple projects and went to Stringtopia.

I’ve also planned some goals for 2012.  These are how I posted them on Ravelry:

1. Weave more. My looms have been too silent.
2. Knit more. Make more time for knitting.
3. Spin more. I havn’t felt much like spinning. Even when I was laid off, I did pathetically little spinning. Time to figure out why I’ve been so apathetic (other than depression).
4. Train more. Not just the dogs (who need it) but also others. I’ve been too silent with offering advice and observations.
5. Live more. I have a marker that shows how depressed I am. I realize now when I start playing solitaire, I’m sinking into depression. It usually starts with boredom. Seriously, there is a lot I can do to keep busy, but it’s easier to play solitaire sometimes.

How do I know if I’m reaching these goals? Well, I have to keep track and that’s something I actually LIKE doing. I love dates and spread sheets and paper binders. Statistics I consider a friend, not an enemy. I don’t have much of a baseline for the weaving and spinning, and offering advice, but I do for the dog training.

Speaking of dog training, we also have a new addition to the herding crew.

Meet Emsket’s Diamond In The Ruff aka Shiloh.  A dog rescued from neglect only to have that family have to give him up due to his fear of the children.  He’s still very much here on a trial basis.  He has a lot to learn to live in a household with other dogs.  We are happy to have another Aussie in the house, but not happy about some of his behaviors.

But for the most part he is a perfectly normal Australian Shepherd down to helping me geocache.  What’s that on his head?  It’s a head collar called a Gentle Leader and I’m using it because he pulls like a mule on lead.

I’m also learning to make cheese.  Yes I said cheese.

This is my first Gouda I made.  It’s now in the fridge aging.  It takes 3 months from when I make it to when I can actually try it.

This looks a bit fuzzy because it is a bit fuzzy.  It’s Camembert ripening.  It’s a mold ripened cheese and I hope it will be ready soon.

Tonight I will welcome in the New Year with open arms.  Come on 2012 and please don’t suck!

And On It Goes Into A New Venture

So it’s mid-summer and I’ve spent a good deal of time thinking about a lot of things.

But it’s dawned on me how much I have at my disposal. Fibers and dyes and time it would seem. But honestly I don’t know how I ever worked and had time to do anything else. Things like training dogs, spinning, weaving. I could easily keep myself busy just at home. However that is not my reality. I have dogs to take care of, a puppy to consider purchasing, and bills to pay.

Some things have been sold, such as fibers, and more fibers are for sale. Some equipment has sold as well.  I’ll miss the Victoria wheel and the Majacraft Alpaca wheel, but I didn’t use them very much.

I’ve taken a long, hard hard look at things and realized that some other things had to change.

I started by creating a home office in my basement. I am no longer as heat tolerant as I used to be so it’s been miserable where my home office currently is. Moving downstairs was a no brainer following The Great Power Outage Of 2011.

July 11 a Derecho moved through the area leaving major damage to the power grid. Luckily we had the basement  and got our hands on a generator but not before losing the contents of my fridge and freezer. The basement became our living quarters. But we had hot water and are on city water. The dogs were confused but did well.

After being down here and staring at bags of unprocessed raw wool and a box of roving, and fleeces I’ve watched I started questioning what I wanted to do.

Wool is a very important part of my life.

But I have A LOT of wool.  More than I can ever use.

So I finally took the plunge and opened an Etsy store, Emsket’s Fiberworks.

I am going to be focusing on three things, small farm fleeces processed into roving, dyed wool locks, and weaving kits for both 4 harness and rigid heddle looms.  I’m excited and scared all in one.  It’s a big, new responsibility.  Taxes to collect, a store to advertise and eventually packages to ship out.

Oh yeah and advertising to get out there.

On another note, the dogs have not been idle.  K9 Nosework has taking over my training time.

I entered Masi in his first National Association for Canine Scentwork (NACSW) Odor Recognition Test (ORT). We attempted two odors, birch and anise. He had 2 great runs. He was on the right track with birch but I called an alert before he got to the right box. I was devastated. But Sara had me enter anise too and once again he found it quickly. I missed acknowledging his first two indications and I brought him back around again and when he gave me the third I called alert. I was in tears. My little reactive Aussie just passed a test at his first ORT. I entered him in anise because my instructor asked me to. He was ready, I wasn’t.  I needed experience.

Wow, now we still need to pass birch before we can enter a trial.  But you bet your booties we will work hard to pass the next one.

So if you excuse me know, I have wool to wash.

Perendale-Long, Lovely, Locks

It’s been too long.

I’ve had the yarn spun for this for a coons age, but I never could get to the point of taking pictures.  Well, I just went and did it and while it’s not the greatest photography in the world, it could be worse.  I purchased this wool from The Spinning Loft.  Seriously, if you want wool, call Beth…she’s got the goods!  She doesn’t have all the the wool up on the website so don’t hesitate to call and ask her “What do you have that I don’t?”

This fleece is a lovely light brown/gray color.  Almost a cafe au lait, just a tiny bit darker.  These locks were about 5.5″-6″ long

Here is the combed top.  I used my double row viking combs to produce this.

Here is the spindle spun product from the combing.  If I had gone back and re-spun the yarn, I would have given it more plying twist.

It combed easily giving me a rather disorganized and loose rolag.

The yarn was very similar thanks to the length of the fiber, the effort of carding was lost and it produced more of a worsted yarn.  And this one is better plied.

Based on what I have experienced with this fiber, I would be tempted to use it in something like a coat or other outerwear.  It is also appropriate for tapestry, where the luster of the wool is an advantage.  I will probably comb the rest of the fiber, but am uncertain what I will actually do with it project wise.

Life has been, um interesting to say the least.  It’s been a spring of tornado activity, much of it serious.  Much damage through the south and in the nations mid-section.  At this moment I am watching the situation developing in Central Indiana on (5/25/11) with trepidation.  My idea of storm chasing is to watch it on the computer as other people track the storms and if I am local to it, to look at the resulting damage.

I have a severe weather plan, I have crates in my basement to house my dogs in as safely as I can.  We put that plan into action three times last year.  Luckily, no tornadoes, but you never know about the next.

I’m still puttering around here.  It looks like I might be teaching a rigid heddle weaving class…I’ll let you know the details as it becomes available.  Other than that not a whole lot has been going on other than going to Clicker Expo in March.

I have no really good pictures from Expo, but that is Emma Parsons.  She rocks!  Masi and I attended her lab and had a good time.  That is saying a lot because Masi is still reactive to other dogs.  I’m very proud of my silly Aussie!

I’ve done a bit of weaving.

Yes, Olga was warped.  This is the sample of a rag rug I wove on her.  I’m now tying knots, lots of knots…

I had just finished twisting the fringe, it’s now washed and once I trim ends it will be ready for it’s intended recipients.

Also I have been spinning.

Sock yarn anyone?  Yeah, it’s a bit thick for sock yarn…

Stringtopia?…um yeah…What about it?

Pictures?  Um yeah, there might be some.

So I guess I’ll have to post again soon to show you what happened didn’t happen in Ohio.

Emsket’s Cold On Ice ?-September 19, 2010

Goodbye Roo, everyone misses you.

We lost Roo to hemangiosarcoma of the heart at.  He was only about 8 years old.  Such an ironic end to a dog who took such a big part of my own heart with him. My blue merle piece of velcro is no longer at my side.

ARCHX URO1 UCD Emsket’s Cold On Ice CD CD-ASCA CD-H RE RL3 RL1X RL2X CL1

Has Anyone Seen My Brain?

It’s been brewing in my brain for a while, but I finally decided to put out a series of geocaches.   Normally, I’m a finder of geocaches and a placer of earthcaches, but not traditional geocaches.  So it will end in a rather painful puzzle that will require more than looking something up on Wikipedia or decrypting a cipher.  The subject matter is rather dear to me…J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord Of The Rings series.

I’m trying to make it hearken back to to the books rather than to the recent movie version.  And so far it’s been a lot of fun.

I am done knitting, but not done finishing this.

Yes, the Patches Memory Shawl (love the nifty Ravelry link.  Thanks Casey!)  How many years later….ahem…but it’s going to SOAR 2010! Or that’s the plan.  I haven’t registered yet, that’s not until May 6.   So you know where I’ll be then….

Oh and I was kidnapped, sorta.

A couple of the above guilty characters decided I needed to go to Greencastle.  I didn’t argue.  They put me up and transported me.  I also realized that weekend I’m not 20 years old and a grad student anymore, oy.  There is nothing like realizing that you are now old enough to be a college student’s parent.  But I had fun, bought a bit of fiber, a couple new spindles and enjoyed myself thoroughly.

Hopefully I’ll be able to post something more concrete later.  But for now I just wanted to pop in to say I’m alive and I have not forgotten about this blog.  I have fiber to spin, now that I’ve found it!

Bond-As Versatile As It Is Beautiful

The Bond samples were finished at SOAR, but could I find them…NOOOOOOO….  Finally they were located, in a bag that contains all my spare knitting needles.  Why they were in that bag I have no idea except those needles were with me at SOAR (don’t ask).

Here is a sample of a lock.  This particular sample had a very distinct crimp and a bi-colored lock.  Usually when I find locks with two different colors they break where the two colors meet.  Not so with this sample.  The tips were a bit tender but not bad at all.

Even after being stored in a bag for months the carded rolag came out and with a slight bit of fluffing came out looking good.  I can’t say that for all the rolags I stuff in plastic bags.  The crimp gives it loft and resilience that I love.  Think about mittens and socks.

Here is how it spins up.  Okay, it looks like I had too much swill when spinning this, but honestly it is high in squish factor and will wear well for those before mentioned mittens and socks as well as a comfortable cardigan.

Bond works equally well when combed.  Here are a couple tiny puffs of combed top.

I could see this either knit into a fine and open lace or woven into a warm shawl.  It isn’t apparent in the picture, but the yarn here has a subtle shine to it.  Perhaps a twill pattern to show off the shine?

Bond is certainly one of my favorite wools and I hope you will take the opportunity to take it for a spin.  Even if it isn’t moorit I believe you will find a col0r that will take your breath away.  Gleason’s Fine Woolies is where this Bond originally came from.  I bought the washed locks from an Etsy shop called Woolslinger who is currently taking a break from selling.

It’s been cold here in the swamps, and snowy.  We have something like 12″ of snow on the ground right now.  So I’ve been working on my weaving a good bit.

The handtowels are off the loom and that includes the extra special one woven with my own handspun tow linen!

And it actually looks good!  Much better than the crappy cell phone picture shows.  A little short, but hey, that’s what ends of warps are for!  But I still need to hem the ends of all the towels I made.

I’m weaving a rug on the rigid heddle loom.  What you see are rya knots made with Icelandic locks.  Yes the same fleece I did the review of the Icelandic wool.  I also took the Lincoln locks I had left and are using them as well.  It’s quite the contrast with the longer and matte Icelandic.  I’m really growing to like the rigid heddle loom for a quick and easy project.  Well, warping is much quicker anyway.  I’ll probably start playing with some pickup.

My knitting currently is focused on the Blessed Thistle Tsock pattern by Lisa Grossman.  I am currently much further than the above, but still not done with the ribbing and the little leaves before the main choke.  This pattern so far has been fun and I love lace so am itching to get into the main body of the pattern.  I also need to finally decide what fingerless glove pattern I’m going to knit using some of these yarns.

Bling bonanza here!  This is yarn from my Enchanted Knoll swap partners.  It’s sooo tempting to cast aside my sock and cast one one of these but patience is a virtue and I’m waiting until the socks are done.

And I’m also spinning Enchanted Knoll batts.  This is Pumpkin Juice Wildcard batts I’m spinning to knit more socks with.    I also have queued up some more batts for my Patches Memory Shawl.  I feel like I’m  almost done, but then again, no where near done.

As you can tell, dogs are not getting much training.  That was a bobbin for my Journey wheel.  Masi ate the rest of it.  Oh the joys of puppyhood.   I just keep reminding myself, slow to mature, slow to mature…

So I better go and train some dogs because in the words of Shirley Chong, “Management always fails.”

What Do You Mean It’s Almost 2010?

Yeah I know, I still have to post the Bond.  I finished spinning the samples while at SOAR, but I still haven’t photographed them.  Story of my life.

I have been knitting and weaving.

The Daughter Of The Regiment socks are now complete.  Lisa got to see the one I had finished while at SOAR was was tickled pink to see them “in the wild”.

Speaking of “in the wild,” Abby Franquemonts book Respect The Spindle came out just before Thanksgiving and I spotted it at a local bookstore.

Very cool.  I also attended her book signing at The Spinning Loft on Black Friday.

I will leave this picture up to your imagination.  However, for those of you who need more information let me just point to Kat’s Blog where she explains what happened.

As far as the weaving is concerned.  I have now warped my large Oxaback loom with a short dishtowel warp.  It is the Striped Kitchen Handtowels from The Big Book Of Weaving by Laila Lundell.  It is the second project in the book and while it is a very easy project, the warp is set closer than I used to warp my previous dishtowels in 8/2 cotton.  The next project is a rag rug which I have never done in my almost 15 years of weaving.  Remember, I said I  have a lot of holes in my weaving education.

My dog training mojo is slowing coming back.  I could spend 24/7 training Masi, but there are other dogs that need my attention.  Luke is happy to just play training games and chase the ball.  Adam is plenty busy just being cute and occasionally doing a bit of agility stuff.  Danny, Roo and Daisy are all working on either rally or obedience.

So what will 2010 bring?  Oh heavens I hope good things!  SOAR is in Delavan Wisconsin in the fall and I no longer have flyball to get in the way of agility trials.  We will just let the days roll by and see what it brings.

P. S.  Please excuse the large amount of blurry cell phone photos, but that’s the way my life have been going recently!