Beth Smith's Blog, page 18

The Next Book

So over the winter I was working on a new book. It’s going to be published by Storey again which is the publisher of the currently available book, The Spinner’s Book of Fleece. The title will be How to Spin.

This next book will be a bit different than the last one. First of all, it’s part of the Storey Basics series. They call them books for self-reliance. The series has a wide range of titles like Knife Skills, How to Knit, How to Crochet, Electric Fencing and so many more! The price points are very affordable at just under $10 but the knowledge contained in the books is way more valuable!

I’m excited to be added to this great group of authors who know what they are talking about! I hope that I’ve done my topic justice.

The manuscript went in at the end of March and we are working on edits now. All of that smoothing and shaping that happens to the work behind the scenes. It’s been amazing to me to see, for a second time, what a good editor can do with the work I turn in.

This next book should be released In February of 2016 so it’s not too far off! Here’s the cover as it stands…things can change:-)

Nails

I like to get my nails done. If you have been around me for any more than 5 minutes you know I like sparkly, painted, fun nails. I usually have acrylic nails. My own real nails that live under the layer of plastic have been bendy, easily broken and very thin through my whole life. 

I also have some issues with my cuticles if I don’t keep my nails up. It’s not pretty. For some reason they are really dry no matter how much lotion I slather or what it’s made of. Then little dry skin bits are there and they bother me so I do something I shouldn’t I pick the off. Then things get worse…and worse.

I let my nails go a couple of weeks ago. I needed a fill and didn’t have time or budget for it so I took them off and was trying to live with naked fingers. But then yesterday I remembered that in just a couple of weeks I’ll be in Colorado taping some videos for Interweave and my fingers are not attractive and I expect that people will want to see me spin – which may include closeups of my hands.

Today I went to my favorite lady. Her name is Tracy and she is the owner of Nails Studio here in Howell. I’ve been going there for at least 10 years now. She always fixes me up.

Here is what she did for me today.

The nails are beautiful. The cuticles need some healing time. But there is hope.

This is what my nails looked like when I went to do the photo shoot for my book 18 months ago.

See? All will be well. Boring and lacking sparkle for the videos but at least my fingers will look healthy.

OK. One more thing checked off the list. Back to work.

What’s Coming

On Tuesday my current book is due. I’m so close to being ready to turn it in. it might even go in a few days early. I’ll begin reading it over one last time tomorrow. I’ll add the places I want illustrations to be and hopefully all will be ready to press send on Friday. Yay!

Then wool washing begins so I can be ready to ship all the wool I need for my Olds College Fibre Week classes. I’m doing the 2 day breeds study there. That class alone is 18 breeds! 18! You can see what else I’m teaching at Olds by checking ouot their website. It’s a lot of classes so I should try to get those materials shipped by end of May to make sure everything has time to get there. Even though those classes aren’t till mid-June sometimes Canada Post can be a tiny bit slow.

At the same time as washing is going on I have some work to do to prepare for a couple of videos I’m making with Interweave in May. Details will be coming in the future but they’re going to be good.

While I’m in Colorado in May I’m going to get to see my friends at Schacht Spindle and also my friend Stephanie who used to work at Schacht but now she writes and teaches and spins and weaves all the live long day. I’m also going to be teaching at the Recycled Lamb! this is a new development so I’m not sure which class they will choose yet.

Then in June I’m off to meet the materials I shipped at the end of April in Canada!

And then that’s it! That’s the whole plan for the year. So here’s where I say if you want me to come and teach at your shop or guild at the end of this year I am quite available. It’s all because of the stinkin’ contacts form on this website that failed to forward emails last year and so I missed a ton of opportunities. I’m smarter now and try to remember to check the contacts website every week or so so this never happens again.

Oh! One more thing. Did you see I’m on the Fibretown Video Podcast today?

Ok. I’m going to go immerse myself in some mindless sitcoms to rest up for the next 3 months!

Spinning For Weaving

On the one hand, I don’t have ton of things on my calendar this year as far as teaching, so come and see me! I’ll be at the History Unwound retreat Next week and all of my classes still have space. I’ll also be at Fiber Week at Olds College in Canada in June. Those are the only two places to see me so far. So, have you signed up yet?

On the other hand, I have so many things going on that I need to be at home for. There’s a book that I’m writing. It’s almost done. I have a really hard time writing while I’m traveling so I have to be at home to get writing work done. There are a few articles in the works. And I also have a few things I want to make. Two of the projects are at home projects. The other is a knitting project but I’m not done spinning the yarn yet. So.

One of the at home projects is, of course the bobbin lace I’ve been practicing. It’s hard to travel with that pillow.

The other project is the handspun, handwoven skirt project I’ve talked about before back in January of 2014. Then i got busy with other things. So the open space on my calendar means time for making things that are bigger than sample skeins and 4X4 swatches.

I started with Cheviot and made a few samples but I’m not sure about the fabric. I want something very resilient so that when i sit down in the skirt it doesn’t hold the shape of my butt when I stand up. So Cheviot will be one skirt and the other will be Columbia.

I’ve been spinning the Columbia over the past couple of weeks every time I have a minute to sit at my wheel.

It’s a white Columbia roving from Imperial Ranch.

 

Columbia is an American Breed developed in the western United States in idaho. It’s extremely soft, It has a high crimp and the staple length is long enough that you can avoid a lot of pilling if you add enough twist while it still maintains its softness. It’s a wool I prefer to spin over Merino and it has a similar micron count.

 

I spun four bobbins of singles and then thought to myself that I hadn’t used my Hansen E spinner in a  while so I plied the forst two bobbins on the Hansen with the Woolie Winder.  Things didn’t go as planned. The Hansen isn’t fast enough for me and with the Woollie Winder if I turn up the speed, the motor doesn’t like it. So the yarn didn’t have enough twist.

So, I wound the bobbin off onto my niddy noddy, put the new skein on the swift next to my chair and ran it through the Matchless with the small whorl.

That’s the twist I was looking for.

And that is the unwashed skeins. The second two bobbins I just plied on the Matchless and all is well.

Here is the washed yarn. There are about 1518 yards there. The yarn is 13 wraps per inch.

The plan is to make a 4 gore skirt and use the same pattern for both breeds (Cheviot and Columbia).

I think I want the bottom edge of the skirt to measure  about 126 inches. That means I will use my Mighty Wolf which has a 36″ weaving width. 126″ / 4 = 31.5″ and I need seam allowance and I also know there will be some draw in so I’ll thread the loom to be 35″. If I want my skirt to be about 24inches in length I’ll need 96 inches of yardage plus loom waste and sampling space so I’ll add another 24″ to give me a total warp length of 120″ or 3.33 yards. Let’s round up to 3.5 yards.

For a balanced plain weave you usually sett the yarn at wpi/2. My yarn is about 13 wpi so I would sett it at about 7 epi for a balanced weave. But I’ve learned some things from my friend Sara Lamb who weaves for clothing all the time,  so I’m going to do a closer sett. Probably about 12 or 15 epi. I’ll do a sample first and make sure.

So let’s imagine that 15 epi is what I want and I need 3.5 yards. I’ll need 1838 yards for the warp and about the same amount of weft. Now my friend Barbara DiJeannene recommended I try a thinner yarnas my weft and possibly just use singles which is awesome and I have bg plans for trying it.

I’m about 350 yards short for warp and have no weft spun at all but I have plenty of white Columbia so I will get back to work. I’ll let youo know when I start winding.

In the mean time, if any of you weavers have advice, please don’t hesitate to comment.

Plying a Bit

I’ll begin this post by saying that if you are planning on going to Disney, wear a crown or a tiara. you won’t be sorry. Maggie and I did it last time and Dana and I did it this time and it is extremely fun! Don’t even think about it. If grown men can walk around with Mickey Mouse ears then you can certainly wear a tiara to the parks. We even wore ours on the plane for safe transport. It was out birthday trip. I am turning 50 this month and Dana will be 55. Our birthdays are one day apart and we’ve been friends for almost 16 years. These milestone birthdays needed a bigger celebration than our usual going out to dinner.

This is what our faces looked like for almost the entire 4 days.

OK. Down to business. I’m home and I’m trying to get back to work.

I have plans for making things this year and so I’ve been emptying bobbins to get ready I had one and a half bobbins of this. I believe it’s Masham that was dyed by Southern Cross Fiber. Seriously, I need to get better at labeling things that I’m spinning for my own personal use. Anyway, I probably made these singles aboout a year ago – maybe more. But I need the bobbin space. So I plied the bobbins together and this halfish of a bobbin is what was left.

So I had a few choices here. I could Andean ply the stuff or make a center pull ball or wind off about hald to another bobbin and do a straight 2 ply.

Last week I had a bit left on a bobbin. Not nearly as much as this and decided to Andean Ply the rest.

I wound it on my hand until things started to be uncomfortable and then moved the bracelet to my wrist and started winding again until I had wound it all off the bobbin. You can see it’s a lot of yarn.

Since this bobbin was bigger and I wasn’t feeling that industrious I used my ball winder and wound it into a center pull ball.

Ignore the broken nail please.

This yarn was pretty cooperative since it had been sitting around for so long but the key to energized or relaxed yarn is always keeping that center hole open so everything doesn’t collapse on itself. I use my thumb for that. I use my forward hand to control the twist from going to far back toward the ball and the fingers on my yarn holding hand to control the tension of both strands. It can be a bit of a struggle sometimes and you can’t expect to treadle as quickly as you do when you are just plying straight from a bobbin.

These are the skeins after plying. The one on the left where the colors are lining up is the one plyed from the center pull ball and the one on the right is the one from the bobbins. Normally, I would do a little ply back sample and try to match the twist in the sample. To do this with yarn that has been de-energized like this I take a strand, ply it back on itself and put it in some water. As soon as it hits the water, the energy starts to come back. I let it stay there for at least 5 minutes (15 is best but I’m always in a hurry) and then i can see about what the fresh ply back would have looked like.  I didn’t do that with this yarn because I knew that this was my relaxation spinning and so I’m very familiar with the twist that I put in when I’m not thinking too much so I knew what kind of ply twist I was going for.

That night before I went to bed I put the skeins in to soak. Because this was a long wool, I knew that I had spun it with a worsted short forward draw so my finishing method was just a bit of snapping so i didn;t fluff them up too much. I laid them flat on the floor to dry and like magic! Everything was beautiful in the morning.

I have a few more bobbins to empty. we’ll see what happens. Maybe I should weave this yarn….

Right Handed? Left Handed?

Recently I’ve had several questions from different people about whether they are a right handed or left handed spinner. This questions usually preceeds a discussion about what side the flyer on their saxony wheel should be on.

There is some disagreement among spinning teachers about what constitutes right handed or left handed spinning. Some say the forward hand is what determines it and some say the hand that holds the fiber is the determining factor. And it doesn’t always match the hand that the spinner uses for writing and other things.

I’m going to say I don’t care to label spinning as right or left handed. There are a couple of reasons I want to avoid this altogether. First, is because it doesn’t really matter in the end what you call it and second, I think it tends to be confusing because so many people have different opinions.

What does matter is if you are spinning in such a way that you are getting the control and the results you want. There have been many times that I’ve been teaching beginning spinning or a new technique and a certain student is having a very difficult time. I have often recommended they switch which hand is their forward hand and then sometimes, things seem to click.

Some instructors also think that your dominant hand should be your forward hand with short forward draw. I am the opposite. I like to always have my fiber hand be the same regardless of what kind of drafting method I’m using. Since the first day I sat at a spinning wheel, I have held the fiber in my right hand, which is my dominant hand and used my left hand for pinching during short forward draw or supported long draw.

With spindle spinning I am completely opposite of this. My right hand sets the spindle to spinning and then does the drafting while my left hand holds the fiber.

So, when you are thinking of buying a saxony wheel you need to take your fiber hand into consideration. The flyer of the saxony wheel should be opposite the hand that holds the fiber. Seriously, It’s more comfortable that way. If you hold youf fiber in your right hand then you want a flyer on the left wheel. Lucky for you, almost every saxony wheel is made this way. Old ones and new ones.

 

The reason the flyer should be opposite your fiber hand is so that when you are drafting with long draw or supported long draw the yarn should be coming from the orifice accross the front of your body. This will make it so that you don’t have to twist your body to get a good length of yarn per make.

As far as I know, there are only two major spinning wheel manufacturing companies that will make a saxony wheel with a flyer on the right side. Those companies are Schacht Spindle and Lendrum. Ashford used to do it but if I recall, they have stopped doing it. So if you hold your fiber in your left hand and want a saxony style wheel then Schacht, Lendrum or one of the specialty wheel makers will have to do. Otherwise, stick with your castle wheel.

Goals and Resolutions

For the last 3 years I have made a list of goals at the beginning of the year. 2015 is no different. Each year the list has gotten more and more specific.

Because of my friend who is a genius at list making, I have learned that if I write it down, I usually accomplish it. In the middle of last year I also started using the Bullet Journal format for making my lists and setting goals. I got better and better at that throughout the year. I have realized that electronic lists don;t really work for me. Typing the words doesn’t stick them in my mind the way writing them does. In addition, I often forget to open the app or the website where I am storing my stuff but my notebook/journal is always nearby. I like the feeling of paper and a good pen.

This year’s goal list is much expanded from other years. It has 8 categories including Family, House, Writing, Teaching, Spiritual, Personal, Making and Samples. There are at least 3 and 5 goals in each category. Also, this year, I wrote my list right in the front of the journal I started so they are easy to find, review and adjust if necessary.

The Bullet Journaling needs to be neater, I think but it’s a way to keep track of where I am on things and see where I need to get better.

My first goal to accomplish for this year however, is to feel better. I’m going to lay down.

 

Christmas Came Early For Me

I can’t believe it’s been more than a month since my last post!

I have two stories today and neither of them include any spinning but I have to share them.

The first story starts out sad but ha a happy ending for me. Lou and I have friends in Pennsylvania, Mark and Deena. Mark’s mom is Aunt Pam. Well, she’s not actually our aunt but that’s what we always called her. I met Mark and Aunt Pam about 25 years ago when I started dating Lousmith and she was one of those people you immediately love.

Aunt Pam had a house full of stuff that I admired. Lots of lovely antiques and china and glassware. She also liked Christmas very much – as I do. Well, she had a set of dishes from Spode called Christmas Tree. Every year she would get me a piece and I started to slowly collect thedishes. My mom saw how much I liked those dishes and she would buy a few fro me here and there too. My collection consisted of a few serving dishes, 8 dessert plates and 8 mugs as of last week.

The sad part of the story is that earlier this year, Aunt Pam died. We miss her. A lot.

The glad part of the story is that Deena called and asked if I would like to have Aunt Pam’s Spode collection. I may have done a little private dance. Deena and mark saved the dishes for me over these last few months while I figured out the logistics of gettign them from Pennsylvania to Michigan.

Well, this trip to PA for Thanksgiving worked out well because we had to take two cars because Chelsea and Baby Cohen went along with us.

The drive from here to PA usually takes us about 11 hours. We left to come home yesterday morning a little before 8AM and were home by 7PM. The car ride was long. But Lou unloaded the boxes of dishes from the back of his car and I couldn’t help unwrapping them all to get a close look.

There are an amazing number of dishes there and I am in heaven! There are a few pieces I want to add just to round out the set but there is a full dinner service for 8 there with dessert dishes enough for 16!

 

My new kitchen was putting me in the cooking mood and these dishes are just adding to that! I need to fill those serving dishes.

Now I am in the holiday spirit and the tree is going up today!

But first, here’s the second story.

When my book was first available in late August my mom called and asked for three books. I asked why she needed three. She said one for her, one fro her friend and one for a woman she works with. I told her I was going to give her one but the other two ladies would have to pay for a copy like everyone else. I told her i couldn’t afford to buy books and just give them to all of her friends.

Now I feel guilty. My mom actually wanted one for herself, one extra copy for her shelf that she wouldn’t read and one to make a gift for me.

She took the book to a local artist who makes art out of books. She didn’t give the woman any instructions. Yes, those are sheep and a spinning wheel made from pages of the book.

 

This is one of the most awesome gifts I’ve ever gotten!

Here is the information about the artist if you ever want to get her to make you something.

Do you think I should give my mom her money back?

Ok, I’m off to make the house festive since I am in such a holiday mood!

 

Wheels For Sale!

I’m paring down a bit. I love all of these wheels but I never use them for various reasons. They are all extremely beautiful and in great shape. There may be more later but I’m starting with these three.

First up is this lovely little 19 inch Rick Reeves Saxony. It is oak. It has 5 bobbins and 3 whorls. It was signed by Rick when it was built but the signature has worn away over time. The price is $700 which includes shipping in the continental US. If you can pick it up we can work on a little discount. Just let me know.

 

Next is this excellent limited edition Louet S10. It is cherry! It has the plaque on the front with Jan Louet’s Signature. These wheels were made in 1999 to celebrate Louet’s 25th anniversary. 100 single treadle and 100 double treadle wheels were made. This one spins like a dream. It also comes with 5 bobbins. (2 of them aren’t shown) $600 including shipping in the continental US.

This one is sold! And finally, this beautiful Vermont Wheel made by Pat Russo in Vermont of course. Here is what I found on another website:

After a sell out at Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival and New Hampshire Sheep & Wool this year (2010), wheelwright Patrick Russo announced his retirement from making these wheels.

When word began to trickle out that I had the only 1 left for sale, I immediately got a call to hold one of them, but the other is still available.

So if you’ve been thinking about one of these wheels for a while, this is your last chance to nab one.

This wheel was made here in Vermont with special care and attention by wheelwright Patrick Russo. Beautiful to look at and a joy to spin on!

Only a limited number were ever made each year. This wheel i s $950 and is crafted of cherry. It comes with three bobbins and has 2 ratios: 12:1 and 18 :1. Fashioned after the Canadian tilt-tension wheels of the last century, this wheel has a 27″ wheel diameter and beautifully lathed spokes. A special piece of furniture as well as a fine wheel to spin on. Be sure to click on each photo for a closer look at the fine workmanship and artistry in the wheel. These really can’t be shipped so you’ll have to come to the shop to see them, try them out and buy one.

I would like to sell this wheel for $900 including shipping in the continental US. Mine comes with 7 bobbins. Also here is a little blog post which contains a photo of another Vermont wheel which is why I bought this one in the first place.

So there. Three wheels for sale. Email me at bethsmithpink at gmail dot com if you are interested.

Preparation – the Second

So the wool got washed and a few days ago I was sure i had all of my fibers but I needed to assemble the fibers for each class to make sure.

This is my starting pile:

That hip high pile is all of the washed fleece. I ad my list of what wool i needed for which class and got down to weighing. I do one class at a time. Each class has it’s own bag containing the smaller bags of the fibers for that class. it looks something like this.

 

Those two bags contain the fibers for the American Breeds class and the Fine Yarns class at Rhinebeck. I have seven classes at the New York State Sheep and Wool Festival and so there will be seven bags in the end.

This weighing and digging and rearranging took about 4 hours all together because I also got my fibers ready for the 2 day breeds study I am doing for the Black Sheep Guild in Ithaca New York in early November.

Here’s what the space where the pile was looks like now.

 

Now I need to just go through that box of filing that is waiting to be done…

Anyway, I’ll think about that later.

Here is all of the fiber – almost ready.

So, what’s left to do? See the box with the red, blue and yellow? That’s for my Color Wheel Carding class. I need to make little kits from that. i estimate that will take about 2 hours. I also need a detailed list of the things that I need to take in addition to the fiber. It will include the bog things like a spinning wheel and lazy kate as well as the little things like extra handcards, combs and flicks to share in class, hole punches, blank tags and my collection of dizs (dizes. diz’s? I don’t know how to make diz plural)

For my breeds classes I also provide little cards that have the name of each breed already printed on them. This helps with the organization of the students’ samples. Don’t you hate it when you go home from a class and forget how you made the samples? I try to help with that. So there are also little plastic bags and sometimes even stickers for labeling the bags. It all depends on the class.

In addition, I need to print class outlines for each student. Before I do that I have to make sure that the outline is correct and up to date with the correct information and fiber. And finally, I need detailed outlines for me with little facts and tidbits that I don’t want to forget to go over during class.

All together I would say that I have at least another 8 or 10 hours of work to do before I can say that I am truly ready to leave for Rhinebeck. But I’m making progress.

Also, it’s a good thing I assembled the fibers so early because I found out that I need to wash another 4 pounds of Jacob! I’d better get on that so the wool will be dry in time!