A Few Setbacks.

I have had a very bad back recently which has made any kind of work difficult, even sitting to knit or spin. This has meant missing out on my weekly knitting group and the monthly meeting of The Bucks Weavers Spinners And Dyers. A real shame this last one, the talk was on 17th century spinning and I was really looking forward to it. Still hopefully I'm on the mend now and can get back to work.
The next knock back came when a dear friend decided to move back to the US and take the Ashford Traditional wheel that I have my jumbo flyer on with her. Well it is her wheel and I have had it for ages so I can't really complain. The flyer does not fit my other wheels so I can't spin any very thick yarn at the moment. A rethink is needed and I have fallen for a Majicraft Wheel so watch this space.

(I don't think that is the right spelling of Majicraft.)

New Etsy Post.

 I have just posted a Angora Shoulder Cape on Etsy. It is hand knitted with my best hand spun angora from one of my favortie rabbits called Flute. He has a lovely coat which grows thick and long. It takes about 30mins to clip him because there is so much fibre to come off. It's a good job that I only do it once every 10 weeks because he gets a bit figerty in that time.

The cape is soft and warm with a lovely drape. A cosy cover up for indoors or out any time.

More colourful scarfs.

I tryed dyeing silk scarfs with cochineal and annatto with some very nice results.
The annatto was a gritty powder which gave a lovely yellow after using an alum mordant. I tryed dyeing some wool in the same dye bath which was a mistake because I should have strained the grit from the liquid. The wool was totally full of grit that would not wash out and had to be thrown away. The silk was fine and came out a lovely yellow.
The pale pink came from a cochineal vat using no mordant. After putting a small amount of citric acid in the vat I got a much deeper pink on the next scarf.

 

The patterns were made using shibori techniques, folding, wrapping and stitch gathering.