Starting Down the Path

This last week I've decided to get more serious about doing some lifestyle changes; going it on my own just wasn't being effective. And, well, I can keep being depressed about where I am now, or I can do something about it. So, on a recommendation I found on someone else's blog, I signed up with SparkPeople), a *totally free* site with a large and enthusiastic healthy-living-and-weight-loss community. It's totally free because the founders and creators were early employees (and, I presume, investors) in eBay and they're using their income/royalties/whatever from that to give back to society.

Which is why I'm mentioning them on my blog. It is SO cool to see people who really put their money where their mouth is and do something to make a difference.

I've only been with the program a few days, so no big changes here yet. A few eye-openers, though. Actually tracking everything, I discovered that I consume a heck of a lot more sugar than I had ANY idea of. But yesterday I went for walkies to a nearby park (boring park, though --gotta pick a better one for the next destination) so I logged 2 miles in the old sneakers. I have never drunk this much water in my life, though -- but maybe that will keep away the summer headaches I used to get. Usually most of my fluid intake involves coffee beans or tea leaves.

Got some spinning in, too, yesterday. Still working with this gorgeous Corriedale-Bond white fleece (from "Nora")from Sheepfeathers Farm. Thanks, Robin--you're the best! And Sunday my sweetie Tay helped me get the 7' triangle loom hung on the wall so I can use it more easily. No more of the "collapsing easel ballet"!

I also found out that with a longish piece of stiff wire, in place of the top row of pins on the tri loom, it should be possible to weave any smaller size triangle you want --you're not limited to only the size that the tri-frame is, because you could start lower down on the triangle. Have to experiment with that.

I think I saw that on Wayne's Triangle Loom page, IIRC--he's showing how to weave a triangle on a square loom. Let me check to be sure.

Some really cool books for fiber folks

The other day I raided the college library at Auraria Campus (where I teach at Community College of Denver) to check out a couple of books by one of my absolutely favorite authors, Elizabeth Wayland Barber.

I already have her book, Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years, but she also has written a number of others. Basically, I'll read anything she's written, ever. I love her writing and there's so much material in what she writes, it'd take years to absorb it all. I"ve read Women's Work maybe 5 or 6 times and I'm still getting more out of it each time I pick it up.

Anyway, I'd checked out her first book, Prehistoric Textiles, before when I was writing an article for The Ostracon (the journal of The Egyptian Study Society, based here in Denver), but I'd never actually sat down and read the whole thing. It's a hardcover that's 2 inches thick and has 387 pages not counting the index and bibliography, so it's a good thing that faculty have a 6-month checkout period! My understanding is that Prehistoric Textiles was originally Dr. Barber's doctoral dissertation that got out of hand and acquired a life of its own.

The other book I checked out was Dr. Barber's The Mummies of Ürümchi. I'd seen a documentary on television about this, but I've never managed to see the whole thing as I'm just not all that keen on mummies. Well, as one might expect from Elizabeth Barber, the book is much less about the mummies per se than about their clothes, which is totally fascinating. I'm learning a whole lot of things about weaving and plaiting that I never knew about before.

Another really fascinating book of hers is When They Severed Earth from Sky by Elizabeth and Paul Barber. It's not about fiber work, but about the truth that is encapsulated in many regions' folklore. Awesome book.

No ribbon this time, but loads of fun

Sunday evening we got back home from the Estes Park Wool Market, having competed in the Sheep to Shawl contest for the fourth time. We didn't win anything--fourth place out of four. Oh, well. But we were kind of out-on-a-limb for this one, so we weren't really expecting any ribbons this year.

We brought my friend Catriona's vintagte 8-harness Nadeau Hand-Skill loom, a tubular-aluminum beast dating from 1952. It was designed and built by an eccentric weaver in Woonsocket, RI named Elphege Nadeau. It has a number of interesting and nifty features (but speed doesn't seem to be one of them). However, NO one who came by our competition area at the WM had ever seen one, not even the judge, so we got lots of spectators staring and asking, "What's THAT thing?! Did you build that?" I joked that we should have won the "weirdest-equipment" prize.

There's a picture of one on this page that you can see if you scroll down nearly to the bottom. http://possumjimandelizabeth.com/xhtml/looms_table.html

I was carding fleece, Rebecca and JoAnne were spinning, Darla was plying and spinning, and Catriona wove.

Another thing that made the weekend...um, interesting... was that it was pouring rain most of the time and also colder than heck. At one point, JoAnne said to me that she could see her breath! This is in mid-June, mind you. Looks like we had Highland Games weather for Wool Market weekend--hate to imagine what the weather will be like for the Highland Games!

What was really cool was that the team who DID win the StS (from The Recycled Lamb, a fiber/yarn store here in Lakewood) were first-timers! It was their first sheep-to-shawl, and most of the team were beginning spinners! And they beat EVERYBODY -- two guild teams, and us Sheep Thrills folks. Awesome job--and a *gorgeous* shawl!

One footnote -- the bobbin winder we usually use didn't make it out to Colorado with the Iowa half of our team, and so on Friday while I was packing, cooking, etc., my amazing gadget-guy husband Tay *built* us one! He used an ancient hand-cranked wood drill of my uncle Jack's, and cannibalized a paint roller to make the jig that holds the bobbin. Unreal! And it works great -- don't know what we'd have done without it. One spectator remarked, "He's a keeper!" when Catriona told her about the origin of the jury-rigged bobbin winder... (He sure is, lady -- he sure is!).

Another footnote -- I've finally been exposed enough to Catriona's Nadeau that I'm getting to be not scared of the 4-shaft one she has left with me as a long-term loan.

Gearing Up for Estes--Sheep Thrills!

I'm getting so excited -- this weekend is Estes Park Wool Market, and our fourth time in the Sheep to Shawl Competition. I'm the team captain of "Sheep Thrills", a group comprised of some of my best friends and fiber folks, augmented by a varying collection of "alternates" (the extra member of the team in case someone can't make it or is ill, etc.). For some unfathomable reason, we end up doing it in even-numbered years; there's some kind of jinx that operates in odd-numbered years to keep us from being able to get together.

The original subtitle for "Sheep Thrills" was "Hands Across the Prairie" because half the team is from Iowa: my college friend Rebecca Roush (of R.Rabbit's Fiber Studio) and her friend, now ours too, JoAnne Pruitt. The rest of the regular team are myself, and Catriona MacKirnan (now of Rocky Ford, CO), and Tamara Millyard (Aurora, CO). The second year, 2006, we added "Five Warped Ewes" to our moniker, and I believe in 2008 we added "Dances With Wool." Or was it the other way round? I can't remember. Anyway, I've got to think up some other goofy theme for this year. Hmmm, more sheepy (or sheepish?) puns...

This year is my dear friend Catrìona's turn to weave, and also to design and keep the shawl. The way we do it, each of us has a turn to design the shawl, choose the fleece, and spin up the warp (or most of it), and that person keeps the shawl after we're done. The weaver, whoever it is, keeps any ribbon if we happen to win one and we all split the cash prize if any. We've never used grey or black fleece before, and this time we're using both, as well as a design involving a striped warp. Can't wait to see how it all comes out.

Also, just to be different, we're using Catrìona's vintage aluminum Nadeau loom, which looks like no loom you've ever seen before; it clanks like Marley's ghost, but it gets the job done. That's the loom she's most comfortable with, so that's the one we're using. In fact, her other Nadeau is the loom I'm using at present too until I can afford to buy the Ashford one I've wanted for ages.

If you've never seen or done a Sheep to Shawl, it's totally worth it. Absolutely the most fun anyone can have for the minimal price of the entry fee.

Long Time, No Post

Yikes! It's been a while since I've posted, hasn't it? Last semester was really tough, and I didn't get a lot done on the fiber-artist front either.

But summer is less hectic as I only have 2 classes to teach (less lucrative too, but that's a different topic). So I'm trying to get back into the things I know I should be doing. Yesterday started cleaning up and rearranging the studio so that we can hang the tri-loom on the wall where I can use it instead of tripping over it.

Last week I finally got around to washing up some of the gorgeous fleece I bought last year from Sheepfeathers Farm; this particular one is a Corriedale/Bond cross ewe named Nora. I was overjoyed with how it's coming out -- just a fluffy snow-white pile of joy.

This morning I decided to take 1/2 hour before work and started spinning it up. Wow. It's just effortless, slipping through my fingers onto the bobbin.

Now I just have to decide what it's going to be when it's done.

The other thing I did before work was to post up my first set of polymer clay buttons on Etsy. I'm not sure how they'll do, but it's worth a try.

Have a fibery summer day!

Casting On: In the Beginning

Hello, world. I've actually been stalling for a while on starting this blog because I wasn't sure where I wanted to go with it. I've called it "A Continuous Thread" because in here I'm going to be writing about my fiber arts and my adventures as a spinner/knitter/weaver. The continuous thread represents not only the continuous yarn that feeds through my fingers as I spin, or knit, or tat, or weave, but it also symbolizes the desire--or perhaps I should call it a craving--to work with yarns and threads and fibers that has literally been a continuous thread running throughout my entire life. I do not remember a time in my life, however young I was, that this need to have threads in my hands didn't exist.

I remember being little and watching my grandmother embroidering and crocheting, and my mom knitting. I begged to learn how, but there was this problem. All of those things require sitting still for some period of time, and as a little girl, sitting still was not something I did -- ever (it still isn't). The only way to get me to slow down and stop was to hand me a book. When I'm reading, I can sit still. That's about it.

Well, nobody realized then, or for the next 30-odd years, that I have ADHD. Didn't catch it until I was 39. That's another 'continuous thread' in my life that has made me the way I am--sometimes it's an advantage, sometimes it's a thundering nuisance, sometimes it's a major problem. So, sometimes I'll be talking about that too.

Onward. Mom, and Grandma Thorpe, held out the ultimate carrot: they'd teach me to do any of those wonderful things with thread, if I could sit still and listen for 30 minutes without jumping up to go chase the dog or something. How I managed that, I don't remember--but I did it. I think I was about seven, maybe, when Grandma taught me embroidery. I recall doing bright-pink lazy daisies on something..

When I was about eight, Mom taught me to knit, and I was in love with it--still remember those thick shiny brown wooden needles, and kelly green yarn. I knitted cat toys and one enormous white scarf with colored stripes. I knitted, crocheted, embroidered off and on as I got older, but didn't do much of anything while I was in high school. I don't know why, I just didn't.

Once I got into college, life got more complicated and less complicated at the same time. During my sophomore year, I met one of the two people who became my lifelong best friends, and the people who led me into the fiber arts as a way of life. Her name is Catriona and I met her by way of taking Gaelic lessons from her. That's a whole other story. But Catriona knitted like mad, and still does, and that reawoke my knitting interest. I bought some yarn and needles, and then had to call my mom at home to talk me through it--I'd forgotten how to purl. We laughed ourselves silly as she refreshed my memory over the phone.

Catriona moved away from Colorado, but we kept in touch as much as we could on the phone and by mail; this was back in 1981, so no cell phones or email then. I learned to knit socks first, with her help via long-distance. I was scared of trying something as big as a sweater...too overwhelming a project at that time.

The following summer, I met Rebecca Lawrence who was also at CU that summer, and she was an accomplished knitter even then, and still knits rings around me, and anyone else I know besides Catriona. She coached me through my first sweater, which believe it or not, is still in my sweater drawer, still fits, and is still worn from time to time even though it's nearly 30 years old.

I had to get far enough along in my story to get to Rebecca, because she was how I became a spinner. But I'll save that for the next installment.