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my cup runneth over

Posted on | September 17, 2008 | 19 Comments

I have been the recipient of generous offerings.

I won Diane‘s contest and received this pretty package in the mail!  Diane was kind enough to ask my preference – yarn or fiber and of course I chose fiber.

She sent this gorgeous merino/silk blend and tussah silk!  I love it, it is sooo soft!  Diane has an article in the Fall Spin Off about Polworth and has several tutorials on her blog – check it out!  Another new friend thanks to Ravelry, and one I hope to meet at SOAR.

The goodness doesn’t stop there.  Last Saturday was our first guild meeting since May and my friend Karen brought the two Border Leicester fleeces I got from Pia (our guild shepherdess) to me.  We walked out into the parking lot to transfer the garbage bags from Karen’s trunk to mine (and these bags are HUGE), and Karen pulled this out of her trunk and told me she’s GIVING it to me:

It’s a carder.  A Louet roving carder, to be precise.  First, I about fainted and then I jumped up and down for joy!  A carder!!!!!!!!!  A FREE carder!!!!!  Wow.  To say I was stunned would be an understatement.  Karen said she wasn’t using it and she knew that I would, especially with the two new fleeces (plus a couple I already have and haven’t been doing anything with). 

Of course I had to try it out immediately! 

I made this little ball of roving from fleece that had been washed but had no other prep done to it.  It took awhile to figure out how to use the carder, at first I was doing it completely wrong and had a mess of fiber on the small drum, but then I read the instructions (who says it’s only guys who have that anti-instruction-reading gene?) and the second go-round was much better.  And easier.

I spun up that little roving ball and it was great.  Easy to spin, easy to draft, I ended up with a light and fluffy yarn – and that was just playing around, so once I really get the hang of it, the yarn should be even better!

If the weather cooperates, I plan to wash a lot of fleece this weekend.  Spin Off also had an article on washing fleece, but to be honest, I found Aija’s tutorial much more helpful.  Not to mention timely.  I probably have 10 pounds of fleece to wash.  Fun, fun!

 

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