# FAC -Jan. '07



## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

I completely forgot that I promised this thread :shrug: So I'm getting old and my brain is like swiss cheese some days, sheesh :help: 

This is the monthly Fiber Arts Chat. Normally it is posted on the first of the month. We usually use this as a chatty thread to talk about all the sill things we do. Family, job, and any other issues you may want to bring up or need help with. For example you need to find a way to hide the massive amount of fibers you just bought so your DH doesn't find it right away :nono: We know all the secretes of hiding fibers and all the great excuses to use. Feel free to ask away :hobbyhors 

This thread is also used for serious discussion of fiber related things. Also for keeping in touch with everyone when you are too busy to post elsewhere. If you are a lurker, newby or old timer say hello introduce yourself and tell us what you are working on or want to be working on.

I've been plying some of my singles on a drop spindle at work. But last week my new boss said I couldn't do that any more :grump: :Bawling: Now I sit and twiddle my thumbs and dream of what I could be doing.


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## donsgal (May 2, 2005)

Marchwind said:


> I've been plying some of my singles on a drop spindle at work. But last week my new boss said I couldn't do that any more :grump: :Bawling: Now I sit and twiddle my thumbs and dream of what I could be doing.


What a shame! Knit him a nice scarf and tell him you sure "wish" you could work on your fiber at work, since it doesn't really hurt anything.

Maybe with a little subtle bribery, he'll come around.

donsgal


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

I like the way you think lady


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## Annie in MN (Oct 15, 2002)

Hey all!

Nice to find you again! I just finished a shawl on my 7' tri-loom. It is from medium brown handspun alpaca from one of my boys. It turned out just the way I wanted it. This is the second I have done from handspun alpaca, and the first I spun too thinly. This one was spun to the right thickness for the tri-loom. It has a nice drape, but isn't too heavy. I want to keep it, but it is already sold. I am now spinning up some wool/silk laps, which I will ply with a strand of alpaca. Once I have it all spun, I will dye it a light blue. It should create a nice yarn, one strand matte (alpaca) and the other shiny from the silk. This will also go into a tri-loom shawl, and it is sold too. 

I hope none of you are caught in the ice storms, but if so, I hope you are safe and warm!


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## lilyblossom (Dec 4, 2006)

Hi all,

I'm new to Homesteading Today, but not the fiber arts. I've been knitting and crocheting since the age of 8 (taught by my grandmother) and 2 yrs ago I started spinning much to my DH's dismay. At moment I am trying to spin my way through 2lbs of BFL that has been marinating in the stash for a bit and on the needles, I am knitting a red scarf for the Red Scarf Project.

It's still raining here in SW Indiana and the weatherman is predicting 5" of rain for us within the next 24 hrs. 

DK


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

Annie I am so glad you found us too. Those shawls sound really nice. How lucky you are to have such a large tri-loom. Did you make it? If you can take some pictures will you try to post them?

I'm glad you are well and posting again.

We have finally gotten some more seasonal weather. It was 20 below this morning and I have no idea what the wind chill was. I just wish we would get some snow.


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## betty modin (May 15, 2002)

I'm still "unknitting" the scarf I made my middle DD a couple of years ago to repair the damage done by a young cat with an appetite. You'd think the girls would have gotten a hint to put their natural fiber things away when the thing"ate" a cashmire sweater (at $200!!-not DD's) I couldn't find anything in the stash the right color, so I'm unknitting to the damage and then reknitting it. Of course is was 'upside down' so it won't just rip out. I have to untangle each and every stitch in the whole thing. I wouldn't have tried it if she hadn't been so sure that "mom could fix it". The things we do for love!

I've had a great illustration of just how insulating wool really is the past few days. We've had unseasonably cold weather here-low teens to single digits at night and break the ice all day, with new snow as well as clear skies. My little shetlands love the snow-caught them eating it actually- and their backs have a nice coat of it which hasn't melted or turned to ice yet. Their body heat is kept close to their skin by the wool and hasn't melted the snow. I'm sure those of you in colder climates have seen this, but it's new to me. I keep watching them and they're totally unconcerned by the snow on their backs. 

I've got a little one (not too little)with me this long weekend. She's not one that can go to a regular foster home-too likely to be a problem for other children. We're hoping that she can do a short stay with me and maybe be ready to try a foster home without other children after that. We'll see. We're starting with a series of short visits before we make any plans. If not, she'll be off to another residential care facility as she ages out of our program. Keep us in mind please. She deserves a chance at a better life than the one she's had, and if I can help with the process I'm willing to have her here for a time. Sometimes I really love my job...other times it's very hard.

I love the idea of shawls on a triangle loom. I've been looking at them in the catalogues. Awhile ago a member of this forum who's not been here in awhile had the possiblity of some...think I'll get in touch with her if I can. I'd love to learn to weave.

May winter bring you long days of nothing but contentment. betty


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## pasotami (Jun 1, 2006)

Ahhhh..... I need you all to kick me in the rear.... the weaving (tapestry) that I am making my DS is not going anywhere.... I can find all sorts of things to do instead of working on it.... I need a zapper so every time I go to work on it and find myself going for something else I'll get pinged....
I want this thing off my loom!


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## betty modin (May 15, 2002)

Maybe you could make an 'appointment' to work on the thing. Set a time each day when that's all you do for 30 minutes..or whatever seems right to you. That way you just do a little bit every day until it's done. Start planning your next project and begin getting all the things together to get it started. That might be another 'kick in the..." to get you going. I should talk. I just counted- as I was waiting for the plumber to make the water go again-and I have 5 knitting projects right now.. good thing I spent time finishing the plying this morning-while waiting for the plumber to arrive.

I am learning one expensive lesson per year here. It's incredible what a coastal California woman of 'a certain age' can be ignorant of when it comes to snow and ice! The plumber just said he 'hopes' he found all the breaks- and to try to turn it all on again in three hours to check. If not....moving sounds good right now. How did I know that you needed to cover all the ventilation grids in the foundation? I'd never had more than a skim of ice on the chicken water to worry about alone before I moved to Oregon's Cascades. I'll get those things covered this weekend..and run water all night until then. I'm ready for it to rain, or anything warmer at the moment. I'm sure many of you are in the same predicament.

It is fun to watch the sheep in this weather. My little shetlands are covered in snow and I've seen them eat it, move it aside to get at the vegetation underneath and stand around outside in it watching to see if I'm coming with cookies yet. The snow hasn't melted off the fleece on their backs for days now. It's amazing how well wool insulates. Today I had to get water from the creek for them, as the above mentioned plumber hadn't arrived yet. Ony the ducks and goose seemed to mind having frozen buckets.

Hope you all are warm and cozy and using the weather as an excuse to play happily in your nice warm, wooly stashes.... I am! betty


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## MullersLaneFarm (Jul 23, 2004)

I just now noticed the FAC.

Betty, you are such a blessing to the children that come into your home. I don't know how you do it.

I'm working on my 2nd pair of socks from handspun. DH is literally almost sitting over me waiting for them to be finished - he just loves the first socks I made him. I have 1 small and 1 jumbo bobbin filled with Icelandic thick/thin (I want to spin up one more jumbo bobbin). I want to dye the skeins mainly a dark green with spots of burgandy, blue and a touch of yellow. Then on to knitting a pair of clogs to felt.

Project after that is trying to master the Great Wheel with some alpaca. I figure it slips easily enough that I might be able to get the long drawl down for longer than 1 arms length.

Other than that, I need to restock my spring line of floral soaps and restock the stand-bys that were depleted for Christmas. 

DH continues to be the love of my life and is so supportive of all my fiber habits (then again, I _did_ let him run his traps through my dishwasher)


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

Cyndi I know what you mean about finding the FAC. I think I will ask Karen to unsticky it. I just don't seem to look at the top when I come here. The first time I noticed it was a sticky I had been looking for it for some time. I didn't post it as a sticky originally. But I think if we unsticky it people will notice the thread more when it moved up and down the stack of threads.

Betty you really are an amazing woman. I'm glad you are helping to enable more fiber addicts too.

I don't know if you all have been reading the other threads but I'm finally getting my floor loom. A good friend of mine had a Nilus she was given by her SIL and will never learn to use it. So she has offered it to me for $450. I told her when I get my taxes done I'll buy it. I am so excited to get this.

I haven't done much fiber wise. My thumbs have really been bothering me lately. I'm having surgery March 1st on my left thumb. They will go in and clean out the joint then they will take some tendon from my arm and roll it up and put it into the joint and it will form cartilage. I guess it will be able 6 weeks for full recovers. I've taken 2 weeks off from work but I'm not really sure how much time I'll need. I just know my hands hurt. My left one is worse than my right. Thankfully I'm right handed. If this all goes well I'll have my right hand done later on. I'm hoping that this will ease some of the pain I get when I knit and spin. The throbbing at night is the worst, it makes sleeping difficult.


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## MTDeb (Feb 20, 2003)

I keep forgetting about this up here too. It's nice to have a place just to chat. 

Tomorrow's going to be a busy day. We get our 11 sheep sheared at 10:00 a.m. Yes, it's a little early but I think we're going to be lambing early this year cause we never separated out the ram last year. :nono: I can't wait to run my fingers through all those freshly shorn fleeces.

IN the afternoon I'm going to help one of our guild members with a begininer's spinning class at a local yarn shop. She's teaching, I'm just helping her! It should be fun and I'll probably learn a lot too! 

I hope everyone is surviving the winter. It's hard to tell from one day to the next whether it's spring or winter!


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

I asked Karen to unsticky this thread. I hope you all find it now and post more often.


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## Katherine in KY (May 11, 2002)

Hi all. Deb, you're right about winter or spring. We were supposed to get a bad ice storm last night, but we just got more rain. We've had so much rain; some days we can't get out to the road as our lane is flooded, and, of course, our phone and internet connection go out. Spending less time on-line is a good thing, though. I've mostly been working on the seed exchange I manage. I got almost no help this year on packaging the seeds, so it's been really time-consuming. I try to spin everyday, though. Last night I finished plying some hand-dyed corriedale with silk. I added some angelina to it when I carded it so there's a bit of glitz, but not as much as I was hoping. It takes a lot more angelina than I thought to get the sparkle. Still, it came out really nice; I'm going to make a small shawl from it. I also started a gansey sweater for DH--my own design; I'm using purchased yarn which seems so harsh compared to the handspun I usually knit.
March, congrats on your floor loom. I hope you use it more than I do mine. One of these days I'm going to warp mine again and make a rug using unspun fleece and try to reduce my stash.
Betty, you continue to do such wonderful things for those kids. I hope in some small way they appreciate it. I hope your plumbing problems are solved. Freezing temperatures are definitely something you have to adjust to, not that I can talk after this mild winter!


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## Sherri C (Jun 21, 2002)

I didn't even notice this thread when it was a sticky.  

I'm still working on the same pair of socks that I've been working on for almost a year.  I started a new job so now I bring my knitting to work and knit during my lunch break, so there's hope that I may finish the socks before they have their first birthday. I have a couple more rows to finish the gusset decreases and then it's on to the foot. 

Go Colts!


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