New spinning wheel

It was Guild day on Saturday, and the sales table was laden with goodies. Sadly, a member of the Guild had died fairly recently, and her granddaughter had cleared out her workshop; there was a huge amount of wools and equipment. I bought various bits of wool, lovely new pure wool, Jacob and Romney Marsh for 20p per skein of 100g or so; star buy, though was this lovely Schacht Matchless wheel. The Guild wanted 50.00 for it, so it came home with me. It's a very nice looking wheel, made of honey coloured maple wood, with a double treadle and double drive. It came with several bobbins and an instruction book. I haven't had time to have a go yet, but I've treadled it to get a feel for it, and think I'll be very happy with it.

Woolly progress

Progress with the handspun Jacob fleece is progressing; the skein above was plied yesterday, then skeined and balled - it's now ready for knitting, but I need to do a bit more before i start. Change of plan, as the resulting wool will be too thick for socks, so will become a hat for the lad who's sheep supplied the fleece, not sure whether it was Barry or Barbara! Pleased with what I've achieved now I've ironed out a few hiccups with the spinning - tension and joining in new rolags were the bugbears, but I seem to be getting over them.

Fleece to foot

How to turn fleece into socks - I hope!! This is one of the Jacob fleeces I was given, sorted, but unwashed. I sorted it outside a while ago, to remove the dirty, daggy and unkempt bits (on to the compost heap with them!), then it was rolled and stored over the winter.


Separated into manageable portions, and well washed in warm water with a bit of Ecover added, then well rinsed, and laid out on a sheet in the sun to dry - took two days to dry fully.


I decided to hand card this, as it shouldn't take too much for a pair of socks, and it's less disruption than clearing a huge space for the drum carder. I'll use the drum for the rest of the fleece, though I think. This is it on the carders, mid-card, with completed rolags behind. Just a few more!!!

Wool and curd-filled day!

Got up early to get some lemon curd on the go for the WI market tomorrow; greentwinsmummy came over this afternoon and kindly picked it up to take there for me; sent some duck and chicken eggs too, the boxes resplendent in their newly printed out Lynn Cottage labels, looking very smart.

The pictures above are of yesterday and today's spinning efforts; I have completed two skeins of knittable wool, one of which was then knitted into the sampler of garter stitch. This was some Gotland fleece from the Guild I was given for a challenge, so I challenged myself to get on with it!! I am really, really pleased to have got the hang of it, more or less, and feel confident enough to tackle the fleece mountain that is lurking behind the front door (and on top of my wardrobe, and in the cabin, and in some drawers.........)
Up early tomorrow morning to trial the non-shop shopping - hope the weather is better than it is at the moment, though!
Teh rest of the day was spent on research - alternatives to paraffin for the lamps (lloking hoepful); researching uses of meadowsweet, just coming into bloom here in teh damper ditches and verges; more grain research.
It's a full and happy life.