The Calm before the Storm...

The weather forecast for Wednesday is quite horrid - apparently we will be catching the tail-end of a hurricane that has been roaring through Miami recently. But for now we have a wonderful day - slight breeze to keep the midgies away and sunshine all the way. Looked out of the front door this morning to see the heather on the hills opposite just starting to colour up, so thought it would be a great way to start the blog today!


This morning I finished off the hand-spun wool samples for Breanish Tweed so they should be in the post office this afternoon. The original roving was Falkland wool from blueface454 on e-bay. I have bought quite a bit over the past year and its always of a consistently high standard and a pleasure to spin.
After all the messing around with dyeing, I finally got a dark charcoal colour and put in the scarlet knobbles.
The carding after the dyeing was a bit weird, but after a couple of times through the drum carder it looked ok.
The spun yarn was a single and I put it through twice to give it a double twist just to make sure it would hold up in the pirn-winder and on the Hattersley loom. It all looked great when I'd finished, but when I put it through the pirn-winder, a lot of the larger knobbles dropped off leaving the floor looking like it had a bad attack of chicken pox!

So, what have I learned from this project?

1) I definitely need to either get some lessons in dyeing or get someone else to do it for me and 2) If I get to do more of this sort of yarn I will make smaller fluffier knobbles and put in far more of them to allow for some falling out on the winder.

Other than that, its been a good experience and I hope Breanish Tweed can use the resulting yarn.

And the blog would not be complete without a mention of little pup Pippin. He went for a long walk today to the end of the croft and this is him completely out of it on his return. He's settling in really well and is very entertaining. Bramble has developed that pained expression that foster mothers' get when they have to put up with being climbed on, having their tails tweaked and their paws nipped! But she's getting attached to him all the same.

And finally for today - the electricity company are replacing rotten light poles in our area over the next few weeks and the contractors are having to take new poles up onto the summer grazings moor. So far they have demolished a fence, knocked over a gatepost and churned up the side of the access track. Yesterday a large digger looked like it had partially sunk above someones peat bank. For this sort of work they used to use a helicopter to move the poles to inaccessible places - wonder why they stopped?

A Very Special New Arrival on the Croft....

Introducing - Pippin - our new puppy. Pippin is nearly ten weeks old and came to us from Shawbost in Lewis. He is a real character and already gets on very well with Bramble (our other sheepdog), and Heather (small and furry). Pippin will need some time to settle in and get used to living with us and we are looking forward to seeing him grow up and start his training in a few months time. So keep watching the blog and look out for news of Pippins' new life on Scalpay.


The postman brought a very interesting parcel the other day - a kilo of pre-spun from a business in Forres. Kathryn was very helpful to me and I chose the shades below from a large number of really exciting options. I first discovered pre-spun earlier this year (though of course its been around for a very long time - but I do lead a sheltered life don't forget!) It's so wonderful to use for teaching spinning and was an invaluable part of my short courses this year to bridge that gap between practising winding on and keeping the spindle/wheel rotating consistently, and getting to grips with drawing out a rolag. I have no doubt I'll be back to Kathryn for more before too long. Meantime its well worth dropping by www.katre.ws to see
something different - as well as pre-spun, carded and knitting/crochet yarns, there is sterling silver jewellry and kitchen tools made from juniper. I think everything originates in Scandinavia.

And now, at last, I have made a start on the spinning for Breanish Tweed. Have re-carded the black dyed roving and thrown in the little red knobbly bits, so we have to hope for the best.