Spinning

Paper Threads: Learning Bit by Bit

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My first paper spinning was a workshop in Japan. I thought I knew all there was to know. My own first thread was years ago using paper pattern paper. Lately I’ve been using paper from Japanese account books and I thought I knew all there was to know. However I started to worry that my handspun paper was highly over twisted and it wouldn’t swell or be all right for dish towels.

A friend suggested hers was overtwisted, too, and she wetted her skeins and weighted them to dry and the overtwisted kinks straightened out. I wanted to try it but I was at home away from my studio which has all my equipment and tools. This is how I weighted the my skeins. And they did turn out straight as could be (but kept the little bumps which I love).

I had to make do without a yarn swift to make the skeins. I turned a stool upside down to use the legs to wind my skeins. I was zooming with my weaving friends and one suggested putting the stool on the seat of my office chair and to whirl the chair around to make the skeins. That worked and made large skeins. Which I wetted and weighted as seen above.

This is a tool for making skeins. It’s called a niddy-noddy!

Several people said they were using a drop spindle so now I’m trying that out. I’ve spun a bit and know the principles of spinning so I can spin a thread.

The book suggested using a drop spindle and mentioned making S-twist thread. That means twirling the spindle counter-clockwise. I don’t know why but that’s what I’m trying. And I can control the twist much better and not have the overtwisted problem.

I hope you can see it’s much less twisted and perhaps notice that the twist is in the S direction. That means the diagonal lines of the twist go in the same direction as the middle section of the letter S—from the upper left to the lower right. I don’t think I’ll need to set the twist by wetting and weighting this time. Now I’m really trying to spin enough for a project. Hooray for the Democratic Convention this week.

A Gorgeous Textile, A Dilemma, and Suggestions Wanted

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Introduction:
A friend mentioned she is thinking of moving to a smaller place. I asked: “What about George’s blanket?” I noticed it years ago when it covered his bed—a gorgeous handwoven textile made with handspun goat hair(?). She called back to say she found it but the “moths had gotten to it”. I told her I’d like to have it and would put it in my freezer. Just fragments of it would be enough for me. Today was the first I could get a look at it after the freezer treatment to kill any moths and eggs. Now I need help in what to do next.

The blanket came from Elazig, Turkey, a village in Eastern Anatolia. All the women wore shawls similar to this blanket according to my friend.

I hope you can see that this is a beautiful textile. It is hand spun and handwoven of fine, singles threads at about 30 warps and wefts per inch. The goat hair makes it a little coarse but soft. It is very light weight and supple. I want to enjoy it but what should I do? Cut the good parts out and make a collage of them? Back the whole thing with a cloth and keep it intact? I would like any suggestions. I really don’t want to keep it in the large piece, I want to be able to look at the lovely fabric up close.


There is slight tracking of the plain weave—letting you know the warps and wefts were fine singles yarns. (To avoid tracking, one could weave twill or have the cloth dry cleaned. Jim Ahrens said it’s the water in washing that make the tracking in plain weave.)

I put it in the freezer for two days, then out for two days, and finally 2 more days in the freezer to kill the moth larvae and eggs. Thankfully I didn’t see any live larvae but I didn’t look inside the package.


There were white moth casings scattered all over the blanket. I spent an hour picking them off today after I’d opened the package.

Holes, holes, holes, large and small. The blanket had been folded so they just ate through the layers in places

Cuddling a Baby Lamb at Windrush Farm

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I went to Windrush Farm in Petaluma to one of the “Lamb Days” and it was a glorious treat. The wool felt wonderful.and he was so cute. It was a treat to hold this baby lamb in my arms.

Out in the field there were lots more baby lambs with their moms staying close. So far there ar 30 lambs born this spring with one ewe left to give birth.

These twins were especially cute. The black and white is unusual.

Lambs of different types are bred for different types of fleece. This fleece is from a previous year’s shearing. The farm sells fleece and yarns –natural and dyed.  They teach spinning too. Here is the link to Windrush Farm in Petaluma California.

I’m Bending the Rules

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Here is my current warp on my loom! Just what I taught my students to avoid–unevenly handspun singles yarns that are lumpy and sticky for warp threads. This is silk yarn I brought back from Bhutan–mainly to show the tour group what handspun yarn looked like. I did use plied threads for the 4 selvedge threads on the edges and weighted them separately. I used 5/2 cotton but a plied silk might have been a better idea.

From Linda Heinrich’s linen workshop at Convergence in 1994 and from her book on weaving linen I learned how easy it is to size a warp on the loom. Before now I’ve always been afraid to size anything. Her recipe is 1 tsp flax seed (any kind will do) to 1 cup of water. Simmer 15 minutes and strain. Refigerate and use within 2 weeks or freeze.I brush on the sizing then strum the threads and then open the shed to dry. Don’t apply too much–sort of like dry painting but pat the threads to get the sizing to go through to the bottom of the threads.

This is the yarn on the skein. I’ve shown it before to show the cross  made in the skein. The threads are horribly sticky but with the cross the threads are coming off perfectly. There are plenty of soft-spun lumps and thin areas where it is twisted tighter. I knew from winding the yarn off the skein that the threads were strong–that’s what convinced me to try them for a warp. The stickyness would have prevented the sheds from opening without sizing I realized.

Here is the cloth off the loom and wet finished. I got the cloth really wet in the sink then blotted with a towel. And ironed until dry I love ironing and ironing until dry and I love the sheen I got with the totally mat yarns.

Here is the cloth I just dyed with black walnuts I collected last week. What frun all this is. I can’t wait for the warp to dry and begin weaving again.

I’m Weaving Again!

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The fine silk warp at 125 ends per inch stymied me and I walked away and left it on the loom for a year and a half. I thenbegan dyeing. I knew there were enough threads left unbroken to weave so I began weaving with some heavier handspun silk from Bhutan. When I took off the entire warp, This piece is what I found had already been woven–and I loved it. Originally I was weaving a tube but had decided to weave two separate layers–hence this piece was formed! [click photos to enlarge to see detail]

Here is the cloth woven with the silk from Bhutan. I decided just to weave off the warp with it so I could cut it up to dye later with the natural dyes I’ve been playing with.

You may remember the skein from Bhutan from another post. The skein was unusual because there was a cross in it. Even this extremely sticky thread came off the skein perfectly.

Here is my latest peice–5 yards to try the new silk/retted bamboo thread I saw in Handwoven Magazine. I love it. I the twill warp face on one side and weft faced on the other so when I dye it I’ll have two choices of tones of color.

Shopping at Windrush Farm in Petaluma

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On that glorious day at the farm where I showed the sheep in my last post, Mimi was asked: “Do you have any wool available?” Here is a woman on her way home with enough wool yarn for several projects–sweaters I think she’ll knit. Different breeds have different types of wool not just different colors. I think I overheard this woman discussing exactly what kind of wool she needed for a special white sweater she was going to knit. 


There was roving ready for spinning or felting in one basket and a container full of balls of yarn from the farm’s sheep and dyed by Mimi. She has a stand during the fall and winter at our Farmers’ Market in Marin County on Sundays. Last week at the market she had balls of roving dyed in a wide range of colors that were being bought up by a woman who does a lot of felting.


Mimi’s assistant is balling up roving (wool from the sheep that has been cleaned and combed to be ready for spinning or felting). The balls are weighed then the price calculated. I was seduced last week at the market to buy a gorgeous ball of roving made of a mixture of grey wool. I plan to use it in felting art pieces.

In the courtyard there were two big tables with sheep pelts. The pelts were set out to dry in the sun. I wondered what the white areas were and was told it was salt to help with the drying. What a wonderful day it was with “thread-head” friends, good food, sunshine, beautiful country and sheep about to lamb! As a weaver I learned a lot, too.

A Wonderful Day at Windrush Farm with the Sheep

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Windrush Farm in Petaluma, California specializes in raising sheep for handspinners. They also have spinning classes, summer camps for kids, and “lamb days” every spring so children and parents can mingle with the baby lambs. More information on their website: Windrush Farm

Here they are grazing in the pasture on a simply gorgeous January day.


They came in for dinner and I was able to catch some photos of different breeds. Different types of sheep have differ colors and different types of fleece (wool). In this photo you can see that some have their coats just recently shorn and some haven’t been yet. Mimi said that some refused the shearing the day when the shearer came!

These ewes are about to “lamb” meaning deliver their babies any day now. You can tell because their udders are formed. Some ewes looked pretty fat but the udder is the sure sign. Whether twins or not can’t be predicted.

A couple of lamas are in with the sheep but they don’t mingle much with them. This one wandered in after all the sheep were already deep in their mangers eating. I like the ears and nose!