This is my hand spun sweater from February. The grey is a Romney merino cross that I purchased at the New Hampshire Sheep and Wool Festival a few years ago. The white is a Montadale fleece I purchased a while ago. I had never spun Montadale before and enjoyed spinning it quite a bit. The pattern is mine with the yoke being knit by hand while on my travels in February to visit my brother in Napa Valley and my sister on the big Island in Hawaii and the body and sleeve knit on the machine. The resulting sweater is very comfortable and lovely to wear.
Category: Shows
October 13
It’s been forever since I’ve written a blog post. The last couple of months have been spent preparing for the fall and winter shows. I wrote and had the Stars in the Summer Sky sweater test knit and add a hat and mittens to go with it. At the Adirondack Wool Arts Festival I started on a sweater for myself from my handspun. The yarn is from a lovely almost black Romney fleece and the white is from a Montadale fleece. The first of that breed that I’ve ever spun. The wool was lovely to spin. The sweater pattern is based on a hat pattern that I designed years ago. This will hopefully be my Rhinebeck sweater for this year. We’re nearly ready. Stop by and stay Hi if you’re at Rhinebeck.
April 30
I have almost missed April altogether. It’s that time of year when my interests turn to gardening. So when the sun has been out and the weather is warm I’ve been outside mulching and poking and planning. I’ve also been doing fibery things on all those rainy days. I finished another sweater from handspun. A lovely grey Merino/Romney cross and a stunning black Romney yearling fleece. And last week we vended at Gore Place and had a great but very cool and windy day. We’re looking forward to vending at the Maryland Sheep and Wool festival this weekend. We are very excited to be vending there for the first time!
January 15
I have been re-knitting some of my patterns in commercial yarns so that we will be able offer yarn to go with our patterns. After sampling lots of yarns we’ve settled on a yarn from Cestari that’s 100% merino that’s sources in the US. It’s the closest thing to my handspun in weight and character that I’ve found. The photo above is of Annie’s mitten’s being knit in the new yarn. The plan is to have yarn to go with some of our most popular patterns at our next show this weekend. If you’re near Pawtucket RI this weekend we’ll be at Slater Mill Knitting Weekend. Hope to see you there!
September 21
We’ll be at the Sheep and Shawl in Deerfield, MA tomorrow to help them celebrate their 5th birthday! Cindy’s just released the red and white hat and mitten patterns. You can find them here.
February 26
We had a great time this past Saturday at the Wayland Winter farmers market at Russells in Wayland. We’d done a bit of dyeing to fill out the empty spots in our inventory. And I’ve spent a some time updating our website so the purple and blue gradient patterns and yarn are on the website. I’ve still got the Pleiades and pink gradient patterns and yarn to add and hope to get to it this week.
January 20
We had a lovely day vending at Slater Mill today. Great vendors and a lovely venue. We’ll be there tomorrow too. Stop by and say Hi!
November 23
Happy Thanksgiving!
We’ve recovered from our two big fiber shows and have been making stuff. The top photo is of wet felted pillow fronts drying that I made yesterday. They’re headed for the shop after I make them into pillows but if you’re interested you can send mean email and they can be yours. The white horse and cardinal pillow are $80 each and the small Dala horse pillow is $50. The second photo is of my first attempt at needle felting. A group of us at the Carlisle Artisans volunteered to decorate a tree at at the Concord Museum’s Family Tree Exhibit. The book is “Spring for Sophie” about a little girl looking for signs of spring. One of the signs is birds and bird song so I volunteered to needle felt some birds for the tree. Along with the cardinals, chickadees, and bluebirds I made some woodpeckers, blue jays and a gold finch. You’ll have to visit the museum if you want see them though as a I was so rushed to finish I forgot to take a photo. The exhibit runs through January 2 and you can find more about it here.
November 6
[su_dropcap style=”simple” size=”4″]W[/su_dropcap]here did October go? We had a great time at Rhinebeck and the New England Fiber Festival. This is a photo from the New England Fiber Festival before we opened. Felted pillows in the middle fiber on the right and red and white yarn for to make the fingerless glove patterns that we just came out with. Red and white and blue and white. They were very popular at Rhinebeck and FFNE.
September 21
[su_dropcap style=”simple” size=”4″]P[/su_dropcap]roduction Knitting. After playing all summer with buckthorn and natural dyeing I’m back to work making finished goods for sale a the fiber festivals and shops we’re a part of. The mittens are handspun shetland fleeces. The dark grey and white are the natural colors of the fleece and the blue is acid dyed. The body of the mittens are knit on our “hacked” brother 910. The thumbs are knit on “sticks”.
January 27, 2017
[su_dropcap style=”simple” size=”4″]L[/su_dropcap]ooking forward to vending at the Wayland Winter Farmers Market Fiber Days at Russell’s Greenhouse. We’ll be there with some new gradient patterns and yarn and all of the other things we usually have.