Packaged and ready to go

The Colours of New Zealand Placemats are finally ready to go out the door.  We found a gift box that fits, and printed out the card and linen washing instructions to accompany.  This would have been a bit faster but the house is still a little chaotic as we sort everything out prior to the move to NZ.

The loom made it safely to storage - I lost a little slice of wood off a block of multi-ply on the bottom of one side of the castle when I slid it onto the trolley, but nothing some glue won't fix.  The only other problem was the time it took me to remove the bolts - next time I put it together I will put a little soap on them and maybe they'll turn more freely.

Ready to Go

Otherwise the packing is going well - we have a ready supply of bubble wrap substitute - put washed Clun Forest locks into a plastic bag and stuff them into any small spaces left in boxes :-)  Works perfectly and we have to store a lot of that wool anyway.

Starting the pack

With under two months to go to our departure from the US we have been slowly boxing things up and splitting up what has to go to storage vs what will be going to NZ (and the third option of: we're not sure why we had it in the first place - so give it away!).

This morning was devoted to packing up the Macomber and making some sense of the 'fiber cupboard' in the spare room.  4 hours later and it's all under control.

The Macomber all ready to be transported (next weekend)

While sorting through boxes and bags I found the first ever skein of wool I spun.  It was Merino with angora and was only a few days into my spinning (self) education and after making numerous starts and stops.  I did go on (persevere) to produce some 3 ply what was half-way decent and made that into table runners and a couple of scarves.

One of these won a blue ribbon, then other didn't :-)

So with the loom disassembled and ready to go, all the bits and pieces boxed up and listed - time to move onto the next challenge (the hiking gear), but not until after a great lunch of homemade pizza.

Packed and ready to go

Lunch: Anne's pizza (with a glass of red wine).

Finishing the CoNZ Placemats

Today the placemats were all washed after finishing the hems on them last night.  I put them through a regular wash/spin then lay them out on racks in the freezer.  Less than an hour later they were stiff as a board - so I took them one by one and gave them a hot iron (with a protective pillow case).  The roughness of the woven pattern (and original stiffness of the yarn) quickly disappeared to be replaced by wonderfully soft draping fabric with the pattern visible as the light reflects at different angles.

The complete set - with different colour schemes visible

A test 'setting'

 Now we will have to find a box and get them wrapped, boxed up and posted to NZ to my brother for his Christmas present.