Settling in

As mentioned in the last posting, we have moved to our new home in the mountains. So far I haven't actually done any spinning/weaving/fiber work! Too busy setting up the house ready for the arrival of all our furniture from both the storage in Maryland (arrives the second week of June), and from NZ (about the same time, as it arrived in the US on the 24th, but still needs to clear customs etc).

That being said, I do have combs, a drum carder, my Rappard wheel, and the table loom, so really nothing to stop me getting going, and as most of the 'move in list chores' are now done.

The equipment coming together

It will be great to get a couple of looms set up in their own room permanently, and still have another room for spinning and fiber work.  More on that once the gear arrives

Move to America

The move finally happened, and basically without too much fuss (although at times the stress level did rise slightly).  But here we are settled in Tennessee with progress on all fronts.  We have bought a house and 17 acres of forest in Polk County (on the doorstep of the Cherokee National Forest), our furniture from Maryland and New Zealand should all arrive early June, but we will be moving in with the bare basics by the end of the month.

We have made a few trips up to Maryland to retrieve some of the more fragile (paintings) and valuable items from the storage.  On the first visit Anne managed to retrieve my Rappard wheel and some Clun Forest washed locks.  The only trouble was that these were probably our 3rd choice locks, but never the less I was able to take the washed locks, open them up a bit with the flick carder and spin direct from the locks.  That resulted in my first skein produced back here in the US.

200 yards of  2-ply, superfine, 8 tpi.

The next trip I rescued some other bags of locks and a large bag of flicked locks (Anne would normally then run them through the drum carder).  I also managed to slip in the Ashford drum carder.  This made the spinning a whole lot faster as I was able to make up batts and spin from strips torn from them.

After watching a little of "The Gentle Art of Plying" a video by Judith MacKenzie that I purchased just after arriving here, I noted her comments about the light reflecting differently off fibers spun as 'S' and 'Z" - all to do with the direction they align.  This got me to thinking what would happen if you had such yarn set out in stripes across a warp, and then you wove the same 'S' and 'Z' stripes in the weft.  That started me on spinning singles the 'opposite' way to normal, and plying them similarly.  With the Clun Forest batts from the carder I soon had nearly 500 yards of each.  The weaving will have to wait for the looms to be set up once our furniture arrives. Who knows what will happen with the yarn during the weaving/fulling process.

The other test I tried, after having once tried this and given up, was to remove the fiber from the drum carder using a diz to produce roving.  There are plenty of videos on the web showing how to do it, so I tried again and had moderate success, which with practice should become easier.

Fine Clun Forest roving from the drum carder

The diz - an old plastic top (with very small hole)

I'll continue to work doing this - and will try a larger hole in the diz, which will speed up the process considerably.

In other 'settling' news, we went along to the Tennessee Valley Handspinners Guild meeting this month (see: http://www.tnvalleyhandspinners.com/ )and signed up.  A great group and I may have a potential outlet for some Clun Forest yarn.

On our last trip up to the storage (we're almost ready for the final move) I did find a bag of the 'best' locks so I searched around and found my wool combs as well in case I get the chance to produce some top.

Look out for more regular posts once we get the Internet set up in the house...