Saturday, September 26, 2009

Past Weekend Activities

Last Weekend was my guild's Fall Fleece Sale. I belong to the Spinner's Flock Guild in Michigan. I spent all Saturday going through my inventory of items, updating my inventory sheet and adding new finished items and new yarns and rovings. I spent a lot of time cranking the drum carder blending some dyed wool into batts. I didn't think that I would be able to move my arm on Sunday.



Our guild will soon be 30 years old. I have only been an active member for about 4+ years. I joined and immediately volunteered to run the learners circle. My job was to shlep the spinning wheels and other equipment that the guild owns to each meeting. I stored them in my house. I also spent a lot of time teaching people to spin. I must have been really confident because I was just a beginning spinner my self. I am a teacher/instructor of computers by profession so the teaching part was easy. I also always felt that I was a spinner in a previous life and that is why I took to it so easily.

Here is some to the yarns that I had in the sale. Yes, that is all my hand spun yarn. I sell it for $6 per ounce.




I have started to dye wool that I buy as a raw fleece. I have it cleaned and processed in to roving by a commercial business. That process is a lot of work and I am more than willing to pay someone else to do all that work. I have a drum carder that I purchased a few years ago and have started to make blends of different colors and make them into batts. Here is a sampling of the ones that I have reciently had in the sale. This is $2 per ounce.





Three different color ways. I had to do a lot of cranking to get them prepared.

I also have some natural and kool-aide dyed samples that I have in the sale. The natural on the left are a variety of breeds. Merino, Corredale, Cotswold, Cormo, Shetland.





I dyed some superwash merino made braids, the ones on the right side are some of the ones that I dyed.






The guild has a Fleece Sale twice a year. In September and Feburary. Here are some other pictures of the sale. I am always impressed with the display of everything. There is raw fleece, a boutique of finished goods, yarns, rovings, felting wool, alpaca, angora, mohair, camel, llama, books, equipment, dyes, and other stuff that I can't remember.

Roving, Etc.


Roving, etc.

Yarns


Raw Fleece



Boutique items, this picute is not good on purpose. I don't want to exploit any one's work.




The economy is really bad in Michigan. I did sell some stuff. So I am happy about that. This economy will improve soon and we will sell more soon.



Friday, September 18, 2009

A New Begining

Well, here I go getting well into the new century and creating a blog. I hope to be a better writer than I currently think that I am and I don't give up on this in a week or two. I usually feel rushed and my goal in this second half of my life is to slow down and enjoy.

I see new technology and need to be part of it. I spent several years at the begining of the millennium techonology free so I missed versions of things and technology as it was developed. I was raising kids and had a different focus. So I feel in this economy I need to be knowledgeable about many things. This blog is the start.