Maiden Voyage

Just a quick note to say that my Pashley got her first 12 miles or so today. I am VERY pleased with her performance. Even on hills.




More on that and first impressions later. I just wanted to share a quick picture of her at the Donkey farm and to say that I do believe I am in love!

She's here!

Look what came today!




Details to come later. :)

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While We Wait

My Pashley should be arriving sometime this week! It's about all I can think about right now, so in the mean while here's some pictures of the Donkeys enjoying a pile of gravel:

Somewhere Over the Rainbow...

... is the first spring rain I got caught in. But boy was it worth it! I would have missed out on this if I had driven.




I had stopped at my usual spot to get a sip of water and blow my nose. I turned around to make sure my blinkie was on before going through the tunnel and saw this huge rainbow!










You can even see the end of the rainbow. :)


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Elastic Dressguards Prototype

Please excuse the crappy cell phone picture, but I thought I would share a teaser. I've been working on 2 designs for dressguards made from elastic bands. One is just many strands, like what is pictured above, and the other is netted. I'm still testing out materials, but so far I am quite happy with both versions. More to come in a few days, so stay tuned!


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My Other World

2011 Fiber Fair at Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park.




Here is a glimpse into my other world. The bobbin part of Bobbin and Sprocket. Today was the annual Fiber Fair at Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park in Elizabethton, TN. I only got to be there for the last hour of the event. Usually I'm there for the whole day demonstrating handspinning (the REAL, practical spinning. Not this silly indoors in a gym on a stationary bike "spinning" nonsense), but since I now work on Saturday mornings I couldn't make it out there until almost 3pm.







Here are friends of mine participating in a "Fleece to Shawl" demo that we do every year. Basically there are several spinners and a weaver. The spinners have to keep the weaver supplied with yarn. There are several spinners spinning single strand yarn, and one spinner who takes those single strands to ply them into a 2 ply yarn. That then gets passed along to the weaver who weaves them into the shawl. I missed getting a picture of the shawl before we all had to pack up to go, but here are some Alpaca:




And some big bags and piles of wool:







I also ended up bringing home the park's spinning wheel to work on. It hasn't worked properly in years, and I could use a third (yes third! I own two spinning wheels and that still isn't enough) for my class that I teach there.




Here it us hanging out with my newer wheel. Didn't have space in the living room for all three.
So, looks like I've got a different sort of three speed to wrench and get running before next Sunday. :)

Yesterday's News

Yesterday I was on Let's Go Ride A Bike answering some questions about bikes and their accessories! It was fun being interviewed and sharing my experiences with them. Go check it out!