My new sidekick

Posted on June 12, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

I bought a new spinning wheel at the wool market! This is my new Schact sidekick.

It folds up almost entirely and has an over the shoulder strap for carrying (thus the name: sidekick – the sides fold up and it goes with you everywhere).

You loosen that clamp in the center between the treadles, and then the treadles pull out and then fold up.

Beyond the obvious benefits of portability, I can get up to 8 different whorls for this wheel, and it came with 4. Whorls are like the gears on a bike, the more you have, the more you can control how fast the wheel turns. I’m limited to 3 whorls on my Kromski wheel, and since they are part of the flier, I can’t change them.

The flier tucks up into the bottom of the left treadle.

I bought it from Dazzler’s Best, a yarn store and alpaca ranch out of southern Colorado. In addition to being kind and frank people, they included a Schact bulky flier, which sort of sealed the deal. This thing is AWESOME.

I can’t wait to try it. The orifice (the hole the yarn passes through) and the bobbin are huge. So bigger beads, feathers, bolts, etc. will fit through. And with the big bobbin, I won’t have to stop and wind yarn off as often.

I’ve only spun lace weight Archie (the grey suri) on it so far, I’ll update you all with a more complete review once I’ve tested the range of the wheel more.

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Recapping the Estes Park Wool Market

Posted on June 11, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

We’re ba-ack! Mom, Dad, Aunt Geri, Uncle Jerry and I spent the weekend communing with fiber denizens of all stripes. Alpacas, goats, paco-vicunas (a breed of alpaca), sheep and llamas were all represented. In addition to the displays by various ranches and stores, there were animal judging, fleece judging, sheep dog demonstrations, shearing demonstrations, animal training competitions, and handspinning competitions.

The alpaca tent had products (including fleeces) for sale, the alpaca fleece contest, and of course, alpacas!

We spent at least half of Saturday in the alpacas tent, chatting with old friends and making new ones. The alpaca ranching community is small enough, we’ve met many of these folks before, and it’s nice to catch up. We strolled the aisles of the vendors’ barn for hours, scouting out the best deals. Then, on Sunday, we returned to make a few purchases (much more on that tomorrow!!).

Bags of fleece for sale. We did buy three, in colors that we never have enough of.

Sunday was much quieter, which was nice for us and probably frustrating for the vendors. The results from the handspinning contest were in, so Aunt Geri and I talked with the judges and examined the excellent work on display. We quickly decided that we could totally enter that contest next year; we are both perfectionists to the extreme.

We learned a ton, and hopefully gained the confidence we need to be more active participants next year. At least we know we’ll enter the handspinning contest.

I have a few more posts lined up from the show. I can’t wait to show you what I got!

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Yarn in progress – hieroglyphics

Posted on June 7, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

Instead of trying to make that gold beaded yarn that has me so un-inspired, I decided to use the same singles with these new, metallic copper beads. The warm color of Tuscany’s fiber reminded me of sandstone and the Sahara, hence the somewhat random name.

Technically, they’re the same singles, so I’ll likely have just as much trouble getting them to balance, but maybe the new bead color will be enough to get me started. I’ve only had time to string the beads so far.

Here’s a shot of the failed gold bead yarn with the copper beads on top. I think that since they aren’t clear, they’ll pop more against the yarn. There’s nothing worse than spending all that time to get beads into a yarn only to have them swallowed by it.

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Because we don’t have enough businesses

Posted on June 6, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

Mom and Dad have many interests. Ballet, horsemanship, theatre, knitting, Native American art,  computer programming (for fun), vinting, we even went through a sort of lumber jack phase. Well, their most recent interest is bound to be tastier. They’re considering becoming bee keepers.

It all started with the crab apple tree. When it’s blooming, it’s absolutely covered in bees. Plus, the springtime wildflower display in our pastures (which somehow have somehow survived all the previous owners as intact, native grassland) is impressive. So, this weekend, they filled in some of our berm spaces with other butterfly and honeybee favorites.

I’ve mentioned before that EVERY activity on the ranch requires the tractor, right?

We have no experience with beekeeping, so I don’t anticipate that they will materialize this year. But, heck, we had no experience with alpacas or handspinning two years ago, and look at us now!

Verbena are sweet little plants. I love them.

As a wonderful side effect, consuming honey from bees in your area actual reduces allergies. The small amounts of pollen in the honey help you build tolerance for local allergens.

Thank goodness Whisper was there to help out.

Needless to say, I’m encouraging this interest.

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Sparkly scarves!

Posted on June 5, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

Thank goodness I’m not the only crafter in the family! Mom, who knits using a rake loom, has been busy. She knit this pile of sparkles using one strand of handspun suri alpaca yarn (that’s the gray) and one strand of blue glitter eyelash yarn.

We tend to err on the side of subtly, more often than not. But this narrow scarf, which will make a nice holiday/winter accessory, is definitely bold.

It will be one of our more “experimental” products at the upcoming Cimarron Sky Dog Artist show. Depending on the feedback we get, we may make more of them. Well, we may make more of them anyway; they are pretty fun.

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Estes Park Wool Market

Posted on June 4, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

The fam and I are headed up into the mountains this weekend to attend the 22nd annual wool market! If you are in Colorado, have an idle weekend and are even vaguely interested in fiber art and the warm cuddlies that produce our wool, you should consider coming up as well. I’m looking forward to hearing about how handspun wool is judged in competitions, and also to the sheep dog competitions. Not that we need sheepdogs, but they are awesome. There will also be vicuñas, a rarer cousin of the alpaca, and I can’t wait to see them (have a look at this post for an explanation of the alpaca family tree). And on top of all the events and exhibitions, it’ll be cooler up at 7500 ft. Hard to say no to that.

Maybe this evening I’ll attempt to get that frustrating beaded yarn done, so I have something to show you. This weekend, I just wasn’t up to it. I mowed the lawn instead. Which took about five minutes, and is not a good excuse.

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Monetary matters

Posted on June 1, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

I need your help. We’ve set a goal to have an online store by August, and the biggest unresolved question may be the most important: how much do we charge for our yarn?

Take these two skeins of that “Rocker Gurl” yarn. Each is around 5 ounces and 135 yds. I realize that’s not much, you’d probably need both to make a small project, but that’s as much as I can fit comfortably on one bobbin.

It looks like shipping will come in at around $5. How much would you pay/charge for one of these skeins?

Let me know in the comments. I promise not to be offended! We have enough skeins of yarn lying around, we need to make a decision and start selling the stuff.

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Frustration

Posted on May 31, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

Generally, the yarn and I are one with each other. We can compromise between what I want it to become, and what it wants to become. But I’ve spun hundreds, probably thousands of yards of beaded yarn, and I can’t seem to get my most recent project to come out right.

It all started at a party. Perhaps not the best time to start a new project. Anyway. I spun my singles throughout the evening, and when I went to ply them the next morning I just could not get the yarn to be balanced. It was like the twist was inconsistent. Well, after 20 yards of frustration, I stomped off muttering acerbically under my breath, leaving poor Dad (who had been keeping me company) wondering what he’d done. And I haven’t picked up the yarn again yet.

I’m “letting the singles rest”. For the foreseeable future.

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Skirting

Posted on May 30, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

I think I’ve written before about skirting. It’s the one step we have to do before we send our fleeces to the mill. On Sunday, Mom and I skirted another seven fleeces.

We start by laying half of the fleece on the skirting “table”. I made our makeshift table from plastic fencing mesh, pvc pipe and zip ties. It isn’t the sturdiest or most efficient thing, but it does the job. We use our fingers to lightly separate the locks of hair, searching for tangles, burrs and second cuts. Second cuts, which are caused by the overlap between two rows where the shearer has cut away fiber, are the bane of our existence. They cause terrible tangles in the roving, which in turn cause lumps in my yarn, and me to tear my hair out.

We also pull, or skirt, off the edges of the fleece, which are not as soft or as long as the center part of the “blanket”. As we handle the fleece, dirt and other nasties fall through the mesh.

After we’ve gotten as much out of one side of the fleece as possible, we sandwich it between the two pieces of our table and shake it like mad. Dirt and dust, as well as more second cuts, come flying out. Then we turn the whole thing over and repeat on the other side.

Second cuts on the ground beneath the skirting table, along with a fine sprinkling of dust.

When we are confident that only the highest quality fiber remains, we begin to load it into a clear plastic bag, pulling it apart loosely. Any remaining second cuts fall out at this stage.

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Gifts of fiber

Posted on May 29, 2012 by cliffhousealpacas

Our shearer Scott, who also has alpacas, just gave us a car full of fleeces!

There were so many stuffed in the back of the car that they were crowding the head space in the front seat. I’m excited, not only because this means we’ll have plenty of roving this year, but also because Scott has beautiful chocolate-y brown alpacas and fawns. We only have Tulip, so we definitely love getting more fawn.

We’ve already skirted 7 of the fleeces, and we’ll drop them off at the mill when we pick up our finished roving from our own animals. Eee! It’s going to be a good year.

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