First Blog Ever

Well folks never done this before. Being an old time Scotts-English-Ontarian (read uptight) I have never been much of an emotional exhibitionist so I thought blogs weren't for me. But then as I read more and more of my friends' blogs I began to realise that they are a good way to both keep in touch and share knowledge and interests. Voila, here I am. So as I try and learn how to manipulate my way around in what is a new world to me, I hope at least some of my friends might be mildly interested in what I am up to.

I am a relatively new spinner, and did the first week of the Ontario Handweavers and Spinners Guild certificate at the Haliburton School of the Arts in Haliburton Ontario in August. It was a great time of learning for me. While there, I acquired a beautiful morrit fleece, from a Romney cross lamb named 'Norah'. The shepherd from whom I got it was Chris English from somewhere north of Kingston, ON. It was (is) a lovely, short staple, beautiful coloured thing. Here is a picture of it 'in the grease' before I cleaned it.

After scouring, then came the hand carding. It was a delight to card, and here is the result, a basket of beautiful, soft, lofty rolags to spin.

Finally, it was time to practise the 'long draw' a spinning technique which is supposed to give a soft, lofty, 'woolen' style yarn. Here is my first bobbin of 'Norah' using that technique. Not great, but it takes practise. All in all I am relatively pleased with this first attempt And it was a lot of fun to do. With time I hope that I will get used to the 'double drafting' technique and gain more control with it, but all in all I am fairly pleased with it.