Yesterday I had a great day out with friends Isabella Whitworth and Claire Crompton as we braved the icy roads to visit Lesley Prior and her wonderful fibre animals. Sadly, I forgot my camera but there are lots of pictures of the Bowmonts and the cashmere and angora goats on Lesley's blog: www.devonfinefibres.wordpress.com.

Bowmonts are unique in the UK in several ways: they are the only commercial flock that is being bred specifically for fibre; they are the only Bowmonts in existence; they live a life of sheep luxury! That last point may not be unique but it is certainly unusual. Sadly for us, but wonderfully for Lesley and the Bowmonts, the fleece is in such demand commercially that there is not a huge amount available for the handspinners

Well, the weather is going the right way and we are a lot less frozen this weekend than we were last. Let's hope it holds.
You will see the TAFA logo on the blog - have a look. It is the most fantastic resource and is an ideal way to while away a wet Sunday afternoon, especially if Santa has some chores for you do!

I am going to put some wonderful eucalyptus bark into soak for a week to see if I can get some exciting colour. It was grown in southern Spain and is a gift from a friend. I shall be interested to see if the bark grown in a hot climate differs in the colour that is produced from my little Silver Dollar gum in the chillier south west of the UK.

Clothes moths are a topic that has been raised on my friend Lesley Prior's blog (www.devonfinefibres.wordpress). Apparently people are concerned about the little blighters eating woollen garments, and that is why they are reluctant to buy natural fibres. I can tell you that if natural fibres aren't available and you have case moths or carpet beetles, that they are quite happy to eat synthetic fibres.....I would urge those of you who swat any moth you see that you check it is one of the clothes moth varieties. Thousands of moths are swatted to death every year when they venture through an open window, usually attracted by a light. These moths have no interest in your belongings, are already under threat from environmental pressures, are pollinators and a valuable food source for birds. The case moth, or clothes moth, is a weedy little specimen, doesn't seem to like the light much, leaves evidence of its presence with the little 'cases' from which the larvae emerge as moths and by then the damage is done, as it is the larve who eat the fibres, not the adults.

So how do you combat them? I keep my clean fleece in vacuum bags, wash dirty fleece as soon as I get it, put suspect fibres in the freezer overnight and repeat in 12 days to catch any eggs that may have hatched in the meantime. I vacuum dark corners, cupboards and drawers regularly and keep a mothball in my vacuum cleaner bag. I have no faith in lavender, sanderswood, cedar or any of the other so called anti-moth smellies, but I do regret the passing of newspaper printed with proper ink - that did help keep the moth down, because the ink contained a poison. I do keep my handspun yarn in hanks rather than balls and if they are to stored for any length of time, I undo the skein, give them a shake, and hang them in the sun every few weeks.

I raise silkmoths, as regular readers of this blog will know, so cannot afford to have chemical controls around the place - poison will not discriminate between useful and destructive moths!

Back to the loom....

Give Fleece a Chance Knitathon

This was very successful! We had spinners and knitters and the flock was increased significantly with more sheep on the go, including mine. We had two press photographers, one of them Mike Kinsey who as well as doing great photos is also half of the great husband and wife team who run the Oratory B&B, www.theoratorydartomoor.co.uk. Highly recommended by friends who have stayed there.

We had a visit from Sally Vincent, www.rainingsideways.com, who keeps Whitefaced Dartmoors and is very supportive of the Campaign for Wool. Again and again we discover that instead of being a small, eccentric group of wool worshippers, we are part of a huge network of discontent over the woeful state of British wool: but the stopper is out of the bottle now, and we hope to make some real progress so that farmers, makers and consumers can have the benefit of a fair price for excellent fleece, cutting edge creations and the satisfaction of reducing carbon footprints by using what is locally available.

Right, off the soapbox and back to the loom!

Give Fleece a Chance!

Just a reminder to anyone out there within easy reach of Duchy Square, Princetown, that tomorrow is the Give Fleece a Chance Knit-Athon at DS Centre for Creativity. It is also Textile Friday - you can never have too much of a good thing!

On Monday, Claire Crompton and I went to visit Sandy Gilbert, www.proudyarns.co.uk to see her studio and work. We had a very enjoyable afternoon looking at sheep, angora goats, yarns, fibres and finished goods. Yummy!

Another week over and another week nearer Christmas! We have had some appalling weather and that may be responsible for the virus I've been suffering. It caused me to miss some exciting textile related jollifications: Women's Wellbeing Day in Sidmouth and KnitExpo in Exeter. I was supposed to be present/represented at both but in the end made neither.....

I'm inspired by Laverne Waddington's blog entry: http://www.backstrapweaving.blogspot.com/ and the fabulous weaving she has just seen in Peru - so many ideas, so little time!

I am experimenting with doubleweave pick-up at the moment and am getting more and more excited. I am also becoming infatuated with the idea of a drawloom....

Dying has been going well and this batch of yarn has really delighted me. The colours are Madder, from Coleur de Plantes, Cutch Waste and Dhak from Pure Tinctoria, mordanted with alum and cream of tartar on a 70% alpaca, 30% Blueface Leicester yarn from John Arbon: wwwjarbon.com. Glorious yarn and the dyeing has been fantastic.

I have some more in a different colourway but the skeins need tidying up before I photograph them.

The other really exciting thing that is happening in the dyeing part of my life is that I am going to ISEND next April. This will be a fantastic event and I am lucky to be going with several colleagues and friends - that always helps!

Another busy week has come to an end and I look back at all the things I promised myself would be done, and haven't!

On Thursday afternoon I went with Philippa and Laura, colleagues from Duchy Square, www.duchysquare.org, to be interviewed on Radio Devon. Our interviewer was Fitz (David Fitzgerald) and if you should be interested, you can listen again online until Tuesday. We talked about Duchy Square Centre for Creativity, what it's for, what it is like being there and I got in a plug for using local fleece.

On Friday I ran a morning workshop for some of Peter Tavy Guild's weavers on how to read a weave draft. The discussion generated over the yummy soup and rolls lunch provided by Hilary, has resulted in our forming a weave study group. Striking while the iron is hot, I turned up at the Guild the following day with a challenge!

We are going to weave a minimum of 20 x 20 cm (8 x 8) samples, using only straight entry and black, white, grey and one colour for the warp. If all 10 of us do our bit, we shall have 80 samples to inspect in January. It will be really fascinating to see how different they will all be.

Tomorrow I am going to teach Lucie Ponsford (www.giselledesigns.co.uk) natural dyeing. Lucie is a fantastic designer and she upcycles old clothes into the most fabulous new creations. Wednesday I am going to help a friend put up her new-to-her loom, Thursday a meeting with Claire Crompton, knitwear designer par excellence and creator of the Give Fleece a Chance (www.clairecrompton.co.uk) project, Friday is Duchy Square Christmas Fair in the evening, and then on Saturday I will be in two places at once....I will be in one and my presence will be represented in the other as I have yet to master the ability to split myself in two.

I hope to find time to experiment with some delicious steel yarn I was given, so watch this space!