A New Color for Post's Sake

Here it is Friday, 27 June 2008. Where does the time go? Most of my days are spent over a boiling or simmering dyepot, which hasn't been a bad thing unless it's 90 degrees out with 50% or more humidity. I'm expecting a large yarn shipment today, so there will be plenty to do.

Last weekend I spent a most enjoyable time at Eckley Miner's Village in Eckley, PA. It's now a museum, but was a coal company owned "patch" or village built for the coal miners that worked in the mine. The village was built back in 1854. It was made famous by the 1970 movie "The Molly Maguires". The movie was filmed, in part, at the village and starred Sean Connery and Richard Harris. It's worth a look if you like older films.

Back to my weekend....Eckley had one of their summer events, "Patchtown Days" and I was privileged to be asked to spin in costume for the occasion in a room located in half of the 1940's house. All the houses in the patch were duplexes. I had my own room, which I decorated with some antiques and of course socks and yarns. The front room had the quilting volunteers also in costume as they worked on a beautiful quilt that will be donated to the museum. We had two glorious days and lots of visitors. Our next event will be "Fiddle Fest" which is in July…the exact day is on the Village's website.

I've been working on some new colors. I hope you will take a look. "Being There" is a favorite of mine. I'm hoping to come up with a new sock pattern using this yarn very soon. We have also come up with a sock kit that will be perfect for the knitter on your gift-giving list….Christmas, birthdays, etc. For intermediate sock knitters looking for something different, is "Jourdaine's Sock." It uses a fingering weight for the sock and lace weight for the lacy cuff which is attached later. I came up with this pattern for my 17 year old daughter, Jourdaine. This sock truly fits her personality and style.

I've also been working on a new color called "A River Runs Through It". I'm getting close. Here's the latest version.


All for now….and I hope to be a little diligent in my posts.

Keep on knitting…Christa.

New Kid on the Blog

This is an updated version of my first post. It bothered me that the BFL photo was excluded.

I find that keeping up with a Blog may not be my expertise, but I'm going to try. I'm a fiber person...big time. The feel of wool right off the sheep; the smell...there's something so earthy, so tactile, it calls to me to do something with it, and I do.

The sheep in the photographs are my friend Peggy's. She's a fiber person too. She has a website. Check it out when you have a chance. Peggy raises Cotswolds and Blue-Faced Leicesters. The curly headed one is Fiona, a Cotswold and the three bald faced ewes are BFL's.

It's shearing time, so there's an abundance of fleeces out there. I've been scouring fleece, drying fleece (very tricky with all the rain we get in April) and flick carding fleece. There's pounds and pounds of fleece. I drum card with my buddy Karen, who owns the drum carder, and with this wonderful machine we make beautiful batts as light as clouds. From there it's on to spinning yarn, then dyeing, and then either weaving or knitting an incredible garment. What a process. It's very satisfying. It's not something for the person faint of heart or who requires immediate gratification.

I'm also a dyer. I have a line of Hand-Painted luxury yarns for knitting. I also design patterns for socks. I'm in the process of getting my goods on Google pages. When I have the chance I love to teach knitting and spinning. Folks, this is what you do when you've been laid off your real job that actually makes money.

For future reference, I will be putting my show schedule on this blog, my teaching schedule, my favorites out on there on the web, tips and observations. Please feel free to comment.

So for now, "cheers"