Swatchy in Hawaii

For Knitta, and the Travels With Swatchy bloggers. Here is my entry to the Win an Odd Book ABout Furry Things competition. Magnus is already worried about the possibility of transformation into a hearthrug.

Wheels within Wheels

Last year I didn't even own a spindle, now for some reason ( most likely my fault ) there are three spinning wheels in Knitting HQ and one in quarantine in the shed. I blame my Knitting Bee chums, Julie and Kit who first introduced me to the joys of spinning. Kit kindly lent me a Louet 10 wheel which is so easy to use and looks like a design icon. I loved it so much that I went to Ebay and bought one of my own. That brought the tally up to two drop spindles and two wheels. Last week I spoke to my sister in law Babs ( hello! ) and she had news of two wheels languishing in Fife. I got the details and on a lovely sunny Saturday we sent off to collect them.

Sometimes serendipity has a melancholy tinge. The wheels had been used by a spinner who recently died. Rather than just give them to a charity shop or worse, throw them out, her husband wanted the wheels to be used by another spinner. Someone who would appreciate them. One wheel is made by a Scottish company called Haldanes, it is at least twenty years old. The other is over one hundred years old and comes from Germany. This one has evidence of woodworm, hence the quarantine. I feel a sense of responsibility and I want to make sure that they get good homes. I'm wondering if a textile museum would like the very old one and I'm still thinking about keeping the Haldane wheel for myself but only if I think it will do something that the Louet 10 can't. Otherwise I will find it a worthy spinner.

We took the Haldane apart, washed and waxed it and then Archie discovered skills hitherto unknown - he is a natural born wheel engineer. Hours of internet searching discovered it to be a double drive wheel and long after I'd retired for the night, he remained sorting out flyers and whorls and drive bands.

I finished my handspun wrap that I've been working on since October last year. I started spinning it with a drop spindle and fininished with the Louet 10. It is a lovely example of a learning curve - the spinning starts out crunchy, overspun and uneven and ends up beautiful and soft and still a bit uneven. Perfection is overrated - I'll take hand made and imperfect every time.

The kindness of strangers.

I mentioned in a previous post that I had recently spent time in a local graveyard. I was looking for the relatives belonging to someone who had contacted me through Flickr. It was good fun and although we didn't find exactly what we were looking for, I took a lot of photos and sent them off. My payment for this adventure arrived yesterday - three balls of yarn. Beautiful Jasper by Berocco. You can't buy this in the UK so I'm chuffed beyond belief. Thank you Georgia!

Here it is, nestling in my new felted bag, this week's finished fellow. I've thought up a pattern that allows you to make a bag according to how much yarn is available - very handy if you are trying to use up scraps or have three skinny skeins of badly spun Jacob needing a purpose.

Today started very early for me on account of waking up at 5.30. I communed on the sofa with Magnus until the sun started to show and then went up to the Dam to take these photos. The heron was fishing in the water but he always flies away too quickly for photography. We have a kingfisher too but I have yet to see it. Ground still frosty and the sunshine pink at the edges. Well worth getting chilly for.

Saturday's Final Whites.

This is my last post in the Winter White series. Thanks to Mary Jane knowing about it and to Shari for hosting. I've loved seeing all of the photos and reading new blogs. I hope you enjoyed visiting mine.

Here are three different things to finish off with.

My new winter coat ( see previous posts for sartorial worries ). And my new hairdo, I was at the hairdressers yesterday and as I don't own either a hairdryer or straighteners, this level of elegance will never happen again. I'm so pleased with the colours.

Archie's Apron - My other half spent an entire afternoon cleaning the cooker this week. What a star.

Soup in the making. Not the whitest of images but soup made with carrots, leeks, onions , celery and potatoes is one of my winter staples and feels to me quintessentially Scottish.

Wooly whiteness

More of a creamy whiteness really but it is cold enough here to require many many wooly layers today. Someone ( Mo'a at http://moaromigboyles.typepad.com/ ) asked if the spindle in the earlier picture was mine. Oh yes indeed. I've been knitting for a good while now but late last year two members of my Knitting Bee arrived armed with a spindle and some fleece in order to lure me over to the Distaff side. I didn't need much persuading, Great Aunt Nan and Great Aunt Ina had worked in a local weaving factory many years ago and I have often wondered if that is where my fibre leanings came from. That and my grandmother's skill with needles.

This weekend was the Spinning Guild meeting and I brought my carders along in order to ask for help in learning how to use them. Not only did I get a lesson, I also came home with at least one sheep's worth of fleece. A huge smelly sack full. Every day I have been washing at least 100g worth in order to work my way through. I love the transformation, seeing the mucky water pouring into the sink, many times till it runs almost clear. The fleece is soaked in Nan's old jeely pan and it is hard to believe when you see the mucky mass within, that just a wee while later, dried and carded into rolags, this filthy fleece becomes clean and cloud light. Full of glorious possibilities.

Graveyard White.

A week or so ago I had a Flickrmail from someone in Canada who had seen one of my photos. The photo was of headstones in Brechin Cemetery and she wondered if I would like to go back and look for the grave of one of her relatives. Yesterday we went off to look and one thing that caught my eye was the amount of floral tributes on the stones. I suppose that over Christmas family members come to remember the people they have lost and bring the flowers with them. A lot of the tributes were made from plastic which brought a kind of gaudy cheeerfulness to the place. We have had some gale force winds recently and flowers have been swept all over the graveyard so it is hard to tell who they were originally intended to commemorate. I like that - a sort of sharing among the dead.

Did I say that it never snows here anymore? Right this minute there are soggy flakes falling from the sky and no life in my camera battery.

Winter Blues.

Part two of the Winter Whites Week.

There has been a lot of rain and frost this year so even though the snow is lacking, there is still a need to dress warmly. One day I will coordinate my knitting so that I look cosy and chic, instead of just cosy.