Boucle!

 Today, here at MoonBound House, I am making yarn! This is not unusual, but it sure is fun! Today I am working on a Boucle yarn.

This is a multiple step process, the first is to spin a fine single, in this case a variegated teal merino, in a z twist (spin it clockwise.) Then you spiral ply it on a another strand, the ply direction is s (anti-clockwise.) I am using a commercial silver thread. While, you are plying you push the wool strand towards the orifice creating lots of random loops and curls.

The yarn is not set at this point, those loops and curls will move and can snag on the hooks of your wheel. The next set will help lock the curls in place and tighten the whole yarn. You ply the yarn again, this time in a z twist.

Voila! you have a boucle yarn. I still have a fair bit to do so I am going to get back to work!

Hope you are creating something that makes your heart happy and your hands warm! ~ Julia

Monday's Musings - What does success look like?

What does it feel like?
If I want to meet some measure of success, I have to define it.
Failure is easy to define, even many failure conditions are easily outlined and fill me head.
But what is success?


As an artist, who thankfully, doesn't depend on selling her work to eat, I am struggling with this. Have I already succeeded, in just exactly that, being in the position to make what I want to make without regard to practical matters of salability and without the pressure of needing to make the sale to feed my family, I know I am fortunate and I am gratefully aware that if I had to feed my family on my work, I would have never begun. Yet, I would like to succeed. I want to sell my work, I want people to enjoy my work and for it to have value for them. I would like to grow as an artist and teacher.

Our society often defines success in terms of money. We can decry this all we want but in part it is so because it is easy.

If I am selling my work, then I am a business, if I am a business, there are built in expectations and costs that need to be met. That is not a bad thing really. But I am struggling with defining success for myself. On one level, each thing I create is a success and if not a business then it is enough to create. That is the success. As a business the creation is not the success, I have to do all the things that lead to someone seeing, loving (hopefully,) and purchase it. And as mercantile as that may seem there is true joy and success in creating that connection too.

So I guess success for me is the joy of the lady buying up my scarves and telling me she loves them, she hunted me down after buying one and technically I sold the remaining ones on a bus ride home over the phone.  It is the lady would brought in the hat she made from my hand spun yarn, to show me what she had made. It is the lady who got some of my yarn as a gift and wrote a post about the creation of the shawl she made with it. It is the child who was really listening to me discussing spinning and offering me some grass to spin.

All of these are success!

But they don't fit in a ledger.

And no this post is not me saying I am done selling. It is certainly, not me saying I am done creating. It is me wondering about how I can set a definition of a goal of success that has a fixed point. And right at this moment I have no answer. Maybe you do?

Still Pondering ~ Julia

Mystery spin - three

So now that it is revealed here are the niddy gritty details.

Thrumbs -some Cotton & acrylic, but mostly wool or wool blend. total weight 3grams.

 lighter colored alpaca - I bought this second hand and it wasn't labelled as to what type of alpaca, it is softer than the one below. 30 grams.

 Darker colored - same label problem - it is harsher and thicker in texture than most alpaca I have worked with. 60 grams

 Lincoln longwool - some veg, clean but unprocessed otherwise. 55 grams

 brown sheep wool roving from Wyoming. 14 grams

 Mohair roving from the same mill in Wyoming near my Grandpa's house. 16 grams

 This is Correidale sheep's wool. I was very unhappy with this purchase as there was a huge (about a pound) ball of muddy yuck in the center of the fleece, I couldn't see it at the time of purchase. There was also a ton of veg - I am very tolerant as that goes but this was excessive. I will not be buying from this farmer again. I like spinning Correidale and this is courser than many I have worked with. 18 grams.

 This is Rose fiber, it is rayon made from rose stems, it is soft and flyaway and lovely. 48 grams

 don't forget the beads!

So here we are the Mystery Spin revealed. I am excited but honestly have no clue what to do yet. Still pondering, one viewer asked me to discuss how I will be addressing the differing stable lengths  and I sure will - after I figure out what I am doing. One current thought is sort them into two strands by stable length, ply them together and then autoply beaded thread around them. But I haven't decided.
 ~Julia

Applecart

I finished spinning this yarn at Wisconsin Sheep and Wool. The first photo is me plying from under a blanket, that is Friday morning at our campsite. The wind was strong and I was cold. I was in a sweatshirt, jeans, wool socks,and the blanket. I made many cups of tea but you cannot hold tea and spin! 

The yarn is cotton, 587 yards, 3oz two ply lace weight, with a WPI of 22. I also made a mini skein which is 46 yards, chain played, and 14 WPI which is light or sport weight.

Truthfully, I didn't enjoy this spin. It had lots of veg., noils, neps, and frustration inside. The finished yarn is lovely however and my affection is growing. 

Booth shots

Some booth photos from Spring Treasures!

In Progress - 1st - Drying Time

I have been working on a
few fun things amidst the admin and the clean up work. A video will be coming out soon. This lovely Eiderwolle Sheep's wool is drying after the dyepot. This time, I used Mother Mackenzie's dyes and I LOVE the results in this wool! Hanging to dry there is a single skein on single ply soft yarn, spun thick thin with lots of air. This is my Confetti colorway.

You are getting a look into my kitchen today as the dye porch is entirely too cold to work in! -2 degrees! In fact I had to have the crock I dyed the wool in, in the house for several hours before I turned it on! After, I had waited my husband pointed out that I
could have just warmed it in cool then gradually warming water... Sigh.

I hope you like the new look for the site!

Happy Crafting and Stay Warm (or cool if you are on the flip-side!) ~Julia

Tree Butter & Forest Champagne

A new colorway for me, I am calling it Tree Butter.

This is acorn dyed Eastern Freisian wool. I bought the wool raw (ie really dirty) from the farmer. It is now washed, dyed, washed, picked, carded, and being spun up. I am really hoping that you like the colorway as much as I do.


From the same sheep we have Forest Champagne, it is dyed with Quaking Aspen leaves.

before picking

After picking

The Maw of the Dragon - aka the business end of the picker

Dangerous and painful sometimes

Preparing to card

Spinning in the green

Getting organized and planning going on here. I am also hoping to arrange a bit more time to post so you'll hear from me more often. (yes, once a month would be more often. Sorry)

Here is what I just finished working on! it is not even listed for sale yet, but boy was it fun to work on!

 Fibers are all articulated and ready to go.

 Spinning is going. This shot is about halfway through the project.

Done. Two skeins of Navajo plyed yarn. The green is brighter in person than in my kitchen, we could use some sun here, maybe spinning such a bright green will bring it out. The teal is for a knitting project. This is the first time I have spun up Targhee wool, but it will not be the last! It is soft and fluffy like merino, full of air and spins up great! At the Wisconsin Sheep and Wool Festival I bought two sheep's worth to support a junior farmer. I am so happy that I love working with it as much as I hoped. I bought this green already dyed from a very nice farmer who told me quite a bit about the breed and suggested I check out the birthing area as he was sure there were a few over there.

This momma gave birth at the festival three years running, this year to twins!

If the weather warms up (yesterday's high was 0) I will post about cleaning the wool later this week.

The connections you make

 One of the greatest treats for me as an artisan is to have someone show me how they took something I worked to create and used it for their own act of creation. I love chatting with people at the markets and shows, and of course hearing that people appreciate the work I do, but seeing the joy others get from working with my products to make something unique to them. So far I have only have two ladies show me their work, I have had people stop by to tell me how well recieved a gift purchased from me was.

Trust me, the craftspeople you see in the markets want you to not just buy our work we make, we want it to bring you joy, we want it to enrich your life. If it is a finished good we want you to love using it and remember why you brought it, who you were with, the beauty of the day and the experience of meeting the artist. If it is a supply, ingredient, or tool, we want you to use it, to touch it and have all those memories, to make with it or to make it into something that carries all those meanings with it.

So the next time you find yourself at a craft fair or farmer's market, stop by and tell them you liked the product or art work you bought, show us what you made, tell the farmer the tomatoes you bought at the end of the year made amazing tomato sauce your family enjoyed all winter, tell me your sister loved the shawl you bought her, or how much your baby enjoys crawling on the blanket. I won't be sitting there thinking "I hope she buys more" all though if you want more I won't stop you! I will be glad to know the energy, love, and work I sent out into the world is appreciated.

If you bought a skein or roving from me, I would LOVE to hear about what you made, how you liked the yarn, and what you learned while working on it! So a big thank you to this client for stopping by last week wearing the hat she made from the skein of grey scale yarn she bought two weeks before. You absolutely made my day and the hat looks great!

~Julia