Fiber Arts Friday: More Qiviut Spinning

This last week or so of Qiviut spinning has been blissful.

I was sad to be at the end of my single, but thought it looked so pretty in a cake.

It's now plied.... 1/4 ounce and 25 yards.

I haven't bothered soaking it yet... it's so soft and just the right size for my palm.  All I want to do is hold it and squish it.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday.

More Puppy Therapy

We went to visit our favorite puppies again today... they are now 6 weeks old.

This guy will be coming home with us in a few weeks.  :-)

SCOBY

Symbiotic Colony of Bacteria and Yeast

Fiber Arts Friday: Pay-it-Forward, part 3

My very first taker for the Facebook Pay-it-Forward Project was Vivian over at Bits and Pieces.

I was excited, I adore Vivian and knew instantly that I wanted to spin a yarn for her.  Then almost immediately, I was nervous.  Vivian is a prolific knitter.  She has a lot of experience with yarn.  So the voice in the back of my mind started chattering... What if my yarn isn't good enough?  What if she doesn't like it?  What if... What if... What if...?

You know... some people are just happy that you made something for them.  They don't really care about how good or bad the thing turns out to be... or at least they don't let on that they do.  We call these people Knit Worthy.  I like making things for these people.  A lot.

But Vivian.... Vivian knows what she is doing!  Vivian knows the work involved and has a keen eye.  She can recognize mistakes!  I admire, appreciate and adore Vivian.... and Vivian is really the first person I am making for who knows something about what I am making.... She knows, objectively, if it's good or not.

She is absolutely Knit Worthy, but even better, she is Spin Worthy.  :-)

I had quite a lot of a Wool+Mohair roving in my stash.  This was the very first roving I bought at the very first wool market I ever attended... Taos 2008.

I decided to spin a thinner single with the idea that the final yarn would become a 2-ply and hopefully, a balanced and consistently gauged yarn.

I think I did pretty well.  :-)

I hate finding knots in my yarn so the final result is three skeins of varying lengths totaling 269 yards and 8 ounces.

Vivian, I hope that you enjoy this yarn.  I enjoyed making it for you.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday.

Google Reader is Going Away

Hopefully (if you're a user of it) you've heard by now that Google Reader is going away.

I learned from a friend on Facebook about a week ago.  I had decided to wait to make any changes.  It looked like the other options where overwhelmed.

But then I noticed that it is gone from some menus yesterday.  It is still searchable, but I figured they'd give it a little more time.... supposedly, Reader isn't going away until July 1st.  :-/

I went back to my friend's FB post and reviewed the information that she and her friends had put up and decided to try Feedly.

The iPhone App looked promising and ended up being very easy to set up... almost instantaneous.  The PC/Chrome version was a little more challenging.  The trick is making sure you "add to Chrome."

I messed around with the settings for a while and discovered I could add a few feeds that I hadn't figured out how to add to Reader.  Reading on the iPhone marks as read on the computer and vice versa.  I'm not certain that I'm committed to Feedly, but so far I am feeling ok about it.

The visual experience on the app is quite nice.  Though I have not figured out how to comment on the mobile version of the posts... which is not a Feedly issue.  I can type it in but for some reason they are never posted, so I started going to the web version and that seems to work ok.

If you are a Google Reader user and have yet to make your decision about how to keep your subscriptions, here are a couple of posts from good sources on situations like this: Copyblogger and Mashable.

In the meantime, I offer RSS and email subscriptions on the right sidebar.  --->

Fiber Arts Friday: Spinning Qiviut

I had several questions on last week's post about Qiviut.

Qiviut is the down from a Muskox which ranges north of the Arctic Circle.

The animals are rare... from The Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook: there are only 3 farms that raise Muskox in Alaska and Alberta, Canada and some wild herds also in live in Alaska, Canada and Greenland.  The fiber sheds off in one sheet rather than smaller clumps.  One Muskox produces between 5 and 8 pounds of Qiviut per year.  The staple is between 0.5 and 6 inches with a diameter ranging between 11 and 19 microns.

Image from Wikipedia

Qiviut products can be acquired through Oomingmak, a Native Alaskan Cooperative.  I also found some on Etsy, but not much.  As my friend who (jokingly) suggested I make a Qiviut liner for my Donegal Wool Hat says, "Cashmere is an economy fiber when compared to Qiviut."

As it happens, I have a tiny bit (1/4 ounce) of roving in my stash.  This came from the Estes Park Wool Market a couple of years ago and was part of a spinning sampler that had some other wonderful, rare fibers in it.

All I can really say is, "Wow!"

It is so fine and so soft and I am carefully spinning it into a thread.

I told a friend... "Remember your first experience touching camel and how amazing that was?  Well, now that you know that, touching Qiviut for the first time is the exact same experience."

I have no firm idea of what this will become other than a two-ply yarn.  I may just skein it and pet it.  :-)

Happy Fiber Arts Friday.

A Week in Pictures

Friday Morning: I have been spreading spent hay and alpaca manure on the first garden over the winter.  The soil has warmed up enough that it seems possible to start tilling, but we're expecting snow on Saturday.

Saturday Morning:  2 inches of what became about 5 inches of accumulation before the day was over.  It never really got below freezing, so the snow was melting as it was accumulating.

Sunday Morning: fresh snow and blue skies.  The 5 inches are about half melted already.

Monday Morning: What snow?

Tuesday Morning: We were surprised by another 4 inches of the fluffy white stuff... also half melted by the time I took the photo.

Wednesday Morning:  A little frost, but the snow is gone again.

This morning, Thursday:  We had our first night that stayed above freezing in quite a while.

Theoretically I should be able to plant the early season seeds this coming weekend, but with all of the recent moisture, the ground has been too wet to do any meaningful garden preparations.

My next opportunity to do any garden preparation is Saturday, which has a forecast of rain.

I am not complaining, we need the water.  :-)

Happy Spring!