Category Archives: tiny wool house

woodshedding

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This summer I decided to wood-shed in the tiny (wool) house, which is a little walk into the woods (beyond Juno), and spend the days in the company of some primitive hand tools like drop spindle, hand carders, and a dye pot. I have been dyeing up a lot of wool in the tiny dye kitchen, experimenting with colors to call my own, re-inventing the wheel in so many ways. Most of all I think that I love this space for what I can achieve with short light photography.

At times I am exhausted of my obsessions, and I worry that I am just a dilettante. But heading into the dog days of summer I dive deeper into refining my creative pursuits, as I try to convince myself that textiles are not just a hobby, but a way of life. I am relishing the isolation, the hours of silence, the palpable feel of time, as I keep walking down to the tiny wool house, two or three times a day, sometimes just to think.

June is almost over and even if I haven’t made any significant finishes to show for the last couple of months, at least I’ve put together a hodgepodge post about some of the tweed tests I’ve been working on.

Tweed Chronicles: Speed Tweed #2

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In a recent post I began my Speed Tweed experiments, combining an earthy mossy sage toned dyed braid along with undyed wool rovings, attempting to simplify the steps in creating a varied tweedy yarn (which is spun by the way, more on that project is forthcoming). I’m loving the drum carder and speed tweed so much I am racing on to Speed Tweed #2, blending hand pulled tufts off the end of three roving in equal amounts, placed into the carder, and I really love this color combination so much! Its gotten to the point where I just walk down to the tiny (wool) house, make coffee, and get to blending on the new drum carder, for no other reason than I’m in a wool carding mood. I’ll show off these blended batts in another separate photo wool nests and the spun yarn in another post.

♣     ♣     ♣

Techy stuff for Speed Tweed #2:

My summer fields: carding.

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I’ve been busy since the resident carder came earlier this week, down in the tiny (wool) house, raking through the fleece that, after washing it twice, and putting through the box picker twice, I gave up on it as it still had way too many weedy bits, still smelled bad, and was still greasy. The last thing I need is a moth attracting sweater in my wardrobe, so, after cleaning the greasy grime that was fast accumulating on my brand new Ashford carder, I started over blending color with commercial white corriedale/merino top roving I had on hand, and added still more marigold, honey, and dark caramel hues.

However, I made the mistake of pulling off the rolags from the last carding without test-spinning ~~ I am so out of practice ~~ no recipe, just improvising, honing my instincts, and from this point forward it is going to be what it wants to be. I am planning on this first sweater in my wardrobe, to wrap me in the warm memories of golden summer fields all winter long. As I changed course in the middle of carding, I have no idea how much all these rolags weigh, but I’m guessing well over 600g . . . and now for the spinning!

See all posts in this series My Summer Fields Project

Tiny (wool) house.

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Those of you who have been following my blog since at least four years ago do not need to be reminded about what the tiny house is.

But for those who don’t know; after the wildfire Jeff, me, and our dog Emma lived in it while our house was being rebuilt, then Jeff’s daughter stayed in it during the pandemic. It has been vacant now for a couple of years, spiders having it all to themselves, and having become weathered from the elements, I cleaned it up and decided to inhabit it for the purpose of wool processing, and carding!

While fresh air blows through all the open windows through the entire summer, the place is feeling wonderfully clean, neutral, and cozy, and so I am making plans as I await the arrival of the Ashford drum carder, due in a few weeks from New Zealand. I have pulled out the box picker and decided to get a head start picking the fleece mentioned in last post.

I was rather surprised in myself to purchase the drum carder, as I really just didn’t think about how it would create dirt and dust in the house from carder fly-off, especially with home-grown wools, so it became evident a shed would be needed, then I remembered about the tiny house, it just called to me!

Such a sweet place to ponder in the afternoon, a short walk from the house, down in the charcoal forest, and having spent some hours in it today, mostly cleaning and then bringing down the wool picker … I made a cup of coffee, wrote down ideas, and picked wool. I very much enjoyed the warm and inviting personality of this space, remembering its womb-like feel. Anyway, I am hopeful that I can do something special with the tiny (wool) house, things happen for a reason, and well, here I am.