Heather and Anneruth met at Heather’s place in the eastern city of the castle, Edinburgh, whilst the Galgael gang was cooking in a castle west of kil-bridie!
Heather had cooked a lovely meal for us two, and had to wait for ages, nearly starving to death because AR was late as usual :-)
We spent most of the afternoon and evening together, carding, spinning and singing, and listening to a CD with Fionn telling the Bridgit story, and exploring Heathers still unused weaving equipment, her new warping frame and the 2 shaft old table loom, that Colin gave her.
Heather had been fantastically busy in the last weeks, dyeing (loose) wool with indigo, cochenille, logwood and spinning it into both fine and chunky yarns. With the chunky yarn she knitted a number of woolly hats in a very simple pattern. The fine wool is getting ready for other knitting projects or for selling per skein.
When spinning the blue wool on her most treasured Hebridean wheel, Heather sung the most beautiful Gaelic spinning song she had composed herself......
Anneruth tried her hand on the chunky spin Country wheel with her Hebridean wool – not as easy as it looks, esp if one is not used to 2 treads. Will need much more practise! Plus batts carded on closer set drum carder. ..?
More pics on everything can be seen on the album. (email Ruth if you have props accessing the online album)
Heather knits these great thick hats on single ply of the chunky wool, sometimes doing one row in one blend and then the next in another colour, alternating.
The warping frame got unwrapped at last and looks simple and strong (must ask Davy to maybe make one of the kind?), = easy transportable as 4 rods of wood.
Heather then got the table loom out which Colin gave her, and we had a look at what needed mending (such as the reed-beater wood structure is cracked) and what kind of density of threads per inch the loom could do, and what kind of handspun threads could be used for that.
Here Heather is trying out her spun strong soya fibre on a cardboard gauge to text the weave set that would give (I think the reed gave 6 p.i.)
Meanwhile Anneruth did a bit more weaving on her little loom with the silk scarf (Chinese silk warp. 6 p.i, and 2ply hand-spun mulberry silk)
We had a great time, late night, and a real wool crafty day for our Imbolc (candle light and all!)
Heather is planning to come through to the wool craft group in Glasgow next week, and bring one of her wheels.
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