SPINNING DEMO

Sunday Cyndy and I – but mostly Cyndy – did a spinning demo at the Williams House overlooking Lake Wallenpaupack. The house is owned by the Wallenpaupack Historical Society.


I had some roving from the Sheep Shed Studio that I had dyed and had already spun one bobbin on my Londonderry, N H wheel that dates from around 1800. I spun a second one and plied the two bobbins during the afternoon. Cyndy showed combing wool, spinning on the great wheel and drop spindle spinning.

ROSES AND TAPE LOOM WOVEN BANDS

Many of the roses have finished blooming ahead of the Japanese beetle onslaught . We have around 27 different wild, species, antique and cold hardy roses. Most of them bloom once and early. Right now the old ramblers, Seven Sisters (?) and The Fairy, are blooming along with the wild native roses and the Canadian Explorer roses. The Japanese beetles will be along soon, but hopefully the chickens will eat some of them.

We've had a lot of rain this year and the flowers loved it. The honeysuckle wafts its fragrance all around. The climbing rose, New Dawn, looks better than it has in years as does the other pretty explorer rose whose name I can't recall at the moment. John Davis is the one with the field in the background. It is one of my favorites.

I finished the band on the Modest Lady's Inkle Loom as well as the one I had on my paddle loom and made my first inkle band into a little zippered pouch by sewing four lengths together.

Modest Lady's Inkle Loom

I just finished my first band on Fred’s version of the Modest Lady’s Inkle Loom. He made it after seeing an article in the Spinning Wheel Sleuth Handloom Supplement.

The loom is made of cherry and all the pegs screw in with threaded wooden screws. The larger peg is the tensioner which has the screw off center so it can be turned to adjust the tension.
I can sit on the sofa and work on it which is pretty neat.

Wish I could send the fragrance of these roses and peonies over the internet somehow.

Outdoors the Canadian Explorer rose, William Baffin, is in full bloom.

Gardens: flowers and veggies

Fiber pursuits have taken a back seat to the gardens lately. I took a chance - - which would have been most foolish most years - - and put out the tomatoes, eggplants and peppers which had been living on the windowsills around mid-May.

There are already tiny tomatoes on some of the plants and the lettuce and spinach look better than any we have ever grown.

The brown chick’s mother was killed by a coyote, but the chick survived. It took us over an hour to catch the little twit who kept scampering away from us in the bushes. Judy gave us the white chick to keep ours company.