The Fox Way Boys

It's time to meet the gang from Fox Way Alpacas that I have had the pleasure to visit a few times over the past couple of weeks.  From left to right we have: Kane (Raising Kane), Simon (Simon Says), Turbo, and Aiden.

Turbo is the biggest of the bunch and acts as the leader of the pack.  He's always the one keeping a look out for danger and is usually the first one to greet a newcomer to his domain.

He's technically a beige alpaca because of the smudge on his forehead, but for all intents and purposes, his fleece is just as white as Kane's.

Kane tends to be the troublemaker and is definitely the most rambunctious of the group.  I have yet to have a great deal of trouble with him, but I hear he can throw a bit of a hissy fit.  When in the shelter, he likes to hunker down by the door so he can always see what's going on outside.

Simon is a bit skittish, but has a very lovable personality.  Perhaps I just view him as a fellow introvert and leave him be.  His fleece is a beautiful black and I love the streak of white on his forehead!

And lastly we have Aiden.  Aiden, obviously, is a brown alpaca and had a stint in the show ring before moving in with the other boys.  His dad is still a showpaca (I made that word up), so for the time being he'll be staying out of the circuit, but his fleece is quite beautiful.

All four of these boys are very gentle and are a joy to be around.  It's always fun to watch them run and jump around, roll on the ground, or most often in my case, do what they can to stay away from me.  Hopefully that changes soon!

I definitely think alpacas are man's other best friend.  Who said a person can only have one?

All photos in this post are taken, with permission, from the Fox Way Alpacas Facebook page.

The Deep End

Ever since I attended the MN Alpaca Expo on a whim a month ago, I have turned into a bit of an obsessed freak when it comes to my fiber interests, and so my mission began.  I wanted to become a more knowledgeable spinner and fiber fanatic (I can't really say "fiber artist", because I mostly tend to flail around like a novice) by learning more about sheep breeds and how best to used their wool.  I wanted to learn about how animals are raised, the different climates that various animals thrive in, how best to prepare certain fibers for spinning, what the best type of yarn is for a particular project, etc. ad nauseum.  In short, I want to become proficient in my understanding of natural fibers in a way that allows me to contribute to the continued success of this industry.

A few weeks ago I heard about an event in Minnesota called Shepherd's Harvest.  It's Minnesota's Rhinebeck and I immediately and passionately exclaimed (all over Ravelry) "I WILL BE THERE!!!"

...only to discover the next day that my work schedule wouldn't allow for that to happen.  I was so crushed!  I had only just learned that this event even existed and, really, hadn't invested an exorbitant amount of time imagining what it would be like, but I felt so sad.  Luckily, my coworkers are familiar with my wool obsession eccentricities and by the sixth hour of my constant lament of how sad I was that I would have to miss this event that only occurs once a year and allows farmers to connect with those who value and understand the hard work that they put into raising these sheep and other fiber animals, not to mention the teachers who travel from all over the country and the incredible amount of knowledge concentrated into one little space and how could I possibly live with myself if I didn't somehow participate by showing my support and appreciation and... and by that sixth hour, one of my coworkers finally caved and took my shift on Sunday.

And so it was that I attended my first ever sheep and wool festival, and boy, these things do not disappoint!  (Although, somehow I forgot to take a single picture.)  My one and only goal was to buy my first fleece.  I really wasn't interested in yarn or the rainbow of dyed fiber that was available (I'm technically on a yarn diet.  It started on May 1st.  I didn't tell you.  Fiber doesn't count.)  I did a buttload of research about sheep breeds and what kind of fleece would be best for the type of fiber preparation and spinning techniques I thought I might want to use to produce a certain type of yarn.  Armed with this knowledge, I wandered the booths looking for the perfect fleece.

On Saturday there was a fleece judging and silent auction which I was not able to attend because I had a symphony concert to play, and I was certain that every last fleece worth buying would have been snatched up that day.  I am so glad that I was wrong!  I felt confident in my ability to choose a fleece that was right for me based on what I had read and watched about how to pick a fleece, what to watch out for, and so on.  I saw some beautiful fleeces, but passed on them because they weren't a breed I was looking for, they were a bit too dirty for my first fleece, the staple length was too long, the fiber was too coarse, etc.  This whole time as I wandered from booth to booth I thought to myself, "Wow, Peter.  You're being really practical and systematic about how you're choosing a fleece.  I bet this is what it's like all the time."   ...and then I walked into the next booth and was immediately drawn to one of the fleeces on the table and as soon as I felt it, I felt a wave of inexplicable intoxication much like the way one might feel when they have their first taste of the best chocolate in the world, or the first juicy strawberry of spring, or sinking into a warm bath after a long day of work.  I lost all sense and knew that, regardless of any practical reasoning, this fleece was destined to be mine.

I know that this picture is quite disappointing because it doesn't begin to demonstrate the power that this fleece had over me.  The color in real life is rich and gorgeous, the fleece itself is full, soft, and so springy that it feels like a sponge when you press into it and just by sheer luck, it also happens to be exactly what I was looking for.  It's a 5.5lb CVM (California Variegated Mutant) fleece from Crosby Hill Farm and to make things even more spectacular, the sheep was coated which means that the fleece itself is incredibly clean and free of vegetable matter and other foreign objects.  This fleece is sure to provide me with YEARS of spinning pleasure and I can't wait to begin the process.

I would have been happy to have stopped with one fleece because I was so elated to have found exactly what I was looking for, but I had made a mental note to visit the Hollyhock Alpacas booth to see what they had to offer.  The Hollyhock farm raises Huacaya alpacas (the fluffy ones) and I was curious to see a huacaya fleece because the farm I volunteer at raises Suris.  Well, it turns out I didn't just see a huacaya fleece - I took one home with me, too.

But honestly, how could I say no?  This is a cria fleece, which means that it was the alpaca's first shearing (a cria is what we call a baby alpaca.  No, I don't know why) and as I'm sure you all know, baby alpaca is soft, soft, soft!  I was so fortunate to have snatched this one up as it was their last cria fleece for sale.

I also took a three-hour spinning class on Sunday morning and although I was perhaps a little disappointed with the class overall, it did provide me with the opportunity to try a number of fibers that I had never spun before - silk, yak, cashmere, and cotton.  The yak was my favorite.

I'll be back tomorrow to introduce you guys to the four alpacas I've been spending my weekends with.  They're such charming boys, I'm sure you'll love them!

Six Little Bobbins

Six little bobbins

All in a row...

...It's time to ply

So here we go!

All About Handspun

It appears as though I have been falling in love with spinning/handspun lately.  In part I know it has to do with my trip to the Alpaca Expo and the three bags of fiber I bought there, but I also have a sneaking suspicion that it has to do with the changing seasons.  I never noticed until I got to thinking about it, but the spring and summer months tend to be my spinning months.  In fact, looking at my bin of handspun that I have made over the years, not a single skein was made during the winter.  I guess for me, winters are for knitting and summers are for spinning.  At least now I know.

Here in Minnesota, we've had a particularly slow start to our spring season.  This month alone we had snow storm after snow storm.  Here's a photo from April 19, just one week ago:

I have to tell you, working in a coffee shop where I interact with hundreds of other Minnesotans every day, it was clear that we were all using every ounce of our strength to stay sane and civil during these past few weeks.  In the fall, we mentally prepare for a long, dark, cold winter with the knowledge that on the other side will be spring.  We hunker down and get through it the best we can.  When March comes around, our longing becomes a little more desperate and with each snowfall, the complaints begin.  April hits and we know that the snow will soon be gone and we shed our emotional winter coats in place of a more hopeful, lighthearted demeanor.  So when April continues to dump inches upon inches of snow on our already fragile, now unprotected, winter-weakened emotional state, it is a little difficult to cope.  We get through winter knowing that spring is coming, but when we get to the other side to discover that there is only winter...  the anxiety, frustration, and desperation is palpable.

Thank god, then, for this weekend that has brought temperatures in the 70s, a clear blue sky, and the warm spring breeze that we have all been longing for these past six months.  And like clockwork, the changing of the seasons (and I really don't think it's supposed to happen this suddenly...) has brought me back to spinning.

Outside, even.  In fact, I was sitting at that very same picnic table that just a week ago was covered in half a foot of snow.  I never realized how relaxing it is to spin outside - I'll definitely be doing it more often.

It's well past time that I finished up this spinning project, which I started almost a year ago.  I'm very near to the finish line with only seven ounces (of 36) left to spin, resulting in the most amazing sweater yarn I have ever owned.  I am so excited to have this done, not because I'm sick of spinning it (which I am not.  I never tire of watching these colors flow through my fingers), but because it means I can move on to the next step of the process - knitting the sweater!

And it's not just the spinning wheel that has been seeing some action these days.  I even broke out one of my spindles again, which has been a lot of fun.

This particular spindle is a Kundert spindle and spins like a dream.  It is perfectly balanced and beautiful to look at and has very quickly become my new favorite.

And as if spinning wasn't enough, I've been knitting with my handspun, as well.

I showed you those wrist warmers back in February, and they're still not finished, but hopefully soon I'll have the second one done.  I'm also knitting up a lace shawl using some superwash BFL dyed and gifted to me by Anne at Wooly Wonka Fibers in her "Wood Duck" colorway.

I love the wonderful character that handspun is adding to this project.  The pattern is Miriam Felton's Mountain Peaks Shawl, which has been in my queue for years.  I think this pattern is a perfect balance of lace and simplicity to show off the yarn, which totally surprised me with its stripes.  We'll see if they continue throughout the whole project.

I've continued to submerge myself in spinning, reading what I can and watching several videos to improve my skills and understanding of the craft.  Does anybody have any recommendations for the best hand cards and combs?  And yes, I'm totally serious.  I want to take this spinning thing one step further and begin to prepare my own fiber.  I hope to at least get one Suri alpaca fleece from this year's shearing at the farm, but I'd love to prepare other fibers as well.  Any advice would be very helpful!

Until next time, stay warm and enjoy the sunshine!

Finding Greener Pastures

Well, I sure didn't last very long with my blogging resolutions, did I?  Let's do some bullet-point blogging before I get to the meat of this post.

• Not much has been happening since my last post.  The sweater is still unfinished.
• I started a lace shawl with some handspun, but I had to put that down pretty early in its development because
• I agreed to do some more sample/test knitting.  This means I can't show you what I'm working on.
• My LYS now carries BrooklynTweed yarn.  It takes every ounce of strength to not go there every day.
• Last week (two weeks ago?) I was working a later shift at the coffee shop than I normally do and discovered a secret knitting group comprised of young, hip knitters.
• They said they tend to intimidate new people because they're "serious" about their knitting.
• I said bring on the cables and leave the crying at home.
• I'm playing with a symphony again, but I still get paid more to knit than I do to play my clarinet.

Alright, now we're all caught up.  Wanna know what I did today?

I drove down to the Minnesota Alpaca Expo and hung out with these camelids!  I had seen a post on Ravelry a couple weeks back about this event and immediately took the day off of work so I could be there.  I had never gone to a fiber festival or anything of the sort and I thought it was high time I saw what all the hubbub was about.

Today the hubbub was all about alpacas.  The expo was less about fiber crafts and more about the animals themselves.  They had a halter competition (like a dog show) and there was a silent auction for live animals.  Alpaca farmers from all over the midwest showed up with their best show animals to compete for a blue ribbon.

I, however, simply showed up to see these cute faces.

As I wandered around taking an obnoxious amount of blurry pictures of alpacas looking away from me, one of the handlers asked me if I had any questions.  "No, I'm just looking..." I heard myself say.  "Wellllll, maybe just one question."  45 minutes later and I had met two local alpaca farmers and was walking away with plans to start volunteering at an alpaca farm starting next weekend!

You think wool fumes in a yarn shop are bad?  By the time I did one loop around this place I was ready to drop everything and start an alpaca farm of my own!  The next best thing to do, in my mind, is to volunteer at someone else's as much as possible.  The one I'll be visiting has 80 alpacas.  I'm so excited!

Did you know there are two different kinds of alpacas?  Huacaya alpacas are the ones I've been showing you above.  They're soft and fluffy and have shorter fibers than the second type.  Huacayas also make up 97% of the world's population of alpacas.

And just look at all the different natural colors they come in!  Be still, my beating heart.  (Full disclosure: I walked away with 8oz each of black, gray, and white fiber.  I couldn't resist.)

The second type of alpacas, the 3% that's left, are the Suri alpacas.  They have a very long staple length (the length of their fiber), which naturally forms into beautiful dreadlocks.

I apparently didn't do a very good job taking pictures of Suris.  You can see that when there are children present, the alpacas won't even give you the time of day.

Suris make up 17% of the US population of alpacas, but even so, there are less than 20,000 of them in the country and they're no longer being imported.  I'll be sure to get better pictures for you later because the farm that I plan on volunteering at?  All Suri alpacas.  I have to admit, I think they're less photogenic and look a little nerdy, but that's what makes me like them so much.

All together now:  Awwwwwwww!

Cozy

I don't have an incredible amount to share today, but I would like to show you the progress I have been making on my Staccato sweater.

See that?  It's totally almost done.  Somehow I managed to knit both sleeves and the hood over the past week and a half.  Before I had done the sleeves, I thought this sweater was going to be way too huge for me and at one point I almost scrapped it.  But now that all the pieces are done, I'm loving how comfortably roomy it is.  It's exactly what I wanted.  This is the sweater version of the baggy sweatshirts that I love so much.  (Yes, I realize I'm not the most fashionable individual out there.)

I can't wait for it to be completely finished so I can begin wearing it (although, truth be told, I've been wearing it as is all day and it is wonderful.)  I have a sneaking suspicion, however, that it will be going into hibernation again for quite a while.  I've never been very keen on all of the finishing a large piece like this demands, and there are still hundreds of ends to weave in, hems to tack down, a zipper facing to knit in, and a zipper to install.  Perhaps this sweater will be ready for next winter.  Wouldn't that be great?

My Precious

I've discovered lately that the only knitting that I have managed to do over the past few months has been very basic.  Garter stitch, stockinette, ribbing...  I think I just don't have the mental energy to focus on a project that involves colorwork, cables, or lace.  Lately I've been rediscovering the comforts of mindless knitting and today I have something truly luxurious to show you.

This, my dear readers, is the softest, most decadent knitted piece I own.  Some people may scoff and say, "Seven feet of 3x3 ribbing?  I'd rather stew in a bath of leeches than commit myself to such a project!"  I pity those people because those people will never experience the instant comfort, the true bliss that this scarf brings to one's life.

It's obviously not the pattern that makes this scarf so special - it's the yarn.  My sister and I happened upon this yarn while visiting Bella Lana in December.  In the ball this yarn didn't seem like anything special.  Sure, the colors were nice and the yarn was soft enough, but I didn't think it was anything to warrant the cost.  The samples, however, told a different story.  It was hard to believe that the scarves, hats, and fingerless mitts I was petting came from the same yarn that was wound in those balls.  Clearly the samples had gone through some magical transformation and when the shop owner bestowed upon us the secret to these scarves, my sister and I both scooped up enough to make one of our own.

The secret, if you can believe it, is to throw the entire scarf in the washing machine when you are done knitting it.  Scary, right?  Yes, it is.  60% of this yarn is merino and nowhere on the ball band does the word "superwash" ever appear.  I didn't trust my washing machine, so I decided to hand wash the scarf with a touch more agitation than usual.  I then laid it out to dry and waited for the magic to happen.  It didn't.  Nothing changed.  I waited another day.  It remained the same.

I should tell you, the shop owner did not say, "put this scarf in the washing machine on the gentle cycle with no agitation."  No, she said, "put this scarf in with a regular load of laundry.  I washed mine with jeans."  And so I did.  I put the scarf in a pillow case, tied the end shut, and threw it in the laundry with a bunch of other stuff.  Regular cycle, warm water.  I then chewed my fingernails for half an hour while the cycle ran.  Folks, that shop owner did not steer me wrong.  What I pulled out of that pillow case barely resembled what I had put in, in the best possible way.  What I pulled out was a soft, fluffy, warm scarf with a halo to die for.  A halo made up of short, soft, brown fibers that gave the color a depth that one can only dream of.  I tried to take a photo showing you the difference of an unwashed scarf (left) and washed scarf (right) to demonstrate how significant this change is.  You can't truly see how incredible the difference is, but it's a start.

Are you ready to hear what the other 40% of that fiber was?  The 40% that lent this scarf its warmth, softness, fluffiness, and depth of color?

Possum.

I made my friend a skinnier version of the same scarf and she wrapped it around her neck and praised its beauty, only to tear it off and throw it on the floor as soon as she discovered what it was made of.  She has since embraced the possum.

The yarn is Zealana Kia Ora Rimu DK and it comes from New Zealand.

I know that many of you living in North America, when I said "possum," envisioned the American Opossum and got a chill down your spine at the thought of wrapping something like that around your neck.  Just so we're on the same page, this is the American Opossum:

Photo courtesy of AndrewKantor on Flickr

I don't want to be near one of those, dead or alive, any more than you do.  The possum fiber in the Zealana yarn does not come from the American Opossum, but rather the Australian Possum, which is in no way related.  They are both marsupials, but that's about all they have in common.  This is the Australian Possum:

Photo courtesy of kooky on Flickr

See?  Not nearly as terrifying.  If you're ok with your fiber coming from a sheep, you should have no problem embracing the possum.  I can't say that I will be indulging in much more of this yarn as the carbon footprint must be gargantuan to get the yarn to the US and I don't think the animals are sheared like sheep if you catch my drift (they're invasive to New Zealand and dealt with in much the same way as brown rats may be treated in NYC), but the scarf sure is nice to have and I'm glad that something useful and beautiful was able to come from the possum.  I've said my thanks and consider this scarf an homage of sorts, providing warmth and comfort as a legacy through which the possum may live.

Thank you, dear possums, you won't be forgotten.