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Wool Gathering

Wool Gathering

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This past weekend, my husband and I went to pick up 200# of wool and took it to the processing plant. This is the wool that I will be using to build a yurt this summer. It was really exciting to get started on this project.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAWe got up early on Saturday morning and drove to Florence, MT which is about 3 hours from our house. We arrived and the little white trailer is where the wool we were buying was stored. We loaded it on to our trailer and strapped it all down.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAHere are a few of the sheep that were on Suzanne’s farm.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAMost of the wool is this dark color. This is either a Targee or Black Welsh breed of sheep.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAThe dogs wanted to get in on the act, so here is Suzanne trying to calm them down a bit.

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All of the bags of wool were labeled with the sheep name for the fleece. This is Sophie and there was also Elmo and Ernie and a few others I have forgotten.

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Here’s some of the darker wool. I got a mix of Targee, Black Welsh, Romney and BFL.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAThen we took off for Hall, MT. We had to make a stop for a cargo net to go over the tarp as we were afraid all the wool was going to blow away. Once it was strapped down more tightly, we were back on the road to Hall. After another one and half hours of driving we arrived at Sugar Loaf Wool Mill.

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Here I am helping to unload the wool from the trailer. It was cold and windy.

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Once we got inside, Ed weighed all the bags of wool. We had 206#.

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Here’s Sue and her assistant adding up the wool amounts.

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Here is the carder and it is really huge. Ed was really nice and turned on the carder to make a batt that will be similar to the ones I will be getting back. The videos below show the carder at work. I wasn’t able to edit the videos because I need a better editing program but I think they are worth watching if you haven’t seen a big carder running before. The videos are fairly short and the last one shows Ed cutting the batt off the carder.

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This is a rolling felting machine that Ed built himself. I need one of these 🙂

Focus in 2012

Focus in 2012

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Last year, instead of making goals, I chose a word for the year. I saw this first on Christine Kane’s blog and she explains about choosing a word in her post Resolution Revolution.  I like that the word you choose is related to everything in your life as it is about “being” instead of “doing”. Keeping one word in the forefront of your thoughts is much easier than trying to remember a list of resolutions. Last year, my word was “choose”. I did get a lot done last year in relation to my fiber arts, I was happy with the choices I made and I want to keep moving forward in that same vein. While I was looking at the list of possible words that I might choose for 2012 on Christine’s blog, I came across several that spoke to me. I wrote those words down and my list included clarity, focus, mastery and discipline.  After I looked at these words for a few minutes, it seemed to me that all four of the words fit under the word focus. Focus has several meanings including the center of interest, to adapt to the prevailing light and become able to see clearly, to concentrate or to think about closely. So for the coming year, I will be thinking about focus and how that relates to fiber art.

Vision Quest

I also have a list of intentions that I want to accomplish during the year. I’m not sure how I’ll get them all done but I’m sure if I focus…

  • Continue the Level II Hand and Machine Stitch course
  • Promote my book when it comes out in August
  • Begin teaching felting classes at a local yarn store
  • Investigate future teaching possibilities (felting/fiber art) at the local community college
  • Mentor artists through the Montana Arts Council program at the store about the business of art
  • Participate fully in our new virtual studio The Felting and Fiber Studio
  • Continue exploring the combination of hand and machine stitching with felting
  • Begin making video fiber art tutorials (which I’m sure will involve more than I think it will)
  • Learn more about Photoshop and use it more frequently
  • Continue to explore surface design including more eco-printing with leaves with my local group
  • Begin researching and planning for The Yurt Project

Now if you were paying attention, you might be saying “What yurt project?” I have really wanted to make a yurt  in the traditional way with a felt covering for a long time. It will be a ton of work and I’m sure I won’t get it all done this year. But I’m going to start working on it this year. I have already gotten some books from the library and my hubby is going to help with the frame construction. I may see if I can involve some school groups or civic organizations and teach more people about felting. The idea is still brewing but I’m excited about moving forward.

What are your plans for 2012? I’d love to hear about them.


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