Taos goodies
G'day all!
The stress continues here in Fort Collins. The other job offer is proceeding and they are trying to get us into a visa interview ASAP. To do the visa interview, we have to leave the US. This means Mexico or Canada. Much as I would like to go to Canada, the wait is 43 days for an interview whilst in Mexico it is 2 days. DH has been inspiring me with stories of this particular town in Mexico, so looks like we will be going to Toronto instead. We know people who live just outside To, and I "know" some bloggers who live in To. If we go to Toronto, we are unlikely to leave until after Christmas as Nathan's parents are coming here and then to Toronto around Christmas, so maybe their plans change again.... If all goes well, the new job wants Nathan to start early in the New Year.
So to distract ourselves from fussing, let's look at goodies. The goodies I got at Taos.
An ounce of polypay top. We don't have polypay in Oz.
And some cormo (*American* cormo, no less, LOL cos the New Zealand stuff must be lacking somehow, but then again Americans believe all their stuff is The Best) roving. We don't have sheep called cormos either.
Some really pretty Crayon roving from Fiber Fanatic in Texas - no website alas but I do have her email if you want it. She uses fleece from Tx, NM and Co sheep.
(can you tell I like this one?)
The local coloured fleece sheep breeders had a tent of absolutely luscious fleeces. I could've walked away with about $300 of them but alas, I had forgotten the cheque book and they didn't take visa so I had to make do with the cash on hand. Probably just as well given Monday's news....
Some luscious CVM fleece. I was looking at a number of fleeces from this dealer. All of them were coated and the coats had not been changed often enough so the tips were a bit matted/sticky. Plus a few of the fleeces had scurf in them - large chunks of scurf obvious enough to be seen in the raw fleece. In my experience that is not very common. So I showed one of the scurfy fleeces to Nathan so he knows what to look out for if he ever is looking at a fleece for me. "Look at this! You don't often see this in a raw fleece. See this funny stuff? That is scurf, sheep dandruff. It means that a mite or something got into the sheep and made it itchy." Thank heavens that is all I said, and not that that amount of scurf indicates poor husbandry, cos the shepherd of that particular flock was standing right next to me! Quelle horreur! How embarrassment! Still, I don't expect to find scurf in a spinner's fleece, not much of it. If the sheep are lawnmowers well I don't expect much of the fleece, but if a sheep is raised for its fleece for handspinning, I expect a much better fleece.
Anyway, my fleece is *verra* nice. You can see the silver and moorit colours in the dirty locks. I've washed it now and it is all soft and puffy and wonderful. It is very silvery with a little beigey colour in it, not that dissimilar to the dirty fleece! Can't wait to spin some up!
This lovely Australian Bond fleece from Gleason's Fine Woolies. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm..... It has been a pita to get dry - it is very fine but doesn't have a fine crimp and likes to clump onto itself. I've been fluffing locks out for two days now. I wish I could've bought another fleece that was a lovely chocolate brown. This one is a sort of grey/silvery brown. It is another coated fleece and has very little VM in it.
Plus a yummy "Kev's Korner" Shetland fleece from a sheep called Ginger. It has a few gingery coloured hairs in it. Now that I have washed the fleece, some of the locks pull out to about 20cm - from my fingertips to the base of my hand. I can't wait to get into this one either!
I will be fluffing some of this fleece up and selling some as I have lots of fleece now and will need $$$ more than I need this much fleece! I will see if I can get some of it to Oz quarantine standards - no VM whatsoever. It should be pretty easy with some of the fleece....
Yarn? What is this thing you call yarn? There was lots of lovely yarn there but given a small budget and the choice of processing fleece from scratch or buying yarn pre-made, I seem to go for fleece. I can make LOTS of stuff from a fleece but not much from a skein of yarn.
(Whilst I am excited about my acquisitions at Taos, I'm feeling blasted peeved cos I've realised that for the second year in a row, my birthday is going to be pathetic, present-wise. This year we will be on such a budget that I will be lucky to get a card, let alone the little spending spree I wanted on Amazon and say the Loopy Ewe and (yet another fleece from Black Pines Sheep). Whinge, grizzle moan. Wail. Sniffle.)
Next time, I hope, some pics of the festival and talk about Taos itself.
anon!
The stress continues here in Fort Collins. The other job offer is proceeding and they are trying to get us into a visa interview ASAP. To do the visa interview, we have to leave the US. This means Mexico or Canada. Much as I would like to go to Canada, the wait is 43 days for an interview whilst in Mexico it is 2 days. DH has been inspiring me with stories of this particular town in Mexico, so looks like we will be going to Toronto instead. We know people who live just outside To, and I "know" some bloggers who live in To. If we go to Toronto, we are unlikely to leave until after Christmas as Nathan's parents are coming here and then to Toronto around Christmas, so maybe their plans change again.... If all goes well, the new job wants Nathan to start early in the New Year.
So to distract ourselves from fussing, let's look at goodies. The goodies I got at Taos.
An ounce of polypay top. We don't have polypay in Oz.
And some cormo (*American* cormo, no less, LOL cos the New Zealand stuff must be lacking somehow, but then again Americans believe all their stuff is The Best) roving. We don't have sheep called cormos either.
Some really pretty Crayon roving from Fiber Fanatic in Texas - no website alas but I do have her email if you want it. She uses fleece from Tx, NM and Co sheep.
(can you tell I like this one?)
The local coloured fleece sheep breeders had a tent of absolutely luscious fleeces. I could've walked away with about $300 of them but alas, I had forgotten the cheque book and they didn't take visa so I had to make do with the cash on hand. Probably just as well given Monday's news....
Some luscious CVM fleece. I was looking at a number of fleeces from this dealer. All of them were coated and the coats had not been changed often enough so the tips were a bit matted/sticky. Plus a few of the fleeces had scurf in them - large chunks of scurf obvious enough to be seen in the raw fleece. In my experience that is not very common. So I showed one of the scurfy fleeces to Nathan so he knows what to look out for if he ever is looking at a fleece for me. "Look at this! You don't often see this in a raw fleece. See this funny stuff? That is scurf, sheep dandruff. It means that a mite or something got into the sheep and made it itchy." Thank heavens that is all I said, and not that that amount of scurf indicates poor husbandry, cos the shepherd of that particular flock was standing right next to me! Quelle horreur! How embarrassment! Still, I don't expect to find scurf in a spinner's fleece, not much of it. If the sheep are lawnmowers well I don't expect much of the fleece, but if a sheep is raised for its fleece for handspinning, I expect a much better fleece.
Anyway, my fleece is *verra* nice. You can see the silver and moorit colours in the dirty locks. I've washed it now and it is all soft and puffy and wonderful. It is very silvery with a little beigey colour in it, not that dissimilar to the dirty fleece! Can't wait to spin some up!
This lovely Australian Bond fleece from Gleason's Fine Woolies. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm..... It has been a pita to get dry - it is very fine but doesn't have a fine crimp and likes to clump onto itself. I've been fluffing locks out for two days now. I wish I could've bought another fleece that was a lovely chocolate brown. This one is a sort of grey/silvery brown. It is another coated fleece and has very little VM in it.
Plus a yummy "Kev's Korner" Shetland fleece from a sheep called Ginger. It has a few gingery coloured hairs in it. Now that I have washed the fleece, some of the locks pull out to about 20cm - from my fingertips to the base of my hand. I can't wait to get into this one either!
I will be fluffing some of this fleece up and selling some as I have lots of fleece now and will need $$$ more than I need this much fleece! I will see if I can get some of it to Oz quarantine standards - no VM whatsoever. It should be pretty easy with some of the fleece....
Yarn? What is this thing you call yarn? There was lots of lovely yarn there but given a small budget and the choice of processing fleece from scratch or buying yarn pre-made, I seem to go for fleece. I can make LOTS of stuff from a fleece but not much from a skein of yarn.
(Whilst I am excited about my acquisitions at Taos, I'm feeling blasted peeved cos I've realised that for the second year in a row, my birthday is going to be pathetic, present-wise. This year we will be on such a budget that I will be lucky to get a card, let alone the little spending spree I wanted on Amazon and say the Loopy Ewe and (yet another fleece from Black Pines Sheep). Whinge, grizzle moan. Wail. Sniffle.)
Next time, I hope, some pics of the festival and talk about Taos itself.
anon!
Your crayon fleece is beautiful. I'm glad to hear DH's job is moving forward but appalled at the hoops you have to jump through re: visas. I hope and pray things work out for you both.
ReplyDeletedid they turf him? barsteds!
ReplyDeletesend me your addy, and i'll send you a birthday card!
Very very nice. You've chosen some beautiful fleece.
ReplyDeleteHope the visa thingy goes smoothly, just remember to keep breathing :)
ReplyDeleteBTW, Cormos were developed in Tassie:
http://www.woolfurnishings.com/inforoom/sheep/crossbreed.html
Take care
You have some nice fleece and the crayon roving looks fun!
ReplyDeleteThat's too bad about the visa stuff. I hope everything works out.