I do gently chug along with all the usual fibre pursuits. It is just that at the moment, there is nothing particularly noteworthy in the pipeline. I did manage to finish the Guild Challenge project (although not to actually photograph it, and as I am writing this with Barni on my lap, I don't want to disturb him to go and do it now. It is unremarkable, but somewhat to my surprise not only functional but I actually quite like it.
The project was "something for the head"; the fibre was some less than remarkable White-faced Woodland, made even less appealing by being drum carded. I dyed his deep burgundy, mine a bright mid-blue. I looked at the yarn, and thought, well, what the blazes am I going to do with this.....
But I also had two lots of very nice yarn spun from blends I had been given at SOAR, one a beige plus a little glitter, the other cream. Those two managed to salvage the project. I decided to make a long cowl that would pull over my head when needed, and just did stripes, mostly of one row of colour with a few blocks for variety. It worked!
I can't remember if I ever recorded the fact that the AH class has been ailing. Lots of reasons for this, I think, and difficult for me to address. Over the recent months, quite a few classes had been cancelled, and it was getting to be quite a problem planning the class, gathering supplies and then not being able to go ahead. Did I skip that topic, or just move it over to the next month? Keeping the programme, and our diary straight was becoming a bit of a logistical nightmare. So, rightly or wrongly, in conjunction with TPTB, we decided to reduce the frequency of the class and go to one every three months.
Looks like that was the wrong decision. December has always been a favourite one on the calendar, but numbers were way, way down, with a distinct dearth of the usual suspects. (Although it is fair to say that the Hall was empty apart from us and in the afternoon a group of ladies in for some event and afternoon tea....such a sad and worrying state of affairs.)
Don't get me wrong, we had a good day! Lots of productive sampling, enjoyable chat, and a good Festive lunch of the usual, with a goats cheese and cranberry tart for the veggies. We even had a mince pie at tea time instead of the biscuits we have been reduced to!
Now next up - one week tomorrow, we are off on our travels again. To Mexico. Coincidently for Christmas, which will be very unusual and interesting, but mostly to meet up with dear friends from California and to explore the weaving dyeing and other traditional crafts of the Oaxaca area. We should have internet access while we are there, so I hope I can do on the spot as well as retrospective reporting. I have to admit to being a bit nervous about it as it is rather outside our comfort zone. We don't speak Spanish - fortunately, our friends do!
And finally. One other small FO. I had designed a cowl/neck warmer/whatever on the needles, found it rather too big, and thrown it in to the washing machine to see if I could reduce the size a bit. It also worked! I like the basic idea, but both the design and the execution need a bit of work. This would have had a phot on Flickr, but Flickr refused to co-operate, so .......
Next post, the Festival of the Radish, maybe......
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