MY BANANA IS FAMOUS!

Last week I went to the Knitting & Stitching Show at Ally Pally - I haven't been for about 5 years, and hadn't intended to put myself in the way of temptation this year. Then I agreed to a request for people to cover the stand for the Association of Guilds of Weavers, Spinners & Dyers which came up - followed with a 'by the way can you demonstrate?' Well I always demonstrate spinning when on a guild event, so I said yes, of course - then received an email showing me where 'the stage' was ....... oh that kind of demo! When I arrived I found that actually 'the stage' was a desk in front of a handful of benches, so it wasn't really very scary.

I wanted to talk about the possibility of spinning if you own no tools - so started with hand twining, and moved on to how to create a drop spindle from things you might find around the house - making my point with a banana, a knitting needle and a rubber band - it worked enough (just) - I've spun on a better banana, and actually an apple or a potato generally work better - but it got a laugh, and hopefully made people aware of just how low tech spinning can be.

I was surprised that I enjoyed the show so much - I'd forgotten how inspiring it is - I loved the Sophie Digard exhibition & was completely in awe of the amount of work that goes into her pieces and the wonderful use of colour - so much better seen in the real world, than in photos on-line - where it's hard to appreciate the amount of detail in each piece.

I heard that someone was spinning exciting, sparkly yarn from wonderful batts in the main hall and wandered over to see her and her lovely sparkly fibre at Spin City - we had a lovely informative chat which finished 'oh you're the lady with the banana!' which amused me no end. Then yesterday a knit friend on Facebook posted a link to a blog saying 'have you seen this?' - and there I was on 'The Twisted Yarn' - with my banana. So there you go - never underestimate the power of a banana.

I realised that not having been to the show for a while, I appreciated it much more - it seemed fresh and exciting again. It was lovely to focus on the exhibitions and the people - lots of chat - exhausting but fun.

Dunmow Christmas Tree Festival and Craft Fair

This weekend there's a Christmas Tree Festival being held in my local town and a friend & I were invited along to demonstrate hand spinning.

Yesterday we went along for a day of spinning and chatting - all very enjoyable. We started at 10am and were immediately surrounded by children from the local schools who were fascinated by what we were doing - especially when we told them we were spinning dog fur!

In fact we were both spinning Samoyed fur which spins into a beautiful white fluffy yarn. We had a selection of samples on the table - including German Shepherd hats, Newfoundland scarves and little samples of Poodle, Labradoodle, Bichon Frise, Border Collie and others.

We were there for 6 hours - spinning fairly continuously - when I got home I measured the 2ply yarn I'd spun and plied, and it was 82m in length, and weighed 30g (approx 1 oz) which means it would be approx 328m per 100g or roughly a 4ply weight yarn.

I took photos of the chrismas trees on my mobile - if I can work out how I'll post them here later.

The Samoyed Rally

On Sunday a friend & I went to Potten End for a Samoyed Rally and fun day. We arrived early to set up, and were immediately greeted by the sound of excited sammies! The first ones we saw were in a heap at the entrance - one on top of the cage and two inside.

We each received a big bag of fur to spin and got straight to work - my it's lovely stuff - pure white and soft and fluffy.

The day went off well with lots of competitions - many of which were very entertaining to watch, like the sausage competition where the dogs had to fetch a sausage and carry it back to the start line - the winner was the dog who had the most sausage (or any sausage) left!

The owners of the dogs at the rally were very interested in our spinning, and we had a lovely day talking to them. Many wanted to buy things made from Samoyed fur, or even just the yarn - sadly, as it was our first time, we didn't have anything available for them - maybe next time.

The rally was organised and run by Linda Brasier who organises a rescue centre for neglected Samoyeds - where people have bought dogs not understanding what is involved in keeping them. There were some awful stories, but, in this case, all with happy endings. This largely explains the excitement of the dogs, as they've all come back to their rescue home - and many of them know one another. Having said that - it was suggested that they are 'talkative', and there certainly wasn't a quiet moment the whole day! even when the rain came down for about half an hour. But they are beautiful, happy dogs and it was great to see them having fun with their owners.