What's the hoo-ha over sleep?

Sleep is so over rated! Well it's not, I'm just very jealous of folks who are able to go to bed, fall straight asleep and then wake up refreshed each morning. Lately I go to bed shattered, toss and turn for what seems like hours, wake numerous times during the night and wake up shattered to the sound of my alarm clock.
Life is much simpler as a cat. Tiggi gets to lie about all day, finding a new spot to sleep every day and avoid any decorating even if she is on the dust sheet.




They say we should aim to get 7-8 hours of sleep but there is no single magic number, each individual is different. However, of one finds a box, one must sleep in it.




Then again, if the bath isn't being used, then it's a bed.




There's no end to the possibilities of beds for Tiggi toes. Perhaps I need to try a different bed, think outside the box.
Where's the oddest place your pet has slept?

xoxo

Sophie

New spinning project

First Monday of the month means one thing, spinning evening at the Spinning Weal in Clevedon.
Over recent months I've been spinning a super soft merino batt for a future weaving project and I finally finished it on the weekend so I had to go stash diving for tonight's project. Ages ago I won a hand dyed BFL roving by The Sassy Spinner as part of our spinning groups raffle and decided to make a start on it tonight.




The colour way is Moorland and the base fibre is oatmeal BFL. The oatmeal base really makes the colours deep and heather like and it's a nice fibre to spin.




I want to keep the colours together as much as possible so I'm trying to spin it thinly and then I'll n-ply it to hopefully end up with a 4 ply or DL yarn. At the moment I have no final plans for the yarn, but who normally does at this stage?!?

xoxo

Sophie

Giving love to the unloved room

I moved into my house about 10 years ago and every room has bee redecorated since expect for my bedroom. As B&Q say, it really is the unloved room in the house and it's been long overdue for some TLC.
I visited B&Q a month or so ago and got a number samples from the huge range and when I got home I whittled them down to 2 but in my head I already knew which one I wanted, obviously it wasn't the cheaper one!
I did the complete room from ceiling to the walls to the wood work. This was the first time I'd ever wallpapered and think I did ok.













I'm so pleased with it and will enjoy my room once more.

xoxo

Sophie

Graduation parade

I'm so proud of my big sister. Today she graduated from her open university foundation degree in paramedic sciences and we went up to Manchester for her presentation.




She has worked so hard over the last 4 years and I'm really pleased for her.




Listening to the vice chanceller speak was inspired and going to give some serious thought into doing a course. I just need to think what I would like to study, should I go for a subject that interests me on a personal level or one that would help me in my career?
xoxo
Sophie

Blending samples

A few months ago my local spinning group held a blending day where members brought along their drum carders, hackles, hand carders, combs and lots of fibre to play with. The purpose of the day was to give us the chance to learn and inspire each other.
I thought it was an ideal opportunity to create samples for each method of blending so I can refer back to them in the future when deciding on my projects.

Straight up Rovings

I spun my 2 singles alternating the blue and white roving them plied them together. The end result was a nice smooth yarn which was barber pole in some places and solid colours in others. Due to the fibres being all aligned I did find that the fibre can run away from you if you're not paying attention.

Hackle

I enjoyed using the hackle and it produced a nice blended roving which when spun and plied created a smooth yarn similar to the rovings without the colours being too seperate.

Hand Carders

The beauty of using hand carders is that you can easily see whether or not you need more of a particualar colour to get the result you are looking for. As the fibres are aligned differently, it's easier to spin from these little rolags without the fibre running away from you. The finished yarn is fluffy and full of air.

Drum Carded & spun in lengths

Similar to blending on the hand carders, you can easily see if you want to add more of a particular fibre and if you want a more blended finished you can card the batt more than once. It is possible to diz the batt into strips or you can split it by hand, both gives a nice airy yarn and I have since used this technique to create thick singles.

Drum Carded and spun from the fold

I personally wasn't a fan of spinning from the fold as I found I ended up with a clump of fibre in my hand each time. This may be more related to my technique and inexperience with spinning in this manner so will have to try it again in the future. The end result was very similar to spinning in strips.

I enjoyed each method of blending fibres however my favourite at the moment is spinning batts that have been stripped/dizzed into lengths. I like the finished airy yarn is produces and allows me to have better control at the wheel. The only draw back is that you can get nepps in the batt, but they are easily removed during spinning if you don't like them.

Hope you have enjoyed reading my Woolly Wednesday post!
xoxo
Sophie

Crazy Cat Lady

In life there are three kinds of people, cat people, dog people and those who like neither. I'm a cat person, loud and proud I'm a crazy cat lady. Not sure if I can be called that with just one cat but I have associations with many more which count in my eyes.
My one and only cat is Tiggi

Time to trim the lavender

Every year my lavender bush creeps over the front path denying access to the house unless you're willing to get a hug from it. I've been waiting for ages for the bees to stop buzzing on the pretty purple flowers so I can start the yearly trim.
A couple of weeks ago the bees starting to go away and the flower heads started to turn into plump seed heads screaming pick me. Out I went with my trusty secateurs and trimmed off enough stalks to make these 3 bundles of gorgeous lavender.




Since the first trim the weather went abit down hill and it was too wet to continue the trim. Friday was a good sunny day which gave the flowers time to dry off ready for me to carry on cutting Saturday afternoon. I managed to make another big bundle and three cut little bundles which are hanging in my front porch to dry out. The porch now makes me look like an apothecary from years gone by drying my herbs.
There are no specific plans for all this dried lavender, from last years batch I made this cute sheepy to hang on one of my spinning wheels.




I may have to make some siblings for her this year. In the meantime the lavender bundles will be hung to dry and then put in my fibre stash cupboard to ward off pesky moths.
xoxo
Sophie