Looking Good!

Does this look like a retired 20 year old horse to you?

Good boy, Reggie.

I just might steal you away from David.

How come our oldest horse is working while the youngsters

are hanging around mooching treats?

David, Gossamer, Boomer, Bob, Ben

Dye Day

You know how kids neglect their homework so they can play on the computer?  Well, I've been neglecting my computer so I can play with my homework!  I had to spin 12 little skeins for the last day of Beginning Spinning.

I tried to make two different weights of yarn. I used rolags I made from fleece for nine of the skeins, and batt for the other three.  Spinning from fleece was easier for me.  I need much more practise with batt, lol!  My favorite skein turned out to be one I made just for fun from leftovers.

Homework complete, off to class I went.  We simmered our yarns in three different mordants (The minerals that fix dye to the fiber).  From top to bottom, that's our yarns after simmering in copper, alum and tron.

Then our yarns went into the dye pots of black walnut hulls, bloodroot, cochineal, and onion skins.  Here's my finished skeins, arranged by dye and mordant.

From left to right, that's black walnut hulls with alum, black walnut hulls with copper, black walnut hulls with tron, and so on.

For our final project, we each sprinkled fleece with a different commercial dye.

I think of this as our "unity fleece".  Won't that be fun to spin?

I loved class.  I loved learning something new, I loved spinning, and I loved the ladies in my class.  It was so much fun.

Next post we return to all things ranch!

We Ran Away from Home

Oh yes we did!  David and I ran away from home to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary.  Rey, Jen and superdog Rocky stayed at the ranch for us, and we went to Boulder.  Boulder is a great place to enjoy a little bit of city, and a whole lot of beautiful country.

The Flatirons, from our room,

and the Flatirons under construction

(tee hee hee)

For the city portion of our trip, we strolled Pearl Street Mall, famous for its street performers.  There were two bands with washboards, and while the Hokum High Rollers may have had the better sound,

who could resist a boy band featuring a guitar playing, harmonica blowing,  foot-tambourine playing singer, as well as a washboard playing, garbage pail drummer?  I'm giving the nod to the Tumbleweed Wanderers!

But wait, there's more!  Contortionists!  Jugglers!

etc, etc.

This is about all I could watch of these guy,

 and they were just warming up.

No city trip would be complete without some fine dining.

  The city was fun, but we were ready for some country.

We spent some time exploring the mountains, and we did a little light hiking in Chautauqua Park (click it to learn more).  We both love Chautauqua.  Back when David was getting his doctorate at the University of Colorado, he was a runner.  One of his favorite routes was from campus to the trails in this beautiful park.

It was a wonderful trip.



Happy Anniversary, us!!!