Fiber Monday - Catching up

It's been a while since I posted my fiber activities. This is mainly because I had nothing to show because I had done very little. Not for lack of interest, but I just couldn't seem to get myself motivated. 

I think I got stuck on one thing and couldn't get over that to do much of anything. What was that one thing? Finishing weaving the napkins I've been fiddling with for months now. If you remember, I made a mistake in calculating the length of warp I needed to measure and only did as third as much as I needed. So I left a bit on so I could tie on the longer warp without rethreading.

Measuring the correct length and tying it on was the thing that stopped me from doing much of anything.  Just that, and it wasn't even something terribly difficult. Brains are weird sometimes.

Last week I ended up with very little by way of horse business, so instead of sitting around feeling sorry for myself, I decided to see it as a benefit to work on getting on with the weaving I had been ignoring. I knew from experience that when I got busier again, I would kick myself for not making use of that free time. I just had to make a start. 

It's really all it took. After procrastinating for far too long, I measured the correct warp in an afternoon. I am now nearly done tying it on. 

I will easily finish tomorrow because this is all I have left. 

(I just have that little bit on the right attached to the bit of weaving.)

Then I can start weaving again and finally finish this project. I am extremely ready to be working on something else. 

This has also allowed me to begin work on other things. The weather is temperate, so it's time to wash fleece again. I have four pounds of Shetland and five pounds of merino to wash. I started with the Shetland because it's a little more forgiving. 

Dirty fleece in its first soak 

Clean and doing a little drying in the sun

Of course, now that I have more clean fleece, I have material to do more dying, so that's what I did. First I just tried out a couple of colors from the dyes my adult children gave me for Christmas.

I hadn't worked with Shetland before, so I was curious how it would comb up. Oh my goodness! I love this wool!! It is so soft and easy to work with, and the little nests of combed top are so light and soft and fluffy. I can't wait to try to spin it.  See?

Then I decided to play with a little color mixing.

On the left is the grey-blue color from the earlier photo. I decided to try adding some turquoise blue to see what it would do. The middle is 75% grey/25% turquoise and the right is 50% of each. Once I get more fleece washed, I'll do 25% grey/75% turquoise and all turquoise. The photo doesn't really do justice to how interesting these colors are. 

I'm also hoping in the next couple of weeks to have a finished knitting project to show you. I'm pretty close. 

The moral of this story? Just do the thing you are avoiding. It's rarely as difficult or time consuming as it seems and you will feel so much better in all aspects of life.