kitty: Maryland Sheep and Wool 2007

Maryland Sheep and Wool 2007
click to see larger photo
Jacob Sheep	Rows of Roving	Lily needed them both	It is all about sheep
Electric Spinners	Bobbin Lace	Hand made wheels made by a craftsman who makes musical instruments	To table or not that is the question
Its all about the animals or should be		Mia making a new friend	Book Chakra Spinning wheels
Hi!	Harper's Fairy		a cute chair
"Knit Buddies in Action" We both so wanted this Great Wheel. It is just an amazing piece of equipment and workmanship. It really made you feel like a spinner. Though MG had to help me get the wheel started as I spun off the quill.
The Good: loved ones, good friends, cute animals, amazing hand made looms and wheels, natural dyes, yarns, roving, perfect weather, LOVED the Navajo Booth that was new this year, just all and all fiber goodness The Bad: each year it seems to becomes more commercialized and you start to see the same things in lots of the booth, acrylic yarn shouldn't be allowed, absents of the small farmers who bring there goods, not a lot of natural dyes goods (One vendor who I bought from last year said, that with the wholesale business she can not afford to do the hand dyes due to time/cost. Though that was what made her known.), I didn't see any the one man shows (Where the person would spin their yarn, raise the animals, and process it himself or herself) Had you told me 5 years ago that I would be driving all night to go see sheep and look at fiber, I would have told you, you were crazy. It is hard to believe that I have just gotten back from my third MS&W. Our little carpool of people increased to three this year. Which is super cool since that means that MG got to join M and I on our trip. Hope she was not to terrorized by Java Posse Pod cast all night long. Once we got to MS&W we meet up with Mia in the morning to spend a fun filled fiber day together. It always makes it more special to spend time with friends you never get to see. The day was amazing seeing all the fiber, yarn, spinning and weaving on different equipment and spending lots of money on supplies that will hopefully hold my needs for a while. And wait wait wait... I finally got to meet Andrea from Mellowtrouble. The five of us all had dinner together in Maryland. I was just sad that I didn't get to spend more time with her or meet her kitties. Next time I hope! Cheers to another MS&W!!!

Kitty: Maryland Wool and Sheep Report

What can I say, Maryland Sheep and Wool was absolutely amazing. It was such a happy day and to be honest I am so shocked things worked out and I got to attend. I had so much fun and left totally overwhelmed with all the yarn, roving, cute animals, and supplies. I couldn't believe how many people attended.Some booths were so full you couldn't squeeze through and with lines that lead out of the halls in to main paths. I really wanted a tee shirt, but the line was so long that wasn't going to happen.

And on top of all this, I got to spend the day with my Secrete Pal 4, Mia. We had a blast strolling the isles. To be honest I probably wouldn't have made it through all the exhibit halls had she not been there. She kept us as a chipper speed. (Ok chipper speed for me :) )

So I know you want to see some picture of the event, Click Here! (you know you want to click)

The next question I know you are asking is where are the loot photos. There was so much I wanted to buy, but in the end I didn't buy much.

Jacob Sheep- Stumpy's Roving

Frances Smith and Wendy Fast
www.icelandicsheepworld.com
Friendly's Roving

Wool in the Woods
hand painted Organic Cotton

Davidson Corporation
Easton Rapids, MI 48827
28/12 CPM Cotton

Sprit Trail Fiberworks
I am not really sure how I only ended up with one skein. Since I meant to buy 2 to make socks. I must order more since it is absolutely amazing colours. The photo really doesn't do it justice. More over they use rare, endangered, and unusual breed spinning fibers, one-of-a kind items. A Big Bonus in my book.

A cheap spindel and an Iroko African wood Lucet
The Lucet was from: Margaret a. Ledrich
435 19th street NW
Massillon, OH 44647-5347
The Spindel was from:Frances Smith and Wendy Fast
www.icelandicsheepworld.com

 

Kitty: Vendors to Check out from MS&W

Vendors to definitely check out from Maryland Sheep & Wool:

Brooks Farm - Lancaster, Texas
Tess' Designer Yarns - Steuben, ME
Spirit Trail Fiberworks - Sperryville, VA
Golding Ring Spindles - Saxtons River, VT
Stone Mountain Farms - Jody Sheffer, 527 Greason Road, Carlisle, PA 17013, 717.243.9517 jsheffer@earthlink.net, Colored Angora Goats, Alpaca, Fiber and wool blends.
Fairy Hare & Softie - Wisconsin Rapids, WI
Wool in the Woods - Biglerville, PA
Shadyside Farm and Mill - PA

There were definitely others that I have missed in the list above that were amazing. These were the ones I grabbed cards for, I will have to go through the book and see if I can find urls for the other ones I loved.

This will at least start you happy clicking away.

Kitty: MS&W, Silk Saga, & Fire and Yarn

So where will you find me on Johannes Brahms (Date of Birth: 7 May 1833) birthday????? Well Sheep & Wool of course.

Though really I should be practicing the piano I fear, somehow I don't think he was a knitter or would approve. I guess I will just have to wind my Teddy Bear up and listen to Brahms Lullaby before I go for my homage to Brahms today.

That's right assuming that the server doesn't crash in next three hours (thought it just crashed 15 minutes ago), the database files don't become corrupt, and I am leaving for Maryland. <Happy dance>

Now getting to go to MS&W is awesome, but the coolest thing has to be I get to meet my Secrete Pal, Mia. She really spoiled me during SP4 and we became friends. I thank her dearly for all the kindness and thoughtfullness she showed me. We are going to meet for coffee in the morning. I am so insanely excited to get to meet her. She also passed her practical last night. Her three months of hard work with her Fire class paid off.. CONGRATS MIA!!!!!! I am really happy for you.

---

Since MeowGirl brought up her worries about the silk industry I was doing some more research. It looks like there is some good news on the silk front. Japan is doing research on Flash Freezing the cocoons. The silk is then removed and the moth is released back into the egg hut area. Allowing for a natural renewal. There also seem to be some strict regulation on the treating of silkworms. Even in Cambodia whose animal rights issues are usually not so kind to the animals. So there is some hope. The overriding issues are that to free the moth, the silk has to be cut in some way. So you don't get the 4,000yard single piece of fiber the industry dictates. The Japanese researchers are finding that the renewal process does save money, but is this enough to offset the break in the fiber. The cocoon has to be boiled or baked to loosen the glue that holds the fibers together.

Something really interesting, silk worms are blind and have incredible hearing. Workers work barefoot in the worm area so as to not make any news and the area is kept as quiet as possible. Sharp noise causes the worms to stop feeding and produce half of their body weight in waste products that is toxic. After thunderstorms there is a rush to carefully clean the area so as to save the worms lives.

The choice to continue to buy silk is clearly not clear-cut for me I fear. The over whelming desire to drape oneself in the most luxurious fiber of the kings or to worry about the deaths of the moths that didn't see the day. Another interesting fact about the moths is they are actually blind and have been bread since the Han Dynasty to be chubby so they don't fly. HEHE early on I warned MeowGirl to not look to closely about how silk fibers were actually acquired if she ever wanted to wear silk again.

Some Cool Silk Info:

Self-Assembly of Genetically Engineered Spider Silk Fiber in Insect Cells (Anyone for some Spider Silk Yarn?)
The History of Man-Made Fiber Development
From the Mulberry Tree to Silk Fiber
Silk Ukiyoe Gallery - Wonderful old wood block prints of Silk Production
Silk Laboratory

---

On to a more pleasant topic. I was reading Blue Blogs most recent posting about her giant white bread sweater. She was wondering if there was a test to find out whether the yarn was man-made or plant based? WOHO, My mother will be so happy. I get to use my college education, all those Textile Chemistry and Organic Chemistry class and put it to good use.

Well the easiest way to find out what the fiber identification of an unknown fiber is to do a burn test.

Please, Please burn in a metal bucket and have plenty of water when you try this. I use to do this in a lab, in a white suit, with sprinklers, and chemical hoods. I have watched fibers torch and produce incredible flames in just seconds. So I just dug up my cheat sheet notes from fiber lab. There are essentially 39 tests to run on the fiber to find its true identity, but this is the quickest and easiest.

WARNING: Please Be Careful :) Have water around in case you start a large fire and have the phone near to call 911 just in case.

Burning Test plant and man made

Plant

Cotton: Steady Flame, smells like burning leaves, ash crumbles, will blow out like a candle
Linen: Take a long time to ignite, ash is brittle, will blow out like a candle
Silk: Burn but not easily and no steady flame, smells like hair, ash crumble, can not be blown out easily
Wool: Steady flame, difficult to burn, smells like hair

Man Made Fibers

Acetate: burns easily, flickering flame, not easy to be blow out, burning cellulose drips and leaves hard ash, smells like burning wood chips
Acrylic: Acrylonitrile made of gas and petroleum, Burn fast and lofty fibers have air pockets that burn instantly, Ash is hard, smells acrid
Nylon: Polyamide made from petroleum, Doesn't burn but melts rapidly, it there is a flame it is floating on the melted fibers, smells like burning plastic
Polyester: petroleum product, coal, air, and water, melts and burns at the same time, melted ash bonds with the surface of the item it was held by, smoke is black and sweet smelling, hard to blow out
Rayon: Cellulose, burns fast and leaves only a little bit of ash, smells like burning leaves