Fran Sale Stafford

Worth?

I have been asked many times, “How long does it take you to spin that yarn?” That is such a difficult question to answer without just saying,” it depends. ” Four ounces spun Aran weight or Worsted weight takes much less time to spin than Fingering weight or lace weight. The type of fiber makes a difference as does the fiber prep. Also, whether it was spun on the wheel or on spindles. Then comes the internal argument about how much to price it if it is being sold as yarn and not knitted or woven into a garment or accessory.

Saturday morning I started spinning 4.5 ounces of a soft unknown wool, I believe it is Merino, but it wasn’t marked when it was given to me. I didn’t spin continuously, but did try to track about how long it took to spin and ply it. It spun to 17 WPI, so fairly fine. The fiber wasn’t in the best condition, there were small pieces, some matting (not quite felted). My estimate is about 10 hours to produce on the wheel. I ended up with 313.5 yards. If I knit it into a simple lace asymmetrical triangular shawl, it will take another 10-15 hours. To price the yarn at a price it might sell, I would charge 10 cents per yard for basic wool, and at that price, I have to accept that the time I spent on it was basically recreation, as my time would be only $3/hour. This particular fiber was given to me, often I spend $25 for 4 ounces of dyed roving which then negates anything I would have earned and it basically just provides money to buy more wool. If I knit it into a shawl, it would list for about $40-45 for 25 hours of hand spinning, then hand knitting work if it sold. If it was purchased roving at $20-25 for 4 ounces, plus 25 hours of my time, I would be making less than a dollar an hour to create a one of a kind, handmade item.

I typically only use my handspun yarn for garments I knit for my shop, once in a while a gift skein or trade skein will be used, but I have to value my time as therapy and recreation as this region won’t support the true value of hand spun, hand knit items.

This is the skein I produced, it really is quite pretty, soft and with nice drape, but I definitely can’t use this photo in my shop. I don’t know what you see, but I see a huge turd pile. I guess I need to work on my photography skills.

And in that vein, this is what I saw when I woke.

It isn’t much and it won’t last, but it is pretty now. Again, I need to work on my photography skills.

Change of Routine

For some reason, this week blended into a mess and I missed pre-order time for the market. Hubby hasn’t been sleeping well but was sound asleep when I got up and there were no pressing needs from the market today. Online, curbside grocery order didn’t have an available slot today until after dinner, so I took one for tomorrow, and we stayed in this morning. I let hubby sleep, while I sat and spun on my spindles and drank a mug of coffee.

Tomorrow, we will pick up our grocery order. Monday looks like the warmest (not warm), driest day of early next week, so we will go to the tree farm and see what we can bring home to decorate. I would love a root balled tree, but we couldn’t handle it and I don’t think I could dig the hole to plant it.

VDOT never came to clear our culvert as requested 3 weeks ago and last night it rained continuously from about 5 p.m. until the wee hours of this morning. The driveway that was already a mess is worse. I don’t want to try to dig out the culvert with the tractor bucket as I never get the hole in the right place and the ditch is then too wide. I guess I will have to file another report. I was supposed to get a confirmation last time and didn’t, so calling will probably result in being told they don’t have it on file.

This afternoon, I set up my table, table top rack, and floor rack to see what my set up will look like for next weekend’s Honor System craft event at Wilderness Road Regional Museum Noel Nights event. I wanted to make sure I had enough space and not too much space for the goods and that it looks appealing. I had planned on using baskets for the smaller items, but opted to use one of my 4 cell wooden crates that allowed me to load, carry, and set up in one step.

A little rearranging and some signage changes were made after I took the photo. It would be a nice Christmas gift to sell some of my supply so I can make more for next year when hopefully, I will be able to resume doing some craft and holiday events. It is all packed back up and I have scheduled a set up time during the week.

The weather blogger said we had entered Meteorological winter last week and though true winter is still 16 days away, it is cold, gloomy, and damp. We have already built fires several times to sit in front of to chase away the cold and gloom. The hens finished molt and most of them look fluffy and healthy again, but egg laying did not resume. For a while, the Olive eggers were giving me a few and one brown egg layer laid a few, but I have only gotten 1 egg all week. Not having power to the coop, I don’t want to try to light it as it would have to be battery operated and on a timer, so I will just have to buy eggs for a couple of months until they resume production.

I jokingly told my friend from the museum that if we couldn’t get out and about soon, I was going to “become a crazy old lady hermit, standing on the front porch with a broom to keep intruders away.” The Thanksgiving spike of COVID has begun in the county, with a rise of 14 new cases and 2 more hospitalizations since yesterday. With the county as small as it is, that is a significant rise, yet mask resistance is still prevalent here. One of my friends wrote on a social media post, “You have the right to chose to die if you want, but you don’t have the right to take me with you.” Follow COVID protocol, PLEASE.

Well, I did it!

Last weekend, I put the chain saw carved Santa and Snowman on the front porch, hung the Christmas garden banner by the stoop, brought the antique sled out of the garage and made a wreath to hang on it. On our walk, I found a hemlock branch in the road, probably broken off by the Lodge pick up truck, so I brought it home. I would never cut any greenery in the conservancy, but it was already broken and on the ground. I had made a grapevine wreath from the grapevine prunings and used it as the base. Tied on the hemlock sprigs, a few pinecones from the basket full I have gathered over the years, a couple of teasels and a bow.

Over the years, I have accumulated a lot of quilted, cross stitched, and other handmade ornaments, most made by my sister in law, some by my stepmom and before we sold our coast house and moved to the mountains, they were lovingly hung on a “feather tree” that was about 5 feet tall, in our den, the main Christmas tree in the living room. That tree did not move with us and for a couple of years, they were strung on greenery roping along the loft railing, but that meant taking them down, making sure all were found. A few years ago, I purchased a huge artificial green wreath and attached all of those ornaments to it. Each year it is enclosed in a large plastic bag and hung in a storage closet in the basement and brought out for the month of December.

Last night, I went down and brought it up to hang from the loft. There are large bows with 6″ jingle bells that hang at the ends of the rail and at the bottom of the stairs.

This morning it was too cold to do anything beyond necessary animal chores.

So during my morning alone time, I brought out crate after crate of Santas, Gnomes, Nutcrackers, and Snowmen. The tiny village, and the miniature tree that used to adorn my office before I retired, and decorated the inside of the house too.

Window sills, bookcases, the top of the piano, the top of the treadle sewing machine, and the mantel are all festively decorated. Next week, we will go to the tree lot and pick out a tree, not a big one, but a tree for the house as well.

This afternoon, all of the remaining gifts were wrapped, shipping boxes broken down for recycle or to use in the garden, and the entire downstairs vacuumed yet again, a daily chore.

Yesterday, more salves were made, packaged and sealed. Guest soaps bagged in twos, beard oil labels that were damaged last year at the Holiday market when my table blew over were re printed and the damaged ones replaced and clip on signs made for the baskets that will go to the museum for the Noel Nights craft honor system sale. Yarn and some knits checked for labels and prices and all of it packed in a bin to take over there in about 10 days.

As we are still eating turkey from Thanksgiving, we decided that Christmas dinner for two is going to be a nice roast and hubby likes Country ham, so there will be some of that too. That is a change from 43 years worth of tradition, but it will just be the two of us this year.

I’m trying hard to be in the spirit of Christmas, but it is difficult this year. Maybe the decorations and an occasional Christmas CD will get me in the mood.

The room where I organize the gifts by family prior to wrapping and where I have the batches of soap curing is cleaned up. With the gifts wrapped and sorted into “family” bags or shipped off via UPS, the wrapping station is put away. That is where most of the shipping boxes were too, awaiting use if necessary and now broken down. Only the table with racks of soap are still out, with the ceiling fan on medium to help cure the soap more quickly. The bands are all printed and ready to apply when the bars are dry enough. The decorating put me in a cleaning mood too and kitchen counters were decluttered and wiped down, some of the open shelves rearranged to look more appealing. The basket of red peppers that fully dried without ever getting strung was emptied into a half gallon jar and placed with the “cooking, kitchen” Santa on a clean countertop. It looks quite festive.

I am trying, I really am.