My Calendar Wheel or the £15 Spinning Wheel......

This post is going to be very heavy on pics as I try to describe how Mr S and I made this fantastic wheel from a 10 foot length of timber some nuts, bolts and a selection of screws. 

First off here is the link to the inspiration.  It is a spindle spinning wheel and the US version cost just under $7 to make.  Timber here in the UK is more expensive, but I estimate that it easily comes in under £15!

First off you have to cut 12 blocks four inches long that are chamfered on one side and lay them out in a circle - we screwed them together (Mr S doesn't like nails, screws he says can always be removed but nails can't!!) 

Here is the wheel with the cross pieces in place - the axle goes through the centre where the cross braces meet - very simple and of course it is a dodecahedron which is why it is known as the Dodec Wheel....

Next the base and treadle.  Here I must emphasise the neatness of the design as all these pieces were cut from one length of timber, the angles making the the base.  You can see the cutting diagrams here but all I can say is 'that it was real simple'............

The upright slips into the slot formed in the base.  We had to make some adjustments here because the upright is made out of thicker timber than the base - the next one will be made with the same size timber for everything which will eliminate the need for adjustments. lol...

Here is Mr S about to attached the wheel to the upright - you need a M8 bolt, washers and nuts for this bit and a lots of candle wax to ensure that the wheel spins nicely.........

And here is the wheel attached..................  Next is the receiver or spindle this a nifty idea and the specs for cutting the bits for this are here

This is the receiver or spindle attached to wheel the bolts under the spindle allow for adjustment - and in order to ply you need three spindles, so we made two more

And finally the completed wheel

on which I have spun this

Not the best yarn I have ever produced, but it is the first on a spindle wheel!  The hardest bit I am finding in the quarter turn back so that you can wind on the yarn - but that's my mobility problems not the wheel.

Monday is Washing Day...

So is Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday if you are washing a big fleece.  This undertaking began on Saturday at the North Somerset Fleece Fair where I collected my pre-ordered fleece from Yvonne Hoskins of  Woolastons Woolly Wonders   This was a Polwarth/Merino Cross and he had grown somewhat from last year when I was pipped by K when we came to choose fleeces.

As you can see Molly approved!

Saturday had been cold and wet, but Sunday dawned bright and sunny so I began washing the fleece - now named Baldwin, because Baldwin Steam Engines are called Big Boys in the US and my sheep was a very big boy!  Over the years I have tried many methods of washing fleece, mainly by dividing it up into manageable pieces and soaking and washing before separating the locks for spinning.  Not anymore - last year I watch a video 'Spinning for Lace' by Margaret Stove in which she washes her fleece lock by lock in boiling water.............. but it works and I have now perfected a technique using Teflon chip trays!! 

I lay locks of fleece in a basket created from the tray and put them into a bowl of boiling water and Power Scour and squeege with a potato masher, then the tray is transfer into another bowl, again with boiling water but this time I add a dash of Ecover Washing Liquid, squeege again and then rinse in near boiling water, spin and leave to dry.  Sounds time consuming, well yes it is, but the results are worth it!

The washed locks are ready for combing and take very little preparation - so although the washing does take a while it is compensated by the ease of prepping - and look at the gorgeous top that results from all this work - a fibre that spins like a dream..................

Also on Monday Mr S and I washed the windows - no big thing really, but not a job that we do very often - Mr S claims to be useless at cleaning windows so I bought him a Karcher Window Vac and guess what he can clean windows.............................  But in the process I all this cleaning frenzy I managed to close the front door on my thumb resulting in a fairly stunning bruise.........................

Never speak to strangers.........

Well that was what I was told as a girl.............this fact was probably one of the first things that was drummed into me when I started to go out alone - yes in the 1950s and 60s children were allowed out on their own - I was often absent from home for hours at a time and no one really worried unless you missed a meal - but the one thing that we were never, ever to do was to speak to a stranger, the only exception to this rule was a policeman.........

Well yesterday afternoon I spent the entire time talking to complete strangers - knitters (and one crocheter) in the Arnofini Cafe.  The meeting had been organised on Ravelry through a group known as The Friends of.......... I am not going to go into the reasons for the formation of this group, there are plenty of blogs that go into the KALMedia/ACM debacle - the best one is here, and in some way we must be grateful to KA for bringing us all together............  It was a little reminiscent of the 'wearing a red rose and carrying The Times', except that we all had our knitting and our nom de plumes!

The main reason was to meet up with Pompom who is over here for a few weeks, but the other was to discuss the shenanigans of ACM and the new editorship and rebirth of the magazine once known as Yarn Forward - and a great time was had by all........................and by 4 o'clock we weren't strangers but friends.

On Saturday I will breaking the not speaking rule again - at the North Somerset Fleece Fair, where the SpinDyeWeavers will be demonstrating spinning and combing and other sheepy things from 2-6pm. 

Best of all we will get first dips into the fleeces - well I won't be doing that because I've already reserved my fleece and I AM NOT BUYING ANYMORE fleeces until I have processed the 12 already hanging in the loft...........................................

Good News - Bad news.............

Over the past week I have heard that a very dear friend and a very dear friend's mother both have advanced cancer.  Ok they aren't youngsters, but nowadays there are lot of very young 80 year olds, full of life and living life to the full and to hear that they both have possibly only weeks was devastating. 

Then it struck me that these are both lovely people - Mr K is most gentle and kind man I have ever had the privelige to meet (well aside from Mr S that is!) he will never say as bad word about any one even when he was bad-mouthed by a bitter old woman jealous of his new found happiness.  Because after nursing his wife with Alzhiemers for years until her death he has found a new person to share his life with - she is a super woman who lost her husband to cancer several years ago -  so they have both had hard times but now they are so happy and busy - it has been a pleasure to see them together, little rays of sunshine always smiling and ready to lend a hand in an emergency - so why him? I know life isn't fair. but sometimes it does seem that it is always the nice ones, never the nasty ones - and yes I know that even people that appear nasty may have a nice side but can't show it for some reason..................... but really life is just not fair!

But there has been some good news as well to conteract the bad.  Mr S has been offered a Games Maker role for the Paralympics at the same venue as me - Eton Manor - so hopefully we shall be doing similar shifts for the wheelchair tennis event and he won't just be tagging around as my carer!  It just means that we have to go down to London while we are away on our travels in July which means travelling from Nottingham to St Pancras.  Just been checking London Transport for the best way to get to Canary Wharf from St Pancras - well I might as well have been asking for directions to the moon.................the only good thing that I could find out is that access at the station is fine - lots of new lifts installed...............we'll see.

Off now to weave a couple more cushions for the Woolsack project, have done three so far, honest, I just forgot to take pictures!

Got my sewing mojo back

Mr S says I'm like a butterfly flitting from one project to another leaving many nearly done!  Well I suppose he right, but you know how it is inspiration hits and off you go............... Well I finally got out the sewing machine and quilted my cat quilt that has been waiting to be finished off since January. This meant that I could get on with other things

This being unfinished meant that the quilt for our bed couldn't be put together because all the pins were in use.................  Well that is now sorted and after several hours rolling around on the floor I managed to get the backing fabric, wadding and quilt together!  It is at times like this that I wish we had carpet on the floors, 'cos on wooden floors the whole thing keeps slipping all over - a real nightmare which wasn't helped at all by Mr S laughing at me and Molly walking casually across just at the wrong moment!  Seriously he did help and now I have to decide how to quilt and what thread to use dark blue or turquoise!

Also on the sewing theme, last week I bought the new book  A Bag for All Reasons and it sparked me off into a bag making session - well the first one can hardly be called a bag, because it is a wallet and as I didn't have any matching thread all stitching shows, but it takes some of my cards..................

The new interfacing (Decovil) I ordered arrived and it is really wierd, and does have the feel of leather, so am redesigning the inside of the wallet, because I am not at all sure about the middle pocket for coins, which hasn't got a proper closure - going put more card slots in the middle which I think will be more useful and make a matching purse. Here are the peices all cut out and ready to sew.

 

But second is a bag and I am very happy because it has sorted out the problem of fitting the zip into my 'bag in a bag' idea.  This is an attempt to get a drawstring bag inside a zipped bag so that all the little bits and pieces are kept safe, but it has never looked how I envisaged and has been on hold for several months because I couldn't get the zip to sit nicely!

Well the instructions for this bag has solved my problems. 

 

There are few issues this bag - it doesn't sit flat but that is because I didn't have the right interfacing and used some pelmet stiffening, and I am not sure about the handle which is a little off centre (my fault) and just knotted together - but the zip sits perfectly and that is the main issue. 

Good news - my polwarth/merino fleece is shorn - its owner survived the winter and it's huge - can't wait to pick it up week Saturday at the North Somerset Fleece in Kington Seymour that's 10 days ......................   I'm sure that all this waiting for things can't be good for me - I am a 'want it now' sort of person, goes off stamping wheels in disgust...........