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SPINNING SILK Our Harvest Festival is coming up in September and I always like participating by making something special for the hand-crafting section. I thought of the silk batt I came across recently while going through a bin......not enough for a big project, but it would be a challenge. I haven't spun silk for years......It's been quite hot lately and my house is so lovely and cool. So I gathered my tools, set up my wheel and started spinning. I soon remembered why I haven't spun silk for a while.....In the past week, I had been working outside doing yard chores and my hands were a bit rough.....not so much that I had even noticed, but the silk noticed. Then I had to fiddle with my wheel, fine tuning it to deal with the much finer thread than the usual wool.......My wheel is not a high-tech machine and tuning it requires the use of a rubber band twisted around a hook.....also, the silk fibre is so long and self-clinging, it requires a very different technique...... When I finally managed to spin a satisfying amount of thread, it broke and the end disappeared into the thread on the spool. I had forgotten about that possibility. It was late by that time and after spending an hour trying to find the end of the thread, I gave up and went to bed. This morning, with renewed patience, I managed to finally untangle the spool and skeined it for dying. I still have a lot to spin, but I already feel like a veteran again and I'm confident. I have been watching a patch of Goldenrod that is getting close to blooming. The mature buds give a rich golden colour and silk takes colour best of all the fibres. So, by next week, I will have skeins of golden silk. I'm not sure exactly what I will make, but I will probably crochet it, as silk is not elastic like wool, so it doesn't knit up well......I will explore my options once I know what I have....make some samples........I'm off to check how the goldenrod are progressing. 
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I commend you on your effor!! What a project!! 
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I commend you on your effor!! What a project!!
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