All you need to spin your dreams
Our friend Wooldancer (Michelle Snowdon) in Australia posted a very nice video to YouTube recently of Fibre Art Rolags she is producing. The work she is creating is very beautiful and I have included the link below. I found it really inspirational what talented people like […]
Rob has been in India for the last week and from what I have seen on Facebook, it looks like he has been having an awesome time around Rajastan and Northern India. Here are a couple of pictures he has shared recently. […]
Several years ago, we created a custom Aura for our good friend Therese Cruz. She provided the design which was drawn by a Dutch artist Mark Storm.
So anyway, long story short ;-), I am looking around for inspiration on Bing images this morning and I come across this site amongst the search results!
I recommend visiting the link below to see more of the images.
Until next time
Andy
I have spent much of today working on the Majacraft web site. You may notice a few changes next time you visit. Firstly, the blog posts now feed directly on to the front page of the web site – this is going to make it […]
Our friend Esther of JazzTurtle fame appears in an ABC segment showing how to do tailspinning (and she uses and Aura ;-)! ). Go Esther! Esther Tailspinning Until next time Andy
One of my Facebook friends is Woolwench (Suzy) who is based in Holland. She is also the owner of “The One Wheel” limited edition Aura that we built last year for her Kickstarter campaign. She recently posted on her Facebook page pictures of a new yarn she had produced which she has called “Shelob”. Here is her story about the yarn
I dreamt about this yarn, and it was one of those dreams where everything just happens magically, which of course I discovered as I was spinning it and realised it would have been much easier if I had an extra hand or more fingers. My goal was a very lumpy yarn wrapped in silk just like a spider cocoon, in my dream I had seen the fine cobwebby silk fibers wrapping around the yarn and encasing it in a thin layer. It was a bit like how a spider wraps its prey in silk, somewhat gruesome but hey, it was a dream and they can be weird right! It was tricky to spin, I first corespun a single, then coilspun it to make a coiled yarn, and then coil spun that again, in my left hand, while drafting a silk hankie with my right to wrap around the outside of it, spreading it back along the yarn to open out the silk fibers. I used a commercial spun eyelash thread as the core to add extra texture too. I also made a second yarn using a black sparkly base yarn with a white silk layer over it, hoping for an even more spidery look – I am going to add this to my LOTR yarn collection and have named it Shelob, for the giant spider that Frodo met in the Two Towers book.
Here are some pictures of a Shelob style yarn that was the first iteration of the design
I find it amazing to see what people around the world are creating with Majacraft tools and what we in a small way are part of so congratulations Suzy and thank you for sharing it with us.
Suzy is “WoolWench Handspun Yarn” on Facebook if you would like to connect with her and see what she has been up to recently or visit her site at www.woolwench.com
Until next time
Andy
Welcome one and all, we have started back at work for the year and boy is it hot in the workshop! I am anticipating Autumn and Winter with relish at the moment as the afternoons are so very humid and the workshop has very little […]
Lake Dewar Lodge was the beautiful venue for the Australian 2012 Majacraft Magic Camp, organised for us by Mandie (of Ewe Give Me the Knits) and Janet (of Nanny’s Spin on Things). These two ladies are amazing! Not only beautiful and talented but full […]
OK, I am going to show my ignorance here – thankfully, I have since been educated.
I was under the impression for quite a while that hand weaving was pretty much restricted to creating two dimensional pieces. I was very impressed to see these images of weaving completed by Rona Betts (Thumbelinaspins of Ravelry) Mum bought in to show me. The ideas behind this beanie seem very interesting to me and can see how she has moved the reed segments in her Dynamic Heddle loom to create really interesting effects in the overall shape.
I am quite a hat fan as I like being warm and I am becoming limited to the Friar Tuck hairstyle these days so this beanie has really fired my imagination. To me, it looks like it would be possible to weave almost a cone shape piece of cloth by starting with the reeds segments far apart and then moving them in to create the smaller top part of the hat. I would think that it would even be possible to start with the reeds tight, weave in elastic and then move them out wide and slowing back in to create an elasticated rim.
Here is Rona’s story in her own words
“Redlands Spinners was having their annual camp at Bribie Island the last weekend of August. I had only just found out a couple of weeks before that I could go. I was given a sheet of paper a week before about what was expected and saw that there was a beanie contest and the beanies were being donated to the seafarers. One of our members who had recently passed away had knitted over 2000 beanies for the seafarers and this was a way to remember her. Since I absolutely knew that I could not knit a beanie in time I thought about what I could do. I had just received my majacraft loom and had warped it up to play with. On it I had some Noro sock yarn in fun colors. So I put two and two together realising that weaving does not take as long for me to do as knitting I went to work and in one evening “presto” I had enough woven for a hat. I did not win a prize for the best beanie but had the best time making it! Love my Majacraft Loom!”Here are a couple more pictures of the No Sew Hat:
I find Majacraft is a great place to work when the opportunities to form connections with people who create amazing things come up – like what Rona has done with her weaving.
Until next time.
Andy
The title says it all really! Lexi Boeger aka Pluckyfluff is hosting a camp over the weekend of October 27 and 28. I have had the good fortune to take part in one of Lexi’s classes/camps and she is AWESOME! She has Auras to try […]