Yarnspinners Tales's Podcast

In this podcast, I talk about what I learned about cotton and spinning cotton in a class at SAFF this year.  I also had the chance to do some fiber and fleece shopping, and talk about that experience. I mentioned that I would list the four currently grown species of cotton plants and their details. Gossypium hirsutum  Known as upland cotton and native to Central America, Mexico, the Caribbean and Southern Florida.  This species accounts for 90% of commercial cotton grown. Gossypium barbadense  Known as extra-long staple cotton, and is native to South America.  This species accounts for 8% of all cotton grown. Gossypium arboreum  Known as tree cotton, it is native to India and Pakistan.  This species accounts for 2% of all commercial cotton grown. Gossypium herbacaum  Known as Levant cotton this species is native to Africa and the Arabian Peninsula and is the last percentage of the cotton grown world wide. Extra long staple cotton requires special ginning, known as roller gins. This type cotton can only be grown in a few places in the world, because it requires a long season and will not tolerate rain before harvest.  Currently California and Arizona are the two US areas growing this cotton.

A short podcast talking about the last five skeins in the yarn wash up, and my recent spinning. I mention fiber from a Phatt fiber box, they can be found here. The other fiber I have been spinning awhile is from Hobby Lobby.  I finally looked it up online and can provide a link.  I am spinning Yarn Bee Showstopper in the Winter Solstice colorway.  

After I spin a skein of yarn, it needs to be washed.  I put this off until I have enough to take several days of washing.   I also talk about doing a burn test on fiber to determine the fiber content.  One was a very big surprise!  The flow chart I was using for this burn test can be found here. My pack of luxury fibers contained white angora and it is shown on the Nano spinning wheel in the photo with this podcast.  The pack of fibers came from Sericin Silk Etsy store.

This podcast is for the week of Sept 5th, and talks about prepping cormo fiber for the dyepot, and spinning a merino silk bamboo blend. I also refer to two past podcasts so here are the links: Episode 38 talks about buying a fleece.  Episode 39 talks about buying non wool fibers and how to store all fibers.  Also the ghost story that I wrote is at the end of this episode. The fiber I was spinning was from Wooliebullie.  Right now the Etsy store is only selling art batts, and hand knitted items.

A catch up podcast talking about Stashdash, the state fair and a black and white Shetland fleece. Stashdash is a challenge created by the podcast TheKnitGirlls. The young spinner I mention in the state fair has grown up and now has her own fiber business at Cedar Ridge Fiber Farm. If you would like to see the daily streams I did during Tour de Fleece, they are archived here.  I am still uploading those, but all will be there soon.  My current streams can be found at Yarnspinnerstales on Twitch.TV

Just a brief note to fill those of you that haven't heard of my Mom's illness.  I have to stop the podcast for awhile, as I spend time with her.

A tiny but perfectly acceptable spinning wheel is being 3D printed by Dreaming Robots.   I have the smaller version called the Nano and I talk about it in this podcast.   I purchased it at the Hoosier Hill fiber fair at the booth for Susan's fiber shop. I referenced the book Big Book of Handspinning by Alden Amos.  This is just one source for the book.        

The podcasts will have a new format starting with this one.  The good news is they will be more frequent, and the maybe or maybe not bad news is they will be shorter. For years I have been using this podcast to teach many things about the spinning of yarn.  Those are available on the website by checking under archives.  There is even listings of the episode topics to find specific podcasts.  With the future podcasts, I will be sharing  my experiences and stories of working with fiber everyday.  These will be dated with the episode number but not about specific topics. I am still streaming three days a week on Twitch.tv   on Wednesday, Friday and Sundays.  I just completed streaming all 21 days of the Tour de Fleece and these can be found on my Twitch page under Yarnspinnerstales.  There is a lot of spinning there, and it is a good way to catch up on what I have been doing lately. Thank you for all the years you have joined me on this Journey! And as always, happy spinning.    

Podcasting for me is on the back burner at this time.  I plan to return with the Tour de Fleece in July 2021.

Last podcast of 2020 and maybe the last breed reviews I do for awhile.  It is time to move forward into other areas of spinning and the new year seems a good time to start. The breeds reviewed today are Llanowag and Lleyn.  The fiber was part of a Welsh breed study pack from Wychwood Spinners This podcast was created from the audio of a livestream I did when I reviewed these fibers.  It is different than my normal podcasting, but I think the addition of the actual sounds of processing and spinning is unique enough to be interesting. Happy New Year! and of course may it contain much spinning!

In the last two podcasts, for some reason I said the livestreams were archived on Facebook, which is not true.  I didn't even catch it as I was editing.  Instead of the tedious process of edit and releasing the episodes, I decided to record this separate little audio. The livestreams originate on Twitch.TV under Yarnspinnerstales  The videos will stay there for a month to six weeks, if you do not catch me when I am live streaming. After that, the videos are archived to you tube.  Once you go to you tube, in the search box type lusi222 channel.  That should take you to my channel.  Be sure when you go to the video area, you find where it says all videos, to be able to catch them from the beginning.  Or the most recent will be quickly available right on top.  If you subscribe to my lusi222 channel, you should be notified when a new video is uploaded.  I will try a direct link here, but if it doesn't work, follow my suggestion above. I have to decide which of the livestreams are uploaded to archive, so I am not selecting all of them.  Much of the Sunday afternoon livestreams, are just for spinning and chatting.  I am focusing on the livestreams that I teach something about spinning or using hand spun yarn, to select what I am uploading.  I hope that will let these livestreams have interest over the years ahead, just as my podcasts have over the last thirteen years. Happy listening, watching, and of course, spinning!

The Hebridean sheep have long dual coated wool in various colors.  I used my study to not only spin the fiber but to show on live stream how to separate the two coats. The fiber was purchased from Wychwood Spinner Etsy shop. A short video on Twitch.tv show how to pull for long tog from the short thel using this fiber.

First up in the podcast is a report on my study of the Lonk Sheep Breed.  It's short so I went on to talk about all the spinning projects I have currently going that involve the Merino Breed.   Later, I will do a more complete breed study for that breed.  Finally, I talk about the second Tour de Fleece that ran from Aug 26th to Sept 20th, and what I spun during that time. Lonk fiber was purchased from Wychwood Spinner Superwash merino that I spun into sock yarn was purchased from Yarn Hollow. Sadly, the Ozark Carding Mill I mention is permanently closed. The Facebook group I have been using for the study of different sheep breeds is called 52 weeks of sheep.  I am not sure if FB will allow the link to work.  

In this unusual year, even the Tour de Fleece was affected.  The Tour de France did not run in July as usual, but was celebrated on Ravelry anyway.  Then when the Tour did ride in Sept, we did it again. This podcast is about what I spun and learned during the first Tour.  I also included the breed review for Yak fiber, since spinning it was one of my challenge day projects. The Yak fiber was purchased from Laughing Lamb fibers. If you are looking for my live stream, it is on Twitch.tv Need a way to document your spinning project from start to finish?  I created the Spinners Journal for doing just that!

The Coopworth Sheep breed is a relatively new breed, as sheep breeds go.  The sample I worked with was from a lamb and contained long lovely locks.  I cover in this podcast how to wash and spin locks, and the specifics of this sampling. Information on the Breed is from the Fleece and Fiber Source Book. Another book I mention is Merino by Margaret Stove. Previously I reviewed Coopworth in Episode 45. I have also done a live stream on washing locks. In the second part of this live stream, I show how to spin those locks. All of my live streams are being archived on my channel on YouTube, so if those links above do not work try going to this channel.

A new computer meant a whole new learning curve on new software to record and edit podcasts.  I think I finally have a set up I am happy to release. In this short podcast, I review one of the 52 weeks of sheep breeds, called Ryeland. I talked about this breed in the first part of a  previous podcast, you can access that with this link. The Ryeland fiber was purchased from Marie Redding fiber on Etsy.

So much behind that title!  I am not stopping the audio podcast.  I am moving forward on the wave of technology and taking my concept for YST with it.  I have set up a channel on TwitchTV You can find me under the same name as the podcast, yarnspinnerstales. I plan to live stream twice a week and during those videos you can join me, chat by typing, watch in the video what I am working on (and have been trying to explain with words for 12 years in the podcast!) ask me questions,tell me what you are doing, and so on and so on.  I think as the community of listeners/watchers/chatters grow we will come close to a vision I have always had for YST, a spin in. I also have a Discord channel set up for us to chat, and share photos.  It would be a great place to ask questions you would like me to answer there or show on the next live stream.  Click this link for the invitation to join the channel. Live streams will be Weds evenings and Sunday afternoons.  Once you are on Twitch and are following my channel, make sure you also click to be alerted when I go live.  The alert will always tell you in your own time zone. If you can not watch the live stream, the videos will be available on my channel for 2 weeks.  Be sure to check in and watch it.  

The breed White Face Woodland was studied by the 52 weeks of sheep group on week 14.  Unfortunately, I was unable to obtain a sample of this fiber yet.  But this breed is not new to me, I reviewed it way back on Feb15 2014.  It is Episode 104 and I encourage you to hit the link and listen to it again. The picture I show with this podcast are the tiny skeins I did during that first study.  The fiber came from Hilltop Cloud. In the second part of this podcast I talk about doing a virtual shopping tour of one of my local fiber fairs.

This breed review, second of the three I did at the same time, covers the Shropshire breed, another Down breed from the British Isles.   I had two sources of the fiber.  The first, a small sample, came from Wychwood Spinner.  The second was from Marie Redding Fiber Arts Etsy store.  The samples were completely different, so I combined them into one yarn, a tail spun yarn to display the lovely long locks in the Marie Redding sample. I mention the book The Spinners Book of Yarn Designs, as a source for one way to make tail spun yarn. Another method for tail spinning can be seen on this You Tube video.

For this month, I am releasing three shorter podcasts, all reviewing sheep breeds.  These do not ave to be listened to in any specific order, it was just how I recorded and edited these. The sample I used to review the fiber was part of a Down Breed study from Wychwood Spinner. I also refer to the book The Fleece and Fiber Source Book by Carol Ekarius and Deborah Robson. This breed was studied by the group 52 weeks of sheep on week 12.