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no place like home

10/18/2016

 
Picture
I've been making yarn.
Picture
Clearwater River, ID
Nothing new in that., of course.
But this fiber is Polypay,
a breed developed at the USA  Experimentation Station in Dubois. Idaho.
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Polypay Roving -- grown on the Palouse, processed in Post Falls, Idaho
A mix of Targhee, Dorset, Rambouillet and Finnsheep,
the breed, l
ike so many of us who live in the United States,
is an incomer
a hybrid,
an adaptor
bred to thrive in the west.
Picture
North Fork of the Payette River
Targhee itself,
 a combination of Rambouillet, Corriadale, and Lincoln/Rambouillet X
was also developed in Dubois, in 1926.
(Targhee appears in various well-known commercial yarn blends:
Brooklyn Tweed,www.brooklyntweed.com/yarn/ for instance,  and Cestari )
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Suffolk/ Rambouillet-ish fleece from a 4H bottle lamb
As a spinner, I usually start with raw fleece
​ -- some weird regional combination--
as I like to get my hands into every step of yarn production,
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South Fork of the Payette River
​but this Polypay from The Yarn Underground (my LYS)
is heavenly to spin and I couldn't resist diving into a couple of pounds.
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Hepty Spindle by Henry C Edwards; 24 g
It's fluffy, fine and bouncy,
the kind of fiber that pours off  a wrist distaff 
and onto a spindle,
and an excellent companion for last week's tapestry retreat in Garden Valley, Idaho,
Picture
Camas Prairie
The title of the retreat was Tapestry as Cloth,
my goal to explore  the effect  that
sett, beat, and materials (weight and fiber content of warp and weft),
have on the physical objects that we make. 
You know how easy it is to get into habits
-- this warp, this sett, this weft, this loom--
and sometimes it is useful to ask why,
to shake ourselves up a little.,
to get messy. 
What if this tapestry doesn't want to be stitched into a frame?
What if it wants some linen in it?
What if it longs to sway in mid air?
What if it is more like a blanket?
Picture
Indigo, Walnut, Letheria Vulpina lichen
I'm not sure that any of these questions were answered,
but  four selvedge warps came on and off of looms,
 the company was fantastic,
we made glorious color,
ate delicious food
and soaked out any weaving aches
​ in the geothermal pool.
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Hot Pools steam as the sun rises.
One of the myriad benefits for me was a reminder
of how little one actually needs to make fabric
and how much beauty (and really nice fiber)
can be found  out my back door.
Picture
Skeins of walnut-dyed yarn dry and pools steam on.
Garden Valley is actually about 270 miles from Moscow,
but Highway 95,  the only North-South highway in the state, 
passes two blocks from my back door.
It two lanes for most of the drive
and every wide spot in the road is worthy of a photo, or a quick tune,
 so it all feels pretty darned local. 
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Along the way are a few mountains,
a couple million acres of wilderness,
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Salmon River (sorry for the crooked camera)
the odd pristine river, 
and, after four hours of driving,
a coffee shop that serves
 Landgrove Coffee, roasted by the family of the kids with whom I sometimes play tunes.  
(The Foglifter Cafe is in McCall Idaho, and doesn't seem to have a website of its own)
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It is all  kind of like the Polypay--
right here, and not too shabby.

This morning, back home, I made a warp 
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I think it'll become some sort of a blanket
but I don't actually know yet.

Guess I'll have to  post this bundle of nonsense
(my little Idaho advertisement),

and get back to threading.
Margaret stone
10/18/2016 03:01:12 pm

Gorgeous colours, Sarah in both yarn and countryside. Love your dedication to your craft and the joy that oozes from your posts about it!

Lynn
10/18/2016 03:47:05 pm

Once upon a time, I almost bought a Polypay fleece at the Connecticut Sheep and Wool fair, but decided against it. I've regretted it ever since (maybe 6 years?), but I've never seen another one for sale. (I can resist buying online, so I do. Because two closets full of fleeces is enough.) Now you're making me ... what's the right word? CRAZY. That's it - I'm CRAZY because I don't have a Polypay fleece in hand.

But we knew that about me.

Rebecca Mezoff link
10/19/2016 08:22:16 am

Lovely lovely lovely. The yarn and the Idaho and the joy of weaving. Yay! (I didn't know that about Targhee--just spun about 8 oz for Spinzilla.)

Helen Hart
10/19/2016 06:43:50 pm

Rebecca directed me to your site and am glad she did. Your photos of the rivers and country of Idaho are wonderful. And I had heard of poly-pey (sp?), but now I know how it was developed. I had rotator cuff surgery and now will go back to spinning. Your work is beautiful. Thanks.

patti kirch
10/21/2016 12:13:26 am

Thank you Sarah for a wonderful cloth retreat in Garden Valley. My Jenkin's Finch and Delight loved playing with the roving that you had shared with us.....was it polypay? I took so many colourful notes, brought home newly dyed roving and skeins, cut off a tapestry and begun two more. I caught that bait, the Cloth" bait! I'm hooked.
geothermal pools are da bomb and so are the colours of yarns we dyed to match the North Fork of the Payette.
Thank you so much!

Janet Kovach
10/23/2016 06:14:44 am

10.23.2016 Liked your mention of Targhee......it's my very favorite fleece to wash----let alone spin---- just wash and rinse.....it always reminds me of baby angel hair spreading out in the water.....so fine and soft...from Janet way over Northeast where the leaves are a riot of color....my little white Westie has begun her annual ritual of bringing me a single leaf from the thousands fallen outside each time she comes in.....she holds it daintily by the stem (just one single leaf) and presents it to me like a gift....does she not realize she could never bring them all in?....but maybe this is all a lesson to us to appreciate one tiny single piece of Nature at a time.....from Janet

Sarah
10/26/2016 11:57:51 am

Janet, your description of you Westie careful selection of leaves is delightful. And she is so right --those tiny moments of leafy perfection are so worthwhile.

Linda Healey
10/25/2016 04:47:19 pm

Sarah! Inspiring explorations. How intriguing to slowly and thoughtfully follow your inclinations toward making fabric. I have fallen in love with slowly making fabric entirely from my spindle spun yarn too but wish I could attend a retreat where others are doing the same and experience doing it together. How lucky you are, (how lucky am I)!!
There is a farm raising the polypay breed of sheep near me, over by the NH/ME border, but they're not raised specifically for fiber and I never have been lucky enough to get a fleece (yet). But I love love love spinning Targhee,, so very springy and alive that fiber is!
I love the clarity of the rivers, the hills and grasses, the steamy hot springs. Thanks for bringing it within reach--

Sarah
10/26/2016 12:01:50 pm

You are so welcome Linda. And what a delight to know that Targhee has made the journey east to be spindle spun and made into cloth. So happy to know.

Julia link
10/26/2016 03:26:39 am

What impossibly gorgeous photos. You live in an amazing place and your yarn and weaving are equally remarkable. What a joy to see. Thank you.

Mickey
10/26/2016 05:24:31 am

Thanks for all the photos of the marvelous countryside. Cloth isn't bad either. You have inspired me to get out my backstrap loom. I can at least make the strap out of handspun.

Sarah
10/26/2016 12:00:18 pm

So glad Mickey. Backstrap straps (both Scandinavian and from the Southern Hemisphere), are endlessly intriguing and await in my future, I hope! Love to think that you are already there.


Comments are closed.
    Picture

    ​Sarah C Swett 
    tells stories
    with
    ​ and about

     hand spun yarn. 


    Picture
    Click for info on
    my four selvedge
    warping class
    with
    ​ Rebecca Mezoff  
    fringeless


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