Close to Home...Post #11 - Herding-4-Ewe

Sometimes I wind a warp using a lot of different yarns and then realize that I don't have enough of any one yarn for weft. This usually happens when I'm making a mixed warp to use up odds and ends of yarn that I have around. That happened with a couple of the pieces for Close to Home and I found some yarn left over from other projects that worked just fine. These blankets are not in the show but they use yarn that I had made from Herding-4-Ewe's wool. I happen to still have some on the shelves.   Story: Herding-4-Ewe is just around the corner from my farm. Debbie Pollard keeps a flock of mixed breed sheep to use in training dogs (and, just as important, dog owners) the art of herding. My Border Collie, Rusty, and I took lessons from Debbie for a few years.  Now most of the sheep Debbie uses are hair sheep, but at the time I was there she had many more woolly sheep and I acquired some of the fleeces. I skirted and washed the wool and had it spun at Yolo Wool Mill in Woodland. I have woven many blankets from this yarn (including one for Debbie in which I incorporated yarn I spun from the hair of her favorite dog) but have some of it left.  

Here are a couple of the projects in which I needed to find some other yarn.This blanket uses my Mom's yarn in the warp and Herding-Ewe's yarn, dyed with black walnut, in the weft.This is a CVM shawl using the same yarn as above for weft.

I don't have any photos taken while herding at Debbie's but here is one of Rusty working at home:

Close to Home...Post #10 - Sincere Sheep

One of the first yarns I used when weaving for Close to Home was Targhee wool sold by Sincere Sheep. Story:  Brooke Sinnes of Napa began Sincere Sheep in 2003 and focused on natural dyeing yarn sourced from local wool. Since that time she has included other lines of yarn sourced farther from home. Sincere Sheep’s Bannock yarn is a 3-ply worsted weight yarn that features 100% Targhee wool from Montana and the Dakotas that is milled in North Carolina and spun in Maine. The Targhee sheep is named after the Targhee National Forest near where the breed was developed beginning in the 1920’s. The goal of the U.S. Sheep Experiment Station in Idaho was to develop sheep with uniformly heavy fleshing and high quality fine wool that was adapted to rugged conditions of the Western range. Developed by crossing Rambouillet, Corriedale, and Lincoln sheep at the Experiment Station, the Targhee breed was expanded by selection of “Targhee type” ewes from large bands of range ewes crossed with Targhee rams. The flock book was closed in 1966. Targhee sheep produce 10-12 pound fleeces with very soft, bright white fiber that measures 21-25 microns. Sincere Sheep’s Bannock yarn was named for a Targhee Native American Chief.This is one of only two yarns in this show that are not grown in Solano or Marin Counties but I included it because of the variety of colors, naturally dyed, and the quality of the yarn,  and it is grown in the Pacific Northwest, which is Closer to Home than many places where wool is grown.   I love the color variation in this yarn... ...and the variety of designs that you can get on one warp. That means that each of the blankets above was woven on the same warp threading in white yarn, but the patterns change by varying the treading and, of course, the color of the weft. Another series of blankets. And another.At the end of the warp I just wove in white instead of making it plaid and then I felted the fabric. That made great fabric for pillows.I also wove a series of blankets on a rusty red warp with a white weft

  Targhee yarn is very soft and perfect for scarves as well. After the Artery show whatever items are left will be for sale on my website.

Close to Home...Post #6 - Anderson Ranch wool

Last March I watched some of the shearing on a large sheep ranch in southern Solano County and I brought home fleeces. Here is the blog post from that day. In September I got the yarn back from the mill and used it for pieces in my show at the Artery. Story that is part of the show:  Margaret and Ian Anderson farm land that Ian’s great grandfather settled in the late 19th century. While Ian’s great grandfather raised only sheep and grain the modern ranch is a diversified farming operation growing hay, grain, and cattle as well as sheep. The original sheep on the ranch were mostly Corriedale but today’s 3000 breeding ewes are a blend of Corriedale, Polypay, and Rambouillet breeding. The ewes are bred to Suffolk and Rambouillet rams to produce each year’s lambs. The lambs are raised in adherence to the strict animal handling and environmental sustainability protocols of Niman Ranch, where most of the lambs are marketed. Local sources of Anderson Ranch Lambs are Nature’s Bounty near Vacaville and Chuck’s Custom Slaughter in Dixon.

As in many U.S. sheep operations the Anderson Ranch wool is handled as a by-product and is usually baled and sold in bulk. Last spring I watched some of the shearing and brought home about a dozen fleeces. I sorted and pre-washed the wool and shipped 90 pounds to Zeilinger Wool Company in Michigan, one of the few mills in the U.S. that can adequately process fine wools in small quantities. The wool was spun into 54 pounds of 2-ply-sport weight yarn. The fiber averages 20.4 microns. Feel how soft it is for yourself!

This yarn, like the yarn from the Timm Ranch and processed at Zeilinger's, changes dramatically from it's coned form to skeined yarn or finished piece. I will do another blog post about that because it's so cool to see the changes. This would make a great knitting yarn as well (although I'd skein and wash it first) and it is on my website for sale now.  This blanket and the one above it are woven with the same weave structure, but they look different because one has dyed weft. The browns are dyed with black walnut.  This blanket has weft dyed with osage orange that grows across the road.I also wove some scarves. This is beautiful yarn, very soft and would make great knitted scarves or caps. I look forward to weaving more projects with it. Maybe I'll even be enticed to get out the knitting needles.

Close to Home...Post #5 - Mom's Yarn

I've been writing posts about my show at The Artery in Davis. Here is a link to the first post  that explains the concept.I used this photo in the show but had a hard time deciding between it and the one below both taken probably in the 1970's at our place in Cotati, CA where I grew up. Here is the story: Everyone I know who is a weaver has a yarn stash and I am no exception. My stash includes what I like to think of as “archival” yarns that were spun by my mom years ago. Over the years the odd ball of my own handspun yarn has ended up in the stash that I have accumulated.

Most of the yarn mom spun was from sheep that were the descendants of my brother’s  4-H project (I raised dairy cows and didn’t do anything with sheep back then) and many years later from my flock of sheep. Mom took up the hobby of spinning in the 1970’s as an adjunct to her expert knitting passion. These yarns reflect the lumpy, bumpy style of that era as that was the type of yarn she liked to use in her knitting and later in weaving.

The blankets in this show that are labeled with yarn from “My Mom” are woven by me using these yarns for warp and one of my current yarns for the weft. Pillows and organizers labeled “My Mom” use her handwoven fabric scraps left over from constructing jackets, vests, or blankets.

 Two throws, above and below. All of these blankets have Mom's yarn as the warp. The challenge with weaving something like this is that all the yarns are of different grist, amount of twist, and elasticity. That can cause waviness (or seersucker effect) in the woven piece. By using small amounts in each place instead of big bands I can minimize the effect, but it doesn't all go away. There wasn't enough of any one for weft so I used other yarn for the weft yarns--either my Jacob yarn or other yarn featured in the show.

The next two blankets, above and below.  This is the batch of yarns from which I worked. Not that Mom didn't spin in color, but for most of the pieces of the show I was trying to stick true to the "local" aspect of source of yarn and dye. This is a pillow in the show with Mom's yarn in the warp. This fabric was leftover from a blanket I wove for Katie when she lived in VT. See this post for a photo of that blanket.Mom also did some weaving. This is fabric that Mom wove of her handspun yarn and I think she used some for a vest for my brother or maybe my uncle.

There will be more blankets to come using more of this yarn.

Close to Home...Post #4

Another flock represented in my current show at The Artery is The Timm Ranch north of Vacaville.Here is their story: The Timm Ranch is north of Vacaville on the east side of the Vaca Mountains. Susan Timm’s grandfather bought the ranch in the early 1900’s and, although much of the ranch is leased to a cattle rancher, Susan runs about 85 ewes there. Lambs are born in the fall and sold to individual customers and to Chuck’s Custom Slaughter of Dixon.

Susan’s father started with Targhee sheep and then added Polypay and Rambouillet rams to the flock. Susan’s sheep are descendants of this blend of breeds and produce a fine, soft wool.

I took home about 65 pounds from last spring’s shearing (average fiber diameter of 23.5 microns). After pre-washing (soaking and draining in cold water) to reduce weight I shipped 39 pounds to Zeilinger’s Wool Mill in Michigan, one of the few mills in the U.S. that can accommodate fine wool in small quantities. They washed, carded and spun the wool into 30 pounds of 2-ply fingering yarn.

The yarn comes back from Zeilinger’s unfinished (no final washing) on cones. Washing the yarn or the finished weaving results in a seemingly magical transformation from what looks like string into soft, lofty yarn. The ewes after shearing. Fleeces that I took home. Samples for micron testing.Yarn on cone and skeined. I wove a warp with six throws. The brown yarns are dyed with black walnut and the yellow is osage orange. Both of those plants grow across the road. I also wove shawls. These are a 16-shaft huck.

Close to Home...Post #3...Barinaga Ranch Yarn

The first post in this series explains the concept of this show. Blankets woven of East Friesian wool from Barinaga Ranch. Story of this yarn: Valentin Barinagarrementeria travelled from the Basque Village of Markina to the U.S. in the early 1900’s to make his life as a sheep-herder and eventually managed 5000 ewes and lambs on a range sheep operation in southern Idaho. His granddaughter, Marcia Barinaga, after a career in science journalism, and with support from her biologist husband, began Barinaga Ranch, a sheep dairy, on the shore of Tomales Bay in 2009. Her Basque cousins generously shared their knowledge of sheep dairying and cheese making and her American cousin helps with lambing in the spring. The 800-acre ranch is grazed by beef cattle as well as by the dairy sheep and is part of the Marin Agricultural Land Trust.

East Friesian dairy sheep originated in northern Europe and produce on the average a half gallon of milk per day during the six to eight month lactation cycle. They are milked two times per day and Marcia uses their raw milk to make Basque-style cheese that is sold all over California. Milk and lamb production (and of course cheesemaking) are the primary enterprises of Barinaga Ranch, but with the help of local Fibershed members, Marcia is developing her wool market.These are East Friesian ewes and their lambs. They graze the hills in Marin County but spend some time in the barn at lambing time and they were in for our Farm Club field trip.  The wool is not as soft as some of the other wools I used in the show but it is a medium grade and just fine for blankets. They have great loft and dynamic color.Can you believe that this blanket......and this blanket are the same weave structure? The top one uses dark weft and the bottom one uses white. I have a little of this yarn left and look forward to more blankets.

Close to Home...Post #2

I explained the concept behind my Artery show in the last post. Here are some more photos. I'll start as you walk in the gallery. I have a photo and a story for each ranch whose yarn I used.Columbia sheep at the Imperial Stock Ranch in Oregon.

The story: The Imperial Stock Ranch is located on 32,000 acres in Oregon’s high desert and is owned and operated by the Carver family, who raise sheep and cattle and produce grain and hay.

In the late 1990’s the U.S. processing and manufacturing industry drastically declined (moving overseas) and the ranch, like thousands of others, was unable to sell their wool through traditional commodity channels. If the Carvers were going to continue to raise the Columbia sheep that had grazed the ranch for a century they needed to find a way to market the wool. Jeanne Carver’s response was to create and sell premium wool yarns and the Imperial Yarn Company was born.

The Carvers were thrilled to find out that their home-grown “Erin” yarn was chosen by Ralph Lauren for the 2014 Olympics Opening Ceremony sweaters. I saw this yarn at a trade show and was awed by the rich colors. I knew I had to use this for a Stars and Stripes series of blankets.

The Columbia sheep was developed by the U.S.D.A. in the early 1900’s to create a true-breeding large ewe that would yield more pounds of lamb and wool than the randomly crossbred range sheep. The Columbia is a result of crossing Lincoln rams and Rambouillet ewes and is a very large breed that produces 10-16 pound fleeces that measure 24-31 microns.

Here are some of the blankets that I wove. In another post I'll explain the process of weaving these blankets. Also look for a later post of shawls using a fine wool yarn from the Imperial Yarn Company.The first blankets that I wove were in blue and white. All of these blankets except the mostly blue ones at the bottom are woven using "color and weave". The weave structure is the same throughout the blanket but it is the color order of the threads (8 blue/8 white) in the warp and the weft that allow the pattern to show. Where there are solid areas of white or blue in warp and/or weft you don't see the star pattern. For a true Stars and Stripes theme I needed to use some red.  These are the same weave structures as above but with 8 white/8 red/8 blue threads in the pattern area.In the first two red, white, and blue blankets I repeated the 8-thread sequence throughout.In the next two I designed blocks, sort of plaid like, where the star pattern would show up. Then I decided that there should be something in this collection that was more restful for the eye.   I thought about solid colors but had to throw in a bit of design.In addition to being colorful this yarn is very soft and wonderful to work with for weaving or for knitting. I sell it at my shop and on the website. Next up: Yarn from the Barinaga sheep dairy in Marin County.

Close to Home...Yarn with a Story

For many months I have been preparing for a show at The Artery in Davis, CA. The Artery  is an a cooperative gallery with about 70 member artists and I have sold my work there for over ten years. The show runs from November 7 to December 1. I hope that local people will be able to visit.Jacob blankets above and on the rocking chair (my mom's) on the right. Gray blanket on the left chair uses "Mom's yarn" (see a future blog post on that). The others are wool from other Solano County farms.

The best way to explain this show is to reprint my "Artist's Statement" here. My blog is usually mostly photos because that's the kind of blog that I like to read but I hope that you will take the time to read the following because it explains the concept behind the work in the show.  I'll throw in a few photos, but will display others in later blog posts.

Blankets woven from yarn grown by Imperial Stock Ranch in Oregon.The story about this yarn will be in a later post.

Artist's Statement:   In 2010 I became involved in the Fibershed movement by donating yarn produced from my flock of Jacob sheep to Rebecca Burgess whose goal was to wear, for a year, only clothes sourced entirely from an area within 150 miles of where she lived. That means that the fiber (and any dye) was grown, the yarn was spun, the cloth created, and the garment sewn locally! Imagine doing that—it’s not easy!

Why bother? Have you looked at your clothing labels and thought about the impacts of the way in which we clothe ourselves? The true cost of inexpensive clothing is high when you consider the social and environmental impacts on a global scale. (China produces 52% of the world’s textiles.)

Rebecca’s personal challenge led to the creation of the on-line Fibershed Marketplace in 2011, and in 2012 the Fibershed (501c3) with the mission “... to change the way we clothe ourselves by supporting the creation of local textile cultures that enhance ecological balance, and utilize regional agriculture while strengthening local economies and communities.” In other words, by embracing the Fibershed concept, we support the idea of using locally grown and locally made textiles and encouraging the development of Fibersheds all over the world.

Education is an integral part of the Fibershed movement—educating the consumer about the environmental, economic, and social benefits of embracing the Fibershed concept. Imagine the Slow Food movement applied to textiles!

Close to Home... Does that mean down the block, across town, or within the U.S.A? Each yarn used in this show has a story. Some were grown by my own sheep, some by my neighbors, and some in other parts of Solano County. One is grown by a long-established Oregon ranch and another is grown by several ranches in the Pacific Northwest and dyed with plant dyes in Napa County. A few pieces are woven of yarn handspun and dyed by my mom many years ago. It was a challenge to stay true to the Fibershed concept when I needed commercial fabrics for pillows. (One of the many Fibershed goals is to bring mills back to our area that will commercially produce fabrics not locally produced now.) I did the best I could by using fabric and pillow forms made in the U.S.A. and some pillows use my home-grown wool for the pillow itself.

I wove or felted all the wool fabric in the show and each of the fibers have a story. Some were grown close to home and other evoke memories of home. The pieces are simple because my focus is on the fiber and the yarn. Enjoy the photos, read the stories, and think about the stories that your textiles would tell.

Weaving More Blankets

This was the last order of blankets from BC (Before Christmas). Now there is only one more thing that I have committed to weave for someone else (that's you, I.S.). Then I can focus on my LVIP (Looming Very Important Project)…pun there, but not intended.  This is six throws on the same warp. I don't remember what the wool is, but there are some longwools (or maybe it's mohair)  in here as you will see in the detail. They add luster as well as weight to the blankets. They also act very differently when fulled. Some of that has to do with the extra twist in the yarn. The top two blankets in the first photo are in plain weave, but at a glance they may not look like plain weave, in which every other thread is over and under. There are diagonals in here that are not characteristic of plain weave. This is called tracking and is not uncommon when weaving plain weave with yarns that are over-twisted and woven at a relatively loose sett. Detail of a plain weave blanket. You can see that the weave structure is plain weave, but the over-twist of the threads is causing them to migrate and twist after wet finishing.More detail because with this lens I can. Do you see the "hairiness" of those fibers? That is more characteristic of a "long wool" breed. More blankets and details.

Did a box of yarn explode in here?

  You may have seen this photo on Facebook (by the way if you didn't see it on FB you can "like" Meridian Jacobs), but you didn't see the rest.This is a stack of 19 blankets that I just finished. There is still warp on the loom, but I needed to get these off the loom (and I needed to give my shoulder a break--now it's the right one giving me trouble). My daughter will choose one when she is here this week and the rest will go to The Artery for sale.  They are also on my website.

So here is what some of them look like:  Camo anyone?

This is what the cloth beam looks like while I'm weaving.And here is the floor behind the loom.

At the Loom

It hasn't been all hiking and lambing. I've been at the loom too. This is a king-size blanket I wove for a customer who had their llama/wool yarn spun at Yolo Wool Mill. I also wove 2 throws for this person. These are two lap blankets woven of wool from sheep at the Barinaga Ranch, a sheep dairy in Marin County.This is a close up of all four blankets on that warp. The brown weft is Jacob wool dyed with black walnut. I'm always trying to get better photos. The photo above is shot on AWB (auto white balance). The one below, shot on the cloudy setting, isn't that much different, although on my computer the AWB photo has more of a bluish cast. But look at the next one.  The white balance was set to "shade" which is where I took the photo. What is reality? I think it's closer to the top two. I just finished a warp for three shawls. This is CVM yarn in the warp with different locally produced weft yarns.   Same shawls with white balance set to "shade". Detail of shawl on the left.

 This is on the loom now. An experiment. Hopefully all those holes will fill in when it is finished.

The pieces above will be for sale on my website and at the Fibershed Marketplace after our photoshoot that is in a few weeks.