Not To Be Outdone...

I got mail, too :)

One reason I love living in Germany - seasonal Birkenstock updates!

Even if it is only 5 degrees outside, they feel great. And what better way to test out new shoes than to visit the wool shop, hem and haw over shawl yarns and shoot-the-proverbial shit with my new mother-daughter best friends/wool-shop-owners!

The absolutely, wonderfully soft linen mix that I picked up the other day, and was sooo super excited about using, turned out to be as knit-friendly as copper wire. So I took it back today to maybe pick up some of the silky, shiny-ish mohair that's been on my mind since Saturday. The owner showed me a model hat that had been knit out of my linen-wire and, after one wash, it was lots softer. So I kept the yarn I had previously bought and spent my energy on picking brains. The owner looked up drum-carder prices for me Saturday and I figured she might know a thing or two about getting spinning material as well. Yeppers! She has a supplier who only has a small brochure. The description of available wares goes like this: wool, baby alpaca, silk, mohair, etc - any colour. Except I think the baby alpaca is only natural colours (beige, dark brown, grey, etc). Something like € 5 per 100grams. And the prices get better the more you order: like about €35 for a kilo.
For a libra like me, this is pure hell. We need choices. We need a choice of colours limited to different fibers or fiber combinations. I want to look at a catalog and point my finger (granted, it'll take me a couple of days to make up mind which to point at...) But the whole "oh, fibers to spin, sure! What'll ya have?" This attitude of "the fiber world is my oyster" is going to drive me insane. A smorgasboard of choices at my finger tips and I betcha ten clams that I go for a kilo of natural wool to colour at home. Then I can chew over colour choices without shop owners shooting me worried glances and wondering if I'm going to spontaneously explode with frustration.
Speaking of which, the owner remembered I asked about colouring wool during our Saturday visit and she mentioned that she used to do Intro to Wool Dyes and Spinning courses. How cool would that be?! And here I am with an enormous Waschkessel (laundry kettel, I think) in the cellar just begging to boil onion skins or something random like that and be loaded with wool. World works in funny ways sometimes, eh? I told her I'd get back to her in the fall, that there might be a meet-up of fiber nuts and a little wool-colouring seminar would be neat-o!

Anyone care to plan a Technicolor Playdate? Maybe early October-ish???