The Blog

Hey there everyone! I have some exciting news today: I just became a contributor to the Phatfiber Sampler box! If you've never heard of it, are you living under a rock? Just kidding. :) It's basically a collection of samples ranging from yarn to fiber, handspun to stitch markers, and a random of assortment of items inbetween (which relate to fiber crafts, of course!). This time, I've contributed a beautiful, limited edition hand-pulled roving and one of my repeatable colorways, Fallen Petals. So, what's so great about it?

I'll save you the nitty gritty on how it actually started, but essentially it is a way to get a small business's products into the hands of many, devout sampler box buyers. The HQ is operated by just a couple of people (married, I think), and it's amazing all the work they go through to make each box. Contributors only do a portion, but the HQ duo maintain a blog (which offers SO many teasers), free advertising for contributors, and keep all of the contributors in line. Then, once a month, this box is released while lovers of the box wait in anticipation of the release date and time.

Each month has a theme, and contributors are encouraged to participate if they desire. I assume that it adds cohesion to the overall look of the box, and becomes the focus of aesthetics as a whole. For the month of August, the theme is Bollywood. I know you're dying to see what I made, so here's Hot Little Sari, the limited edition hand-pulled roving:

The fiber content for these rovings is 98% merino and 2% angelina glitz. I made these from my drum carder, and the process I used is described in my picture tutorial, Adventures in Drum Carding: A Tutorial. I think I might make more batts this way, since the roving is so fluffy and is perfect for spinning as is (no extra drafting necessary!). Since these are limited edition, I'll only have them available in my Etsy shop. I haven't quite decided how long I'll have them hang around, but they'll be there for the next month at least.

News: The hubby (IT department) has been working diligently on creating a better user interface with my products. He's also cleaned up the overall appearance of the website, and reducing the number of tabs up there (it was kind of getting out of hand, haha). He's now finished with creating it, but now I have the task of repopulating the database again! This time it won't take nearly as long (phew!), but it will take a few evenings of working on it here and there until it's finally ready to go live. This leads me to my next point. Some of you may have noticed that I've added some new repeatable colors to my Etsy shop, but they haven't shown up here yet. Well, that's because I didn't want to have to re-enter those listings right after I entered them into the website's current format.

One other news thing: I've done some testing with our video camera, and it seems that it'll work for showing you video tutorials on the website! Yay! However, the best it can do is 480p on youtube, because it isn't quite good enough for 720p (it's actually some weird resolution between the two at 600p). I've had many requests for showing videos on various spinning/plying techniques, so I'll probably make one of those my first video tutorial. I also want to show you all my bunnies (because they are super cute!), so that might be my first video for the site. :) We might need to invest in a tripod, so it'll take a bit longer for the first video to be made. So, hang tight. I listen to everything you guys say, even if it isn't directed at me. I should probably go wash some locks so I can finish making that cute little sheepie from my last post!