Adding to the woodpile

On Monday it felt too cold to go into the workshops so we decided we'd better get a bit extra for the woodpile. It is running low and this cold weather is obviously going to last longer. So off we went to a "meneuserie" that we've discovered near to Arras. No, we didn't want to get a "stare" of chopped logs, we like the recycled woods that are stacked into cubic metres at this particular place.

 As you can see we get a really random selection - it can be anything, but within this hotch potch of wood is some beautiful hardwood that can be used to make textile tools!

Once we get the wool home we play the game of "one for you, one for me" as John enjoys himself picking over all the wood and choosing the pieces that he wants. He will hold a piece up and say "what's this then?" as if I can recognise what the different woods are (I am beginning to get better, but) The he'll tell me and say "that will be perfect for tablets" or "that's beautiful mahogany, be great for braiding disks"
As his pile grows I start thinking - are we going to have any wood to burn? There is lots of unuseable wood there - it has too many nails in it, or it's wormy or it's rotten, no problem on the fire, but it is so much nicer to give old floorboards and door frames etc a new lease of life as beautiful textile tools that someone will treasure and enjoy using.

Saint Johns Wood produces the most accurate historical hand carders with leather carding cloth for mediaeval through to the 17th century (carefully researched and lovingly made!) Mediaeval Tablet looms and tablets, Inkle looms, shuttles, braiding disks and squisks with stands, weights, bobbins, Marudai and mirrors, nostepinnes, lucettes, spindles, distaffs. All the items produced have been researched and an explanation of the appropriate date of use can be given if requested. ALL of course are lovely for modern use!!!

John has also created an improvement for the inkle loom - his own invention, with a patent applied for! It's called the Moving Heddle Inkle Loom and is something so new he is running a course this summer at the Association of Guilds of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers Summer School in Carmarthen, Pembrokeshire.

 If you would like more information on the loom then do please email him.

Snow!

We have snow! I know that many parts of  UK are suffering from snow at the moment, but I just thought I'd say that we have some too!

It's stopping me from getting into the dyehouse at the moment, which I am not happy about as I have work to do and experiments to play with! The dyehouse is the big building with the garage door - that's the yarn house and next door hidden by the van is the cloth house, however the water has had to be turned off as it's freezing in there and we can't afford to deal with burst pipes! temperatures have been down to -10 at night and not above freezing during the day. I guess you could say that winter has finally arrived!

Yesterday you could see our road - the view is across the front of our house looking towards open fields, we have shelter around our corner and then it's just open plateau with the wind blowing the snow in drifts across the fields.

This morning we woke up to even more snow - it had been falling all night and is still falling now, in fact the forecasts say that we can expect it until Tuesday at least with the temperatures not coming above freezing til Thursday or Friday, and then only during the day!  (this view of the road is looking the other way into the village, you can barely make the road out now and the snow plough has been down once this morning!)

On a positive side I am sitting here on my computer working! Apart from writing this post I am designing new labels for all my dyes and learning lots of things - I know I need to, but this is making me get on and do it!

HURRAH for the snow, maybe I'll get to sort out an online shop eventually!!!

Happy New Year!

The end of the year has arrived with speed! My good intentions of writing more on here have not come to pass as I had hoped - I guess I am still too much of a technophobe to work out how to deal with being away so much........so-

Resolution number 1 for 2013 is to get to grips with THE MACHINE!
Resolution number 2 is to get to grips with THE CAMERA!
Resolution number 3 is to put the 2 together!

I hope to meet you all back here in 2013 with lots of news, photos and an increased knowledge of how this all works!

Wishing you all a happy and prosperous New Year  looking forward to a year of research, learning and COLOUR from the natural world!