I got a chance the past couple of weekends to do some SERIOUS silk-reeling. Whipping through cocoons by the dozens and eventually hundreds, and making skeins that I can actually visualize making an entire project with, rather than using for tiny detail embellishment!
I got a special package in the mail from Bill Wyatt of Wyatt Wheels.
Inside this amazingly sturdy (wood-reinforced!) cardboard box, was the prototype silk winder!!
If you get out to the State Fair, and want to check out my cool premium-winning entries in Creative Arts – the skeins are in Case #40, and the ribbon is in Case #28. They’re both on the back wall – #40 is just to the right of the butter sculpture, #28 is about halfway down that same wall.
The only thing I wish they hadn’t done in displaying them, is they folded the ribbon with a big pleat in the center – obscuring most of the brocade of the silkmoth (and worm, and cocoon) that makes the ribbon make sense.
But hey – the important part is easily visible – the big blue ribbon with the rosette on top!
I put two pieces in the State Fair of Texas – a set of reeled silk skeins, and a tablet-woven silk ribbon.
Each of them took a blue ribbon in its category.
This is the first time I’ve entered a State Fair; I’m very pleased and excited!
It must have been the moonlight. Either that, or this one moth has some amazingly powerful hoo-hoo juice…
Her milkshake brings all the boys to the yard!
Well, I have learned a LOT about Eri silk! I finally got a chance to play with the cocoons, and am fairly pleased with the results – although I’ve had a few “learning experience” type things that I don’t plan to repeat.
My Eri moths FINALLY started hatching today!
I went out the back door to shake a towel that I’d gotten some debris on… and saw this amazing beautiful argiope spider. She just showed up here… how, I have no idea – she must have just hiked it in.
This exotic-looking face greeted me this evening – I was kind of surprised to see him, because I thought the cocoon would overwinter! It’s an exquisitely beautiful moth, Eupackardia calleta. Click here to see the history of it. The first impression is that it’s just black, but there’s a lot going on color-wise with its wings and its fur. This face kind of reminds me of a Zorro costume.
more photos!
