Home Again!

I had a great time at the Folk School as usual. I got there about 4 pm on Friday, got settled in with my room mate from Illinois a great roommate, with a great sense of humor. We didn't get much sleep. We started our class Friday evening and our teacher was full of energy. She had lots of samples of her work, yarn to dye, yarns she had dyed, color everywhere. Saturday we found out as with other disciplines, the dyeing part took the least amount of time. Other steps including winding the skeins, scouring the yarn, mixing the mordant with water, mixing the dye, preparing the tables with plastic and newspapers, dampening the newspaper,applying the dye to the yarn, letting it set for as long as possible, then spinning, boiling, rinsing and spinning! Ten students dyed at least 40 skeins of yarn, tee shirts, socks, sheets and pillow cases. With that much to finish, one washing machine and one stove eye working, and a fish cooker that wouldn't boil, we stayed pretty late, even after commandering the quilters stove and another stove in the dairy barn. One student took command and had everything in order with yarn in bucketslined up in order of what needed to be done next. Otherwise we may have still been there! When we arrived Sunday morning we were greeted with clotheslines full of colorful yarns hanging outside, so beautiful. My room mate and a friend from B'ham were in the felting class. They liked the technique and the fact that it could be done anywhere, little equipment is needed and it is relatively inexpensive. There is such a creative spirit in those mountains. Since everyone is there to create something the atmosphere is just charged with creativity. Other classes included faux painting, wine making (one student told me they called it cooking for the Baptists LOL!), blacksmithing, metal clay jewelry, wood turning, quilting and bark baskets. There were also 48 men there from all over the United States from the Timber Framer's Guild to add a post and beam structure onto the blacksmith shop. They are taking two weeks out of their lives to work on this project. Some of them had to pay room and board to be there, to learn how to do the post and beam techniques. Others have their own companies building P&B homes and took time from their business to teach others and the Folk School. I can't wait to get back up there to see the results of their labor for the next two weeks. A weekend just isn't long enough to be in the mountains.