Madrona Fiber Arts – Day 1
As I mentioned in Sunday’s Post, the Madrona Fiber Arts event in Tacoma Washington was the first knitting conference I’ve attended. And let me tell you – I’m hooked! The event was absolutely amazing. I haven’t had time to fill out my evaluation form yet, but it will be an extremely positive review.
My first class was bright and early on Friday morning. I drove down to Tacoma from Bellevue on that first day so I was up at the crack of dawn. I had to register before my class and since I didn’t know what that entailed, I wanted to be there when registration opened. I also wanted a few minutes to peek in at the Marketplace before settling down to take my class on Blending Fiber Using a Drum Carder.
I lugged my drum carder into the class room and found that I was the first person there. The instructor, Jill Laske of Ashland Bay Fiber, pointed out a spot she thought would be good for me. It later turned out that although this spot was good for accessing my drum carder, it was also in the way of the pathway people used to get to the plethora of fiber that Jill brought for us to use.
And yes, “plethora” is the right word! She had two tables set up at the side of the classroom with every color of dyed merino that one could possibly imagine. It was a spinners heaven! And our task for the day was to learn how to choose different ones to blend into pleasing color combinations for spinning.
First Jill gave us a quick lesson on using the drum carders. Most students had brought their own (including one woman who brought a very cute model called a “Fancy Kitty”), but many of us didn’t have a good idea of how to use them properly. Fortunately, there is a very short learning curve so getting the hang of it was pretty easy.
Next, she talked to us about different fiber types and colors. Then she led us through some color exercises that we put to practice with the fiber. We blended complimentary colors, contrasting colors, analogous colors and finally split complementary. Oh, and she also had us try one where we took a tiny bit of fiber from every color on the color wheel to blend together – results were varied on this one! I actually liked my results, shown below, but some attendees were not so pleased with theirs.
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| Shown above is my sample of merino wool fiber blended with a drum carder using ALL the colors on the color wheel. |
After the lunch break, we learned more about what to look for in choosing different types of fibers for blending. For the rest of the afternoon, we just played with blending different colors and fiber types to come up with pleasing results. I came away from the class with more than a dozen mini batts that I’ll be playing with over the next few weeks.
After class, I spent some time shopping again before meeting up with Zola, another knitter that I originally met through Knitters Review. We had made online plans to meet up with other KR members to chat and then attend the evening lecture by Fiona Ellis. After the lecture, we hung out in the hotel lobby knitting with some other area knitters and bonding with new friends. It was absolutely a wonderful evening and I was exhausted when I retired to me room just before midnight.