Sophie and Rowan in Canada

This morning Sophie washed the billy goat’s fleece, while Rowan scraped splashes of paint off the windows and then did some carding. The mohair was very soft as the goat is only two years old.

In the afternoon Sophie learnt how to use the knitting machine, and knitted the rest of a bag on it which our host had started. The bag will be sold in a gallery, so that makes Sophie a professional knitter. She made a few mistakes which took a while to untangle, but overall it is far quicker than knitting by hand. Rowan, meanwhile, was set to work spinning yarn to be sold, so that makes him a pro spinner. It was a mixture of mohair and wool, dyed various colours (orange and red mostly). It was a bit difficult to spin as the two fibres behave very differently, so the way it handles keeps changing as you’re spinning. Sophie fed the chickens in the rain and wished she was a farmer.

We seem to have made a good impression on some of the grandchildren as they wanted to take us home tonight.

In the evening Sophie knitted some more of her bag and Rowan plied some more wool. He did it three-ply as he is now spinning much finer than when he started.

We didn't take any photos today (bit of a relief - if we'd kept up the rate we were taking them last week I'd be going out for a new hard drive soon...) so these are from earlier in the week - the view from the bathroom and one of the fields!