Blues & Golds Grab Bag

Grab Bags!

2 oz of assort fibery goodness including any of the almost 50 fibers Tactile has carried.  How much fun is that?  Each grab bag will include at least 7 different fibers.  Maybe a bit of California Variegated Mutant (CVM) locks, or some merino-bamboo, could it be yak-tussah or shetland?

The picture shows an example of the Blues & Golds Grab Bag.  Each one will be different and will probably be completely different from the picture.  But, that is all part of the mystery isn’t it?  There is a slip of paper identifying which fibers are included.

Silk Noil!

Concord Grape Silk Noil

Silk Noil is the waste bits from the silk reeling or combing processes. Much of it is the first bit of fiber the silk larvae spins, which has less luster and is more brittle. Noil is very chunky with a short staple length.

It can be spun alone, but most often it is blended with a wool fiber. Try blending it 50-50 with your favorite wool for a highly textured yarn. Spin it fairly fine so the noil bits pop out for maximum texture. For less texture, blend in less noil.

Packaged in 1 oz bags as a little goes a long way.

Silk Sampler

Silk Sampler!

Another fun sampler.  This one is  4 types of naturally colored silk.  You’ll get 1 oz each of tussah and mulberry silk top, 1 silk cap (approximately 21-25 grams or 3/4 oz), and 1/2 oz of mulberry silk noil.

Experience the variety of silk available to spinners and felters.

Ancient Breeds

And, the return of the popular Ancient Breeds Sampler!

Five ancient breeds: Finn, Gotland, Icelandic, Norwegian, and Shetland.

It is not all about fiber though.

New Yarns:

Silk-Camel Fingering Weight

Silk-Camel Fingering Weight!

Lovely fingering weight yarn made from 70% Silk and 30% Camel Down. A bit of shine and drape in a soft warm yarn. This yarn is suitable for lace knitting, weaving, or anything close to the skin.

The 4 oz skeins with approximately 375 yards (997 m) are enough yardage for a small shawl or a hat and mitten set.

Linen-Merino Sport Weight

New colors of Linen-Merino Sport Weight!

The deepest richest red (Pomegranate) I have ever gotten on this yarn, a rich dark gray (New Moon), a bright chartreuse green to remind us that spring will return (Spring), red and purple together at last (passion Flower) to name a few.

Featured Fiber & Yarn

Each month I will feature a fiber and a yarn.  The featured yarn will also be 15% off for the entire month for all sales through the webstore.

For November 2009, the featured fiber is Silk Noil and the featured yarn is Silk-Camel Fingering Weight

You will see some changes in the store as we rearrange the furniture.  New ideas and products are coming soon.

We are headed off to Black Sheep Gathering in Euene, Oregon.  If you are coming, please stop by and say hi.

We have some yummy new products debuting this weekend.

Samplers!

When I started spinning, I wanted to try everything.  I still do.  We thought you might too.

Ancient Breeds: Finn, Gotland, Icelandic, Norwegian, and Shetland.

Longwools: Blue Faced Leicester, Coopworth, Masham, and Wensleydale.

Camelids: Baby Camel, Fine Alpaca, Baby Llama, and Suri Alpaca.

Alpaca Survey: Alpaca, Fine Alpaca, Baby Alpaca, and Suri Alpaca.

Cotton Colors: Naturally colored organic cotton in white, green, and brown.

Camel Survey: Baby Camel, Camel-Merino, and Camel Tussah.

See all of the samplers here.

Our Fiber Club will open on June 5th for shipments starting in July.  We have some really wonderful fibers planned, we hope you can join us!

April Fiber Club

Here is April’s club shipment, 2 oz of Merino-Angora (50/50) for the Luxury club and 4 oz of Finn wool for the Comfort shipment.  The featured dye is Weld, a fantastic bright yellow.

We want fiber club to be a learning experience so each shipment comes with an information sheet on the dye and on the fiber or fiber blend.  We put it on cardstock so you can punch holes into it for yarn samples.  Underneath is the binder that is sent to people who sign up for 12 months of club and sleeves to hold fiber samples.

May Fiber Club

May’s shipment features Cochineal.  Cochineal is a very versitile dye.  It can make a pale cotton candy pink, a rich red pink, a hot pink, or a deep purple depending on the mordant and ph.  It is always exciting to play with Cochineal.  The Luxury fiber is 3 oz of Alpaca-Tussah (70/30) and the Comfort fiber is Merino-Tussah (80/20).  The Alpaca-Tussah is darker because the base fiber is a fawn color.

We are having a lot of fun dyeing and sharing natural dye and fiber information.  We are also participating in club and spinning along with you.  If you are on Ravelry, we hope you will share what you are making in the Fiber Club Spoiler thread in the Tactile group.

Since they were announced last year, we have wanted St. Blaise combs.  They are the brain child of Robin Russo and her husband Pat Russo. Combs are used for removing short and weak fibers leaving aligned fibers that are a joy to spin.  They are beautifully crafted from Vermont cherry and come with a matching mount.  These 2-pitch (2 rows of tines) combs are named after the patron saint of wool combers who was martyred with wool combs and subsequently died in 316.

Other tools added to the online store include cherry Dizzes also from Robin Russo, the Schacht fine wool and cotton cards, and Schacht Pear Tahkli support spindles.

Wool-Flax: a lovely blend of 60% soft wool and 40% Flax.  Flax is the fiber that makes linen yarn.  Unlike many cellulose fibers on the market now, flax is a bast fiber.  Bast fibers are the structural fibers of the inner bark of the plant.  The process of removing the fibers is called retting.  Flax (linen) is very durable and will soften with wear and washing.

Gray Alpaca: we love dyeing over naturally colored fibers.  It gives a richness and a depth of color that is often hard to achieve with natural dyes.  This alpaca starts as a heathered gray which adds to the richness.  This fiber is very tempting!

We will also be adding no colors of old favorite fibers this week.  To see what is new, click here.

They carry mostly indie product lines, including a lot of local indie crafters.  They also carry a full line of needles and accessories covering knitting, spinning, felting and more.  We are thrilled to have Tactile product in their store.

Jamie and Blas are so sweet.  I joined them for knit night at a local cafe and had a great time.  There is a nice community building around Urban Fauna.  Stop by and check them out.

If you are on Ravelry, there is a spoiler thread set up in the Tactile group.  Hope to see you and your creations there.

Tactile’s Organic Cotton Worsted yarn is featured on page 13 of the current Knit.1 magazine (on newsstands starting today). It is number 7, the pink yarn.

Find yummy new colors here, including the featured color: Painted Desert.

If you are more interested in yarns, we have a sport wt. organic merino
yarn and a worsted wt. organic cotton yarn. I used the cotton yarn to
make the ‘Baby Soft Cardigan’ from Knitter’s Book of Yarn (Rav page here ). It’s wonderful to work with.

A selection of naturally dyed and natural color (undyed) alpaca fiber including alpaca-silk blends.

A selection of alpaca yarns: Alpaca-Merino Worsted Weight, Superfine Alpaca Sport Weight, Alpaca Handspun.

We have also added some wonderful books on spinning and dyeing.

Stop by the Tactile web store to see it all.