John Arbon and Juliet Sensicle, our co-directors in UK Alpaca, just swung by to pick up loads of yarn, top, noils, fleeces, the credit card machine, magazines, shade cards etc. etc. for the Wonderwool show in Wales this weekend. When their van is fully packed up there is normally just about room for Juliet in the passenger seat although she is often to be glimpsed under a pile of yarn. We take it in turns to do the shows. We always do the big Knitting and Stitching Show at Ally Pally and they do WoolFest in Cumbria and this one. These shows are full of people selling all sorts of fleeces and yarns and people come from all over the world so we usually take quite a lot of money. Our yarn stocks are quite low at the moment but we have plenty on cone so that will go off to be dyed and balled very shortly.
The funky, stripey socks that John has been making out of the coarse fibre are selling very well and we have wholesale orders for it too. We’re sending a ton of coarse white fibre up to be scoured and made into top very shortly which is fantastic as we have an awful lot of it stockpiled at the Wool Board depot at South Molton.
The Stirling Moss of lawn mowing, Mr Chas Brooke, was out on his ancient ride-on mower last night going up and down at break neck speed grinning wildly. Honestly – men and their toys. The mower is an antique, over 20 years old, and every so often something crucial flies off it and many more hours are spent in the greasy barn. He said the engine was loose. Oh dear, that sounds serious, will we be able to avoid buying a new one for another year?
I started to wory about Joshua as he was out of contact for a few days and is travelling into Peru. Emails arrived yesterday and today so sanity of mother restored. They are in a beach town with lots of surfers and it is hot – marvellous.