Belated MDSW Post

Since my last post, I've been doing a heck of a lot of craft stuff. The most notable was participating in the medieval textiles demonstration at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

I showed off sprang. There I am warping my cheap-ass sprang loom (picture taken by the other person doing sprang at the festival).

New Clothes
Because I have no evidence of sprang being used in early 16th century Spain, I decided to make a set of viking clothes. A new chemise/smock in 3.5 oz white linen and a new dress in lightweight yellow wool gabardine, and an apron dress in fulled black/olive wool that had a not-quite checkered pattern before fulling.

The chemise and dress both have rectangular construction and tapered sleeves. I now have a "good enough" pattern for making more smocks of this style. I want to check a few sources, but I think the pattern with a different neckline will also work for Spanish dresses. I could probably make these dresses fit a bit tighter, and still they'd be OK, and that might be worth working on for the next attempt.

I made the apron dress out of some lovely wool I had sitting around. I fulled the wool, which in hindsight was a mistake. The fabric didn't full evenly the first time around, so I had to try again, the dress is shorter than I really want it, and the lovely drape of the original fabric is completely gone. I think I'll be using this fabric for shoe mockups and hats and other sturdier things.

Festival Loot
While I was at the festival, I picked up a set of Viking combs and a big back of fleece from a black Romney sheep (cue Baa Baa Black Sheep song), and a handful of honey straws from the Bee Folks whose website is currently unavailable.

Related Projects
Since then I've been adding more finishing touches to the yellow dress for the Viking outfit. I'm finishing all the seams with a line of running stitch in red crochet cotton (it's what I had available), and when that's done, I'll hem it.

I've also been cleaning and prepping the Romney for spinning. A wash in the bathtub to get most of the smell off, then scouring a smaller batch in the sink to get most of the lanolin off, then a righteous combing to make it fluffy. I tried spinning some of that on my spindle last night. I'm either going to need to do more prep or use the wheel so I don't have to worry about the weight of the spindle as I draft the fiber. Since I want more of a woolen yarn than a worsted one, I think I shall go with the wheel because hand-carding takes AGES.