Silk Reeling at SOAR

I had a full day with Michael Cook (aka wormspit) in his class on reeling silk.  We were in a separate lodge and the class was small.  He went over different types of silk and he did some demos and pretty much set us all loose.

The class was too short and in hindsight I should have signed up for his three day workshop instead.

I did not get to the silk hankie pulling and just barely finished the plied skein sample.

My head was ready to explode with all the information he provided but we did the following things.

Heated water and started reeling silk the Laos way.

Made a skein for degumming to come later that day.  I had enough time to make another skein that wasn't degummed for practice at home.

Reeled silk the Japanese way with fewer cocoons for a twisted and plied skein.

This was a multi-step process as we were hooking the silk all over the room to ensure that the fiber was dry before winding onto the bobbin.

I plied two strands together and divided it up into three for our little group since the process took too long for each of us to take a turn.

The degumming happened after lunch and I was trying to finish my plying and missed the hankie demonstration.

Michael added some information about washing and rinsing, but by the end of the day, my brain could not add anymore information.  Good thing he provided a booklet of information on what we covered.

All I know is that I need to buy more equipment as the process is awesome.  I'm having all sorts of ideas.

Michael also spun and wove his hotel card holder around his neck with the QR code.  Since I don't have a smart phone, Jeri's husband scanned each one - there were three, front flap, inside front, and the back.  All had information which was totally cool.