Computer Repair

This evening was spent replacing the motherboard in my boys computer. I had help from Joseph (11), his hands are smaller and more supple than mine.

Seating Heat sink and moving RAM

Taking out cards and case fan.

Out comes old motherboard

Order is restored.

Upon booting up I had to set the date and time in the BIOS before windows would boot. Windows then decided it needed re-activating, due to the change in hardware. It would not activate over the Internet, it insisted I do it by telephone, but as it was past 10pm by then, there was no-one to answer the phone. I'll have to try again tomorrow.

Homespun Alpaca

I have been learning to spin for about 6 months and have already discovered that some wool is not as easy to spin as others.

When a friend on Ravelry happened to mention she knew someone with Alpacas I instantly asked her if I could have a go at spinning some of their fleece. So on Thursday she turned up at our knitting meeting with a big potato bag full of fleece which two of us shared between us.

I was so excited I wanted to get all the fleece out there and then to start sorting it, but I don't thing the owners or customers of the cafe we were in would have been very impressed. I managed to restrain myself until I got home.

The fleece is a lovely creamy white and is so soft. The fibres are really fine and tend to float about and attach themselves to my clothes.

I used my flick carder to tease the locks open and remove most of the vm, then passed the fibre through my drum carder (which Mick made for me).

The resulting batts were really soft and fluffy. I used my Kromski Mazurka which I had from Wingham Wool Work for Mothers Day.

I then plied 2 singles together before winding into skeins ready to set the twist.

Producing these skeins had hardly made a dent in the bag of fleece, so I have plenty of work to keep me going. I am finding it really relaxing and the fibre feels so wonderful as it slides through my fingers.
When it is all done, I will wind the skeins into balls to return to my friend, she is planning on knitting something for the owner of the alpacas from the yarn.