This week was full of lots of fibery fun.  Zoe is back to finish her internship and a brand new intern, Kate, started too!Thursday was FREEZING!  Zoe and I dyed fibers.  Within minutes the hot steaming fiber, hanging up to dry, turned into fibercicles.

Also, I made a couple new yarns.

Finished Handspun Yarn

One more made this last week too!  This one was a demonstration for Kate to show her how the drum carder and spinning wheel work.  Here’s the basket of fluff:

Because I was sharing the process with Kate, I missed taking a photograph of the carded batt.  Below is the picture of the finished yarn:

Lastly, the week was full of lots of new felted soaps:

Sorry for all the pictures and few words, but this week was crazy busy!

I had a massive dyed day the other day and guess what the major color theme was?  Yup!  Cupid just came along and puked pink all over the studio.  With Valentine’s Day coming up and spring just around the corner, it was time to bust out the pink shades. Here are the fibers hanging up to dry:

Once dried, I blended a few of the colors together with both more reds and some yellows and created these carded batts:

From the card batts I felted a few soaps.  Retail Stores want Valentine’s Day Soaps for their stores.

Giving soap to a loved one is a funny thought for the holiday of love.  They do make excellent teacher, family, or co-worker gifts.  Unless you need to tell your significant other they stink or to clean up their act….then by all means! Felted Soap is the perfect gift. 😉With the freshly dyed pink fibers, I also created a new “Fluff to String” handspun yarn.  Here is the basket of fluff:The Carded Batt:

The Finished Handspun Yarn:

This yarn is now available in our store. Check it out!

What are you up to for Valentine’s Day?  Do you have lots of crafty things in store?  I’d love to hear all about it. ♥

Here’s a quick little handmade gift you can make to give to all the Razorback fans in your life.  Of course, you can us different pasta, but we had these super cute Razorback Pastas and Woo Pig Soupie was a must make for our holiday gift giving.

This Christmas, I wanted to do something a little different. I try to give a little handmade something to my friends and my husband’s coworkers and boss every year.  In addition to the handmade cookies we make for my husband’s entire crew (what a production that is!).  One of my boys had a school fundraiser with pasta and I knew exactly what I had to make.  A dry soup mix in a jar is the perfect thing to give!

We gathered up all the materials and laid it all out on the island.  We made nine- 3 pint jars, it was quite the sight.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get any photos of the production line, but you can imagine! I bought the 3 Pint Jars at Hobby Lobby.

Here’s the dry ingredients you need to gather:

Carefully layer in this order: split peas, bouillon, barley, lentils, onion flakes, Italian seasoning, rice, and bay leaves. Place the pasta in a plastic bag or plastic wrap, and place in top of jar.At first, I really didn’t want to put the pasta in plastic just because of the look, but it does make it easier to remove for cooking.  If I make these again, just for looks and not for actual consumption, I would place the pasta directly in the jar with no wrap.

After much family debate, our youngest came up with the idea of calling the soups “Woo Pig Soupie” (he’s brilliant…must take after his mom HA!).

I used a Razorback ribbon to wrap around the top of the jar.  Then printed out the labels with instructions on how to cook and what extra ingredients need to be added.

Print a label to put on the soup with this information:

[box style=”rounded” border=”full”]ADDITIONAL INGREDIENTS: 2 pound ground beef, black pepper to taste, garlic powder to taste, 2 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes – undrained, 2 (6 ounce) can tomato paste, and 6 quarts water. TO PREPARE SOUP: Remove pasta from jar, and set aside. In a large pot over medium heat, brown beef with pepper and garlic; drain fat. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, water, and soup mix. Bring to a boil, then turn heat to low. Cover, and simmer for 45 minutes. Stir in the pasta, cover, and simmer 15 to 20 minutes, or until the pasta, peas, lentils and barley are tender.[/box]

Because all of our friends are not Razorback fans (can’t believe we have such people in our lives…I know 😉 ), we also made a Roll Tide Soup with Alabama pasta and a Rock Chalk Jayhawk Woo Pig Soupie (for a house divided with 1/2 cup Jayhawk Pasta and 1/2 cup Razorback Pasta).  The possibilities are really endless…but of course I love my Razorbacks, so in my book, “Woo Pig Soupie” is the best!

Hope you had a very Merry Christmas holiday season and a happy and safe New Year celebration.  We here at The Twisted Purl are looking forward to 2014 and all the fun things it will bring.