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I have 1000 silkworm eggs, or it’s my Birthday!

happy-birthday

If you have the new Spin Off mag, you have probably read the fantastic article by Michael Cook about Growing your own silk, and his in depth website Wormspit.

Well, I fell in love with the little wiggly spinners. A relatively new spinner, and I have only spin with a silk hankie (or matwatas) once. But I knew I had to have some of the voracious little guys.

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I’m planning on letting them all live out their natural life span, all of the info I have found indicate that if you desire the silk for thread, the worm must be killed while in the cocoon (the cocoon is one long filament), but if using to spin, it is not necessary to do that. More info at Peace silk

016Here are my eggs

My husband had asked me “is there anything you would like me to get you for your birthday?”. And so  as I set out on an adventure, come with me on my wormy quest for silk.

I hope to be able to make some silk hankies and dye them. I found a nice tutorial on how to dye them by Constance Rose Textile Design

Here is a tutorial on how to spin them from Clever Crafty Foxy

Photos to follow soon, I hope…

Comments

  1. Happy birthday! That looks like a very interesting project. I hope you keep us informed.

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  2. Happy Birthday! Good luck with your eggs, you'll have to keep us updated!

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  3. Oops... sorry I'm a day late on your birthday... but hope you had a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY yesterday!

    I'll have to say... I've heard of some unusual gifts before.... but never 1,000 Birthday Worms!

    Can't wait to see the photos of your wormy spinning and dyeing.

    Oh, and a "P.S." here..... I've abandoned the Magic Loop and the two circs at once (at least for the time being) because I found out - to my surprise - that I'd rather knit socks on DPN's! Took the socks off the magic loop yesterday, transferred them to DPN's and it's much easier and faster for me. Live and learn!

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  4. Happy birthday. Mine was on the 18th. I had no idea ours were so close. Hope the silkworms workout!!!

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  5. Happy Birthday, Vicki.
    Good luck with all those little silk worms. A few years ago I thought that I would venture into raising silk worms but decided against it because of a lack of Mulberry trees for food. I loved reading the Spin Off article on wormspit. There are a couple of silk groups on Ravelry that you might be interested in.

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  6. Very nifty. My mother's family had silkworms in Laos.

    Also, Happy Birthday!

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