Sheepish!

Rana's sculpt auditioning the types of straight-off-the-sheep/goat wool that will become the finished puppet's hair! The dark wool on top is my order of Drenthe Heath washed fleece, the bottom is the Gotland. The African photo with mud coated braids is a goat horn idea I'm considering for part of Rana's hair style.

"How much grey would you like in Rana's hair?" The Slovakian living in Scotland "Shepherdess" asked. It was like having an entire flock of Highland sheep standing by to grow Halfland's main character's hair to order!

A very cool thing happened recently to Halfland. I follow the blog of a super nice and impressively talented experimental fiber artist, named Monika Lamackova, where she displays step-by-steps for some of her creations/materials/process, etc. (Some deliciousness of which she often sells on her Soft Fibre Etsy.)

One day she posted some Gotland sheep fibre for sale that had such wonderful natural curls and mixture of white with dark that I lusted for it to use as the goat woman Rana's hair. And I could afford it I recall it was like $6. When I explained in an email its purpose here she asked me what my wish was for the mix of shade! I got the feeling I could have requested any color of hair and pictured a flock of animals with a wide range of hues standing on a hill waiting for Monika to come along with a set of sharp shears to clip off a variety of shades to put in my package!

How exotic to receive these packages from generous Monika from such a faraway beautiful land. Over the months I've also bought a few ounces of Wensleydale washed fleece and Scottis Blackface (white) and Hebredean (black) wool for other characters as well as a few actual Woad Seeds because my natural dye loving soul needed them. (She has always included a wee fibre giftie in the pack as well to my absolute delight.)

Can you believe the people we all get to meet/connect with because of the Web?! I can't really get over it.