Advent: December 1st

For my first Advent picture I’ve chosen this scene just down the road from my home. I liked the way the late afternoon sunlight was bleaching out the hills in distance and backlighting the dried and curled leaf caught by the wool on the wire. A few seconds earlier some curious sheep had been observing me through the fence until a pickup drove past with a dog in the back; it barked and the sheep scattered. Their wool is trapped on the wires on the fence where they’ve rubbed along it and when I was a little girl living in town I used to collect wool from the fences and hedges on country walks and try to “finger spin ” it. I could never understand how the wool could ever become yarn to knit with and make clothes; the short lengths I wrapped around my little fingers kept unravelling no matter how much I twisted.

Now I both keep sheep and spend much of my time working with wool – spinning, dyeing, knitting, weaving, felting – both for my own pleasure and for my job. The image of the wool on the fence with the sheep behind made me feel like I’d come full circle…