Nundle Woolen Mills

 Nundle has been famous for the finest Merino Wool grown in the district and although the mill was first opened in 2001, it has antique machinery, some from Geelong in Victoria and I really enjoyed the tour. We watched how all the machines worked, and I learnt a lot, about how a simple ball of wool is produced. 

The mill also sells clothing, although very expensive in my mind, but the first thing that greeted me when I stepped inside was a wall of coloured wool. 

The mill is divided in two parts the 2nd room holds all the machines, in a downstairs area and more clothing, 12ply and 72 ply wool, plus bits and pieces to do with the wool, upstairs. So the tour is conducted with everyone overlooking the machines.

12ply and larger wool area

Looking from the 12ply area with machines down below.

Carding area of fleeces that are washed at Geelong, and rolled up onto large rollers at Nundle. The largest area of all.

Carded rolls into smaller bobbins

The back machines spin the wool, from the large carding rolls, onto the bobbins.

Bobbins being plyed

 The plied bobbins are then put onto a machine known as the hanker which winds them into the old fashion wool winding  hanks,we used to do around chairs when undoing an old jumper. This is done so it can be dyed. 

The wet and dyed hanks are spun in an ordinary washing machine and hung onto pvc pipes, to dry.They are then taken back to the machines and spun onto cones, and from there spun into balls of wool.

 Of course there is a lot more too it than that, they watch that the balls don't have knots or breakages, and if there is a knot when you are knitting it is the manufacturer trying to save money. The girls here pull the balls and put it into mixed bags for craft work, the quality of their wool is that you will find no annoying knots when knitting, or crotcheting.

Some of the left over carded wool is also put into what they call cheeses, for spinning. I got some to test out. I hope to spin a fleece this year but if I want to do more all of this is washed and carded, and ready for first spinning, without any hastle.

Will be an interesting experiment if nothing else.

So some of the highlights in the shop area. 

Washed, carded and dyed, but just weighed out clean fleece, ready for spinning.

Ashford spinning area with wool and silk hanks and patterns.

Sock wool ready for dying.

Sock wool I bought.

Nice apron with sheep on it.

It was a lovely couple of hours and have enclosed the link to all the machines videos in case you are interested. Scroll to bottom of  their page, to find them.

Wool Machine Videos

 

We didn't have any rain while away, so it is disappointing that back home again and it is still raining here, but occasionally a couple of hours of sunshine, so I hope it is moving away. The garden is a mess.

 

 

Till Next Time.  

A Trip to Nundle

 Last Easter we had to cancel our weeks holiday in Nundle, 57ks from Tamworth, due to the hail damage to our van, which was written off. We were given a credit so finally we have taken 5 nights of it and taken our new van on its maiden voyage.

This is our first full size van, so have had to work out what goes in the overhead cupboards, and although I have put containers and shelf extenders, most of the containers are empty, which will probably change on a longer holiday.

It is a lovely green park, and quite a few here. It is situated by a small river which was running fast due to the rain we left behind.

 The township very small country town with two highlights of the Nundle Woolen Mill and Odgen and McClellan Enchange Store, which the day we were there was filled with a bus load of tourists, so a popular place.

Lots of old type wares and I bought a metal pan and hearth brush for the fireplace, plus John got some copper tree labels for the Community Garden, ones that you etch names onto to last forever.

Nundle Township

There is so much in the store, you could easily spend an hour going over everything.

We have had a trip into Tamworth, which was extremely busy, and very long street and shops plus several complexes, although fairly modern, it felt a bit haphazard, and all over the place, but I suppose living here you would get used to it.  Had lunch in the park which I made before we left.

These statues were in the main street.

Tomorrow we are having a tour of the Woolen Mills so will talk about it next week. One thing for sure is I will have to remember to take my laptop on trips, doing a blog on a tablet is hard work. Also no internet so had to tether phone. 

Till Next Time.

Trip to Burleigh Heads

 We finally made it to Burleigh Heads to choose the colours of the new van. Had to leave at 6.15am for the 3 1/2 hrs. it took which was a bit of a shock to get up at 5, but managed to pack morning tea and lunch in time. What a beautiful day it was also, coolish in the morning but the day was lovely. We had morning tea at New Italy sitting on a log in the sun and arrived in time to the Caravan place for our 10am appointment.

Entrance area

 

The office was at the end of an entrance of caravans, and a fairly large back area.

Workshop are as they do repairs as well.

Walking back down a hill to the office.

The service was great tea first when we arrived and cappucino when we finished.

We checked out the van that was at the show as I liked the colours in that. We also had a 2nd look at the outside swirls and lines as we had to choose that as well. In the end chose aqua plain stripe with the Hinterland icon which had a sun and what represented leaves and again chose aqua, with silver/grey above the black metal around the bottom, and silver wheels.

This is a red version, but painted wheels was not our thing.

 The interior is white gloss cupboards around the top, and what I thought was grey is actually a bronze colour on the leather seats and cupboard doors, and a motley bronze/grey bench, and brown grain floor. 

Extras John added were a camera for backing and seeing cars behind as we drive, a heavy duty wire to hook up the big fridge separately to an anderson plug as we drive along, and a electronic stability control system so the van doesn't accidently sway and fishtail from the car in case of some accident, this makes the insurance cheaper as well. My thing to add was two 12 volt fans in the bedroom area one on either side as it is 2 single beds.

As it was nearly lunch time we headed down to the beach area. What a wonderful area Burleigh Heads has. Fabulous board walk and the beach was very clean. Loved the seat made to look like surfboards. 

Park seemed very busy for a Friday morning.

Gold Coast high rise in the distance.

Life saving area we overlooked.

On the way home we called in at Woodburn and had a coffee at the oldest cafe. There was a huge cup and saucer and next door John took a couple of photos at a gift shop while I waited. Luckily didn't go in looked really good, but we are saving hard at the moment. 

I would have bought a little dog if I had seen them.

So true.

As we were sitting there a huge flock of  Blue Eyed Cockatoos flew and landed in all the trees on the opposite side of the road and went to sleep. Amazing to watch. 

 

 It was a great day overall and lovely to get away from the house. Now we wait till maybe late August, as there is a bit of a backlog after the caravan show. Suits us as we can save more.

Till Next Time. 

Review of Synthetic Grass 3 years later.

 Back in February 2018, we renovated the front garden with new garden beds and false synthetic grass laid between them all. I must say it is the best thing we did. It has held up really well despite the very wet weather we get, hail and the hot humid summers.

It has been laid on weed mat and the grass itself is rubber backed. John has found the scraps as I want to experiment with it in the back garden, hopefully on the paving in front of the shed and  new roses and also in the back veg garden area to start with. We originally bought it from Bunnings so it wasn't too expensive, and comes on a roll by the metre.

Scraps from 3 years ago.

This garden is riddled with nut grass and I can only assume the rubber backing has made a huge difference as I have laid weed mat down before, and it grows right through. 

Some weeds do grow but it is on the surface and easily pulled up. The only problem I have found is at the edges, we allowed a little height of grass, but things grow up behind that.

Weeds growing in sides behind grass.

Surface weeds top left, probably zinnia seedlings.

I don't do anything special to look after it and it has taken a hammering from dirt, weeds, and prunings dumped on it. Pots filled with soil leaves a mark but it comes back when moved.

Today I decided to clean an area to show you. There has been a lot of leaves dropping and plants overgrowing because of the rain.

BEFORE ( path closest to the footpath) leaves and soil damp

This one adjoining it at a right angle.

Once pulling out all the minor weeds on the side I grabbed the straw broom and swept everything up.  Also cleaned some of the garden beds. It rained two days ago so was a bit damp.

AFTER  ( path closest to the foot path.)

After right angle one.

If I want to improve it a little more and be a bit OCD I could get the vacuum cleaner, to suck up the soil left after the sun drys everything out, but it will do.

Laying it down originaly

Would I buy it again? YES and in fact we are considering doing so and covering all the pavers with it. They are really hard to weed and we have two choices one to spray weed killer around every 6 weeks or so, then clean all that up. As I expect John to do that I can't see it being done on a regular basis. Two  is  to change it all over to grass then get it mowed, which is a lot of work pulling it all up, getting rid of the pavers, then getting the grass laid down. 

Current paving at the moment. 

This is hard to pull nut grass which is going to seed.

We will spray the whole garden once the weather settles to sunshine everyday, then go from there, maybe even get the Karcher out and I will pressure clean it all first. Definitely the steps will be concreted. I am getting too old to cope with this on top of weeding  the garden regularly, so something has to be done, and John doesn't want to move to an easier house and block, and spends a great deal of his time at or for the Community Garden, which is doing really well.  

The good news is we were notified Friday that we have the Caravan Insurance, after waiting for them to decide 7 weeks later. So booked a spot to go to Burleigh Heads to choose colours, but I liked the sample one gray and white, and will probably stick with that. Apparently now, the  company Pickles will come and get our old one and put it in to Auction, they do that for every caravan written off. Then we get the money. Things are looking up.

Till Next Time.