American Textile History Museum and some other random stuff

Here's another posting about a museum.
This one is pretty nifty. It's the American Textile History Museum in Lowell, MA and a real treat to visit. The first thing I noticed when I came in was of how clean and sharp it looks. There are motion activated lights everywhere and a lot, and I mean A LOT, of spinning wheels and looms! I won't try to describe what I saw, instead, I'm posting some pictures we took, which should give you a taste of the place and hopefully you too will visit this wonderful museum.

... and some other random stuff...

Jaywalker socks!
Yes, everyone has to make at least a few of these wonderfully comfortable socks.

The pair on the left I made for my Ma and the little bitty pair on the right is for me. I used US0 needles instead of US1 and handpainted merino yarn. I changed the pattern a little so that the socks would fit snuggly around my feet.
Oh, and here's a picture of a baby hat I made with the leftover yarn from my socks. I made it very thick and cozy.

... random skeins ...

These are made of various different wools I've collected and gathered here for some reason which I cannot remember now, but I liked the color progression. In case you're interested, from left to right they are: merino x corriedale, cormo x targhee (3), shetland/mohair, shetland/icelandic, merino, merino/silk, border leicester x rambouillet, merino x corriedale, and polypay. Wew! All skeins shown here, except for the shetland mixes, I processed from raw fleece. I dyed the shetland/icelandic with Wash Fast acid dyes and the shetland/mohair was dyed with tea by a nice lady, but all the rest are natural.