In April 2018, I bought a beautiful Romney fleece from Lochan Mor Farms in Cato, NY. It was a bit muddy, but we'd had a "build an ark" rain all spring, and it rained in the days before shearing. The shearer did an amazing job, so there wasn't much I needed to do before… Continue reading Bailey’s Fleece: Romney
Category: washing
Rysa & the 6 Skeins: The Belly Wool
Who decided that Shetland was a good idea for this challenge? Oh, right. Here's me paying the price. I only had 50ish grams of washed belly wool to work with and a good part of that was grass and felted bits. The fiber is tender in spots, so I tested frequently as I picked. I… Continue reading Rysa & the 6 Skeins: The Belly Wool
Rysa and the 6 skeins
Meet Rysa. She's a lovely bellwether Shetland ewe at Trinity Farms. Today I am separating out her fleece to make six different skeins of yarn- one from each of the following body areas: neck, sides, britch, belly, shoulders, back. My goal is to spin for a purpose suitable to the fiber characteristics. I'm going to spin… Continue reading Rysa and the 6 skeins
Processing Fleece by the Pound
Normally when I buy a whole fleece, it comes looking something like this beautiful Shetland fleece on the left. It unrolls, and I can lay it out on the skirting table. It's easy to see the different areas of the fleece, break it into similar types of fiber, skirt what needs skirting, & check for… Continue reading Processing Fleece by the Pound
Alkaline Scouring: Washing with Fels-Naptha soap
alkaline scouring with fels-naptha soap
Spindles In the Wild 