What Do You Do With That Stockpile of Wool and Fiber?

As I said last post, we have a stockpile of wool and fiber. After combing the six pounds sheep's wool, it was still coarse and somewhat scratchy to the touch. It would not be suitable for a sweater or anything close to the skin unless you used a ton of fabric softener when you washed it. I even used baby shampoo and no more tangles on this wool to no avail. It was slick enough the spin to easily, but I knew with the first hand washing that nice feeling would be gone. It has a very nice crimp to it so when you spun it, it held the twist. The staple length was a passable 4" with longer back pieces of 5".

 I know that was a lot of spinning or raw wool jargon in the previous paragraph. But what I'm wondering whether to take the time to spin this gifted wool or not. I guess I could sell it as felting wool. I'd turn over the profits to the person that gifted me the wool. It's only right. With such a short staple length, it would require a greater number of twists per inch, but that isn't the problem because pure angora yarn is the same. Plying or taking the each strand of of spun wool and spinning them together would take 4 to 8 plies to make a usable weight for outerwear. Again like working with angora  except I'd have to heavily lotion my hand and heavily spritz the wool while spinning it.

I was thinking of this pattern

I'm concerned with the yardage. If I made mittens or a hat with the yarn, they'd have to be lined. But, I was thinking more like a coat. The coloring of the wool (dark brown with flecks of gold and tan), would make a gorgeous coat. The coarseness of the wool wouldn't matter. If only the processed wool was softer.  Even six pounds of wool, I may get 6.600 yards of worsted weight spun yarn. As any experienced knitter will tell you, that's pushing it mighty close if you are knitting a coat. For me, it would take  5, 184 yards of yarn (double strands of yarn throughout) not to mention enough yarn to frog (make it wrong) and the amount of yarn to sew the seams. It also depends on how tight you knit. These days, I knit pretty loose. Remember, I'm knitting one handed. This doesn't leave much error room. If I knit it perfectly with no waste, I could make some matching fingerless gloves to go with it, but I doubt it. For me, unless I've made two or more of a particular item, I'll frog it several times until it's finished. This is why I pick one pattern for (socks or sweaters) in a year and knit several pair. My brain can't handle multiple patterns at a time anymore.

Cath 2012

I only kept three pounds of the ten pounds of the pure, English angora fiber from our rabbits this year. If I knew I would losing 90% of them this year, I would have kept more instead of selling it. Once it is spun into yarn, I'll have enough yarn to knit my daughter in Alaska a couple of hats and vest. If I blend it with the other fiber rabbit's fiber and an equal amount of merino wool I have she might get a sweater for her next birthday. She's tiny and might wear a x-small, and have room to spare.

A lot of time has passed since this picture was taken, but she's still as tiny. No fat to speak of except in her bust area. With all the hiking and sports the family is involved with, I don't expect her to suddenly convert to my side of the family's body type anytime soon. Her aunt on my ex's  side is still wears little girl's size clothes at age 58. The only time either woman weighed over 100 lbs was when they were pregnant.

The four lbs of alpaca fiber will be blended 50/50 with merino wool to make a nice sweater for Mel eventually. I may just bead it with small pearls. Nah! Mel ain't that type of girly girl. I made her a cashmere shawl for our first Christmas together here. She hasn't worn it once. I'm half tempted to take it back and knit her a hat or maybe some socks instead. Now I could take the cream colored cashmere and bead it with crystals and I could sell it for a pretty penny. Would that make me an Indian giver?

Decisions, decisions, but that's half the fun of making your own yarn. The possibilities are endless.

Y'all have a blessed day!

Cockeyed Jo

Cockeyed Spinning

 Merry Christmas y'all~ I'm on the road homeward bound. Remember- 

Keep Christ in Christmas!

Preparing fiber to spin is quite labor intensive when dealing with sheep's wool. It has to be washed to get most of the lanolin, vegetable matter, and other things out of the wool. Then it is combed and possibly blended with other fibers before you can sit at your spinning wheel.

Before I moved here I bought a whole merino fleece. I think the total weight was 7 lbs of usable fiber by the time I skirted it and got the second cuts (very short fibers) out of it. I used the suint method of washing the
wool. The suint method is a hands off, less labor intensive way of cleaning sheep's wool. It's basically a rain water fermentation process that takes a full week to halfway accomplish. After it's soaked and rinsed, it is sun dried. It sure beats the traditional way of washing wool in the sink bit by bit and matching water temperatures so the wool doesn't felt.

After it's dry, there may be another step or two involved before the actual spinning can take place. The sheep's wool has to be aerated or picked into fluffy clouds so that it doesn't clump. I've bought a picker for this. If you are spinning locks, that's a different type of spinning all together. Then, you have a choice whether to spin from a cloud or comb it out into batts or rolags. Combing the fibers aligns all the fibers in the same direction. Before my stroke, I spun in all the different variations.

Since my strokes, I prefer batts or rolags. It's just easier to draw and spin. I predraft my fiber to make up for my one handedness. I can hold the bulk down in my lap with my affected arm. It took me two years to teach myself spinning one-handed to get  a fairly consistent end product. I'd been spinning on my great-great-grandmother's wheel since I learned how to spin as a child. When I got that spinning wheel upon my mother's death, my love of spinning became a winter pastime for me. I was determined to get it back after my first and subsequent strokes.

Once I conquered spinning one handed, I donated my great-great-grandmother's wheel to a museum. It had become rickety with age and and to have a craftsman rebuild it would have taken away from it's antique value of the wheel. I bought an electric spinning wheel from Heavenly Handspinning. Jan and her husband are terrific people. Great customer service! And because I ordered it as a birthday present for me, she threw in a free carrying case for me. Now, they live just 30 minutes away from me since I moved up to north GA. No more shipping charges and a quick road trip for me. LOL

I rarely work with sheep's wool anymore. I only use it to blend merino wool with my angora. I buy it in roving form and pick it apart. This will change if we get the Baby Doll sheep I want in the future. But now, I mainly work with angora and/or alpaca fiber for spinning. Neither one has lanolin to have to wash out so no more washing before spinning. Both fibers are very easy to felt so I save the washing for after I've spun it into yarn. I'll comb it out with hand cards and go to my spinning wheel. It's a much simpler process.

Mel mentioned before I moved in with her, that she wanted to learn how to spin. She even built her own spindle and then a spinning wheel. I bought her an Ashford Traveler wheel (first picture) the first Christmas together. She's slowly working up to spinning on it after almost three years. She first had to learn the basics of fiber prep before spinning. That's how my grandmother and mother taught me. First things first. She already knew how to groom the rabbits.

I can now enjoy watching TV while I spin again, while with her it still takes heavy focus. There's a definite learning curve getting you foot and hands moving in different directions. The focus is the hard part for her with her ADD issues, but she'll get there with time and practice. Her favorite way to spin is from a cloud of fiber. This, for her, produces a single ply, thick and thin yarn. I prefer consistent sized strands that are plied together. I've had a lifetime to gain this ability. If she keeps at it, she'll be there in no time.

In truth, our differences make a blended cockeyed homestead work. To each their own with a common goal in mind. She'll have an idea for this or that, and I'll guide and egg her on slowly until completion. It's like this for preserving food stuff too. Mel bought a 23-qt pressure canner and a water bath canner before I got here, but she never canned anything with them. She had nary a canning jar around. The same thing went for her dehydrator, meat and grain grinders. Along comes Jo who knew how to use such items and brought her own as well. I put all of them to use.Come to find out, she detests preserving food stuff. Just helping me, she would look heavenward for patience. That's okay. Together, we have a storeroom and freezer filled with food. We both love that. Two different outlooks for a common goal.

That's it for this week.

Y'all have a blessed day.

Jo