Still Picking, Carding and Spinning

Another day at peaceful "Davenport Pines" and another day spent picking, carding and then spinning more of the Border Leicester...a total of 14 ounces finished...are you kidding me? I have spent the last 3 weeks of my life doing this and I only have 14-ounces of singles...not even plied...yarn to show for it!! And how many POUNDS of fleece do we still have to pick, card and spin...don't even ask. However, the singles are gorgeous (if I do say so myself) and they have been moved to two storage bobbins to let the 'spin settle' before they are plied. We just purchased two (we never do things simply) flickers and I am looking to decide which tensioned Lazy Kate I will purchase because plying is the part I find most stressful. It is so nice that DH gets just as involved in all of this as I do and it is also great to have a knitting friend...the one responsible for the fleeces in the first place...to do all of the washing and hand-carding the Dorset. We are hoping to be knitting with this GLORIOUS :-) (Leicester) yarn by winter! We are just not saying which winter...Ha!

Fleece Factory

When we do something, we do not step lightly...instead we dive in with both feet, a couple of legs and both arms. Thus continues our fleece adventures. A knitting friend has a neighbor who raises Border Collies and, of course, needs to also own sheep to train them with. Friend talks to neighbor; neighbor says sheep are being sheared and I will just dispose of the fleece; friend says, "Oh, no!"; neighbor says do you want the fleece?; friend says "Of course!" and I will share it...and that is how we became part owners of six (yes, 6) 32-gallon garbage bags full of fleece in the grease! Granted, it is VERY nice fleece...Border Leicester and Dorset. The Leicester is especially beautiful with nice locks, nice crimp, very long staple length and exceptional colors...silver, shades of grey and golden tips...see photo. When it comes off the carder it looks like a 'fall of luscious hair'.

It spins beautifully although, as expected, since it is Leicester, the yarn is not lofty but feels quite 'sturdy'. The colors show up beautifully in the singles and I am looking forward to seeing the plied yarn.

The dorset is white with more crimp and shorter staple but cards up to a fluffy white cloud. This also spins up nicely and, since the staple length is shorter than the Leicester, I find it easier to spin. My friend is still washing...I think she has 2 more bags to go and we are still carding and I don't want to think about how much more fleece we have before us to card...I am thankful that we bought a drum carder but I wish it was electric! We never expected to turn into a Fleece Factory here at Davenport Pines.

The saga continues with said friend visiting the exhibit on fashioning felt at the Cooper Hewitt Museum in NYC (http://www.cooperhewitt.org/EXHIBITIONS/Fashioning-Felt/ ) and deciding that next we now have to learn to felt fleece and, of course, learning to dye the white (some is Dorset and some is Border Leicester) with natural dyes is also on the agenda. It is a never-ending story of 'Truth, Justice and the American Way'...or something.

To Card or To Comb?

On this beautiful Spring day (the heat wave of the past 5 days is over...for now) the birds are singing, the sun is shining, the Crab Apple looks like a white cloud & the Cherry trees are in full bloom , violets are peeking out all over the place and I should be out in the gardens weeding and cleaning up the winter debris; but, I am still washing my Gotland fleece...my puny 14-ounces of fleece...I am on the third day of fleece washing...what will happen when I get POUNDS of the stuff??

Yesterday, DH & I set up my new Strauch Petite drum carder and I just had to try to card some of this fleece I have been diligently washing and rinsing and washing and rinsing and...well, I now understand why Stephanie Pearl-McPhee is so picky about how she washes fleece...I just put mine into the wash pot, then into the mesh spinning bag and then onto the drying rack...didn't worry about keeping locks and fibers lined up...now, what a mess! it will take me forever (OK, an exaggeration, but you get the point) to get this all carded. I have to tease each lock and this fiber is VERY curly & VERY crimpy (see photo), so to try to line up the fibers just a little before sending it into the carder is tedious...to say the least. I spent about an hour and just got 1 rolag completed...I had to send it through the carder 3 times! However, when I finished and removed the rolag from the carder it was glorious...like a light gray cloud and so incredibly soft I had to keep 'petting' it...and it spun like a dream. Yes, I had to sit right down and spin a part of the first carded bit...the blend of colors in the yarn was fabulous. But my question, to all you Master Fleece Preparers out there, is should I buy a set of combs and comb the curly, crimpy fleece first before carding? I do want to spin wooly, but not fuzzy.

The timer just went off...down to empty the 3rd rinse (the one with the vinegar in it) and then a final quick rinse, a spin and then set out to dry. Only one more batch to go. Yes! Now I need a good cup of tea...what will it be? How about a lovely Tippy Yunnan...that will make the carding go better...sure!

My Very First Fleece!

When I started spinning, everyone told me that I would soon buy a fleece so I could start 'at the very beginning' (well not quite, since that would mean raising the sheep! and I definitely will NOT be doing that! Right!) and I said 'Oh, no, not me'! Ha! That didn't last long. I started slowly...just 14-oz of the most beautifully clean fleece you can imagine...that is certainly the best way to start (Stay around for the next fleece story-and yes, there already is one!) The photo on the right is the unwashed fleece - gorgeous, isn't it. The sheep breed is a Gotland and if you spinners out there don't know about this breed and its fleece and wool, I would definitely suggest you check it out. Today I spent a good deal of the afternoon washing the first 2-oz...not because it really takes that long but because I had never done it before. This fleece was so clean that I only had to do one washing in detergent and then 3 rinses.

Here it is in the wash pot (which is a very large kettle with strainer I bought for only this purpose...since I now know I will be doing a lot of this washing of fleece!). It took me most of the morning to remember where I had put the detergent a friend of mine gave me for this purpose...surprise, it was found with the other washing detergents...who would have guessed. My compost/soil screen was cleaned up to serve as the drying rack; placed on top of 4 cans of beets - to let the air flow underneath - and placed on my screened-in front porch to dry out of the sun and out of the way of critters. With the very hot weather we are having in the Garden State, I am sure this will be dry by tonight and that means tomorrow I will be able to wash more of this glorious fiber. Once all of the fleece is washed and dried, I will card it into batts (since I am planning to spin it woolen) on my brand new :-) Strauch Petite drum carder. Then the fun continues as I spin it and knit it...with any luck my DH may have his new sweater by the winter of....2010!

Spinning, Fleece and Spring

Spring is here...sunny, deep blue skiy and lots of daffodils and forsthyia looking like sunlight...but the temperatures are still in the 30's at night and mid-40's by day...which is just the way I like it. Spinning is going very well with 4 yarns completed...3 of them waiting for the project to be knit with while the bulky singles spun with heathered grey/brown Jacob roving has become a pair of Maine Morning Mitts and I look forward to wearing them on our next Maine sojurn.

Finished spinning the Fallen Leaves roving...that's it on the right...gorgeous colors and so lofty...it will become a vest with a shawl color.

Bought my first fleece last week...Yea!! Gorgeous shades of grey with a hint of gold Gotland with a wonderful staple and crimp and very clean with light grease...it should be easy to clean and card and as this is my first attempt at both, I am glad that is the case. Later roday I will be picking up my next fleece (yes, that is addictive too), an English Leiscester that a knitting friend has arranged. My knitting friend will also be getting a fleece because, even though she doesn't spin (yet!) she wants to learn about the process of turning sheep wool into yarn. We will work together and that will make it lots more fun. The adventures continue!

Winter Knitting

Seems like all I want to do anymore is knit and then knit some more and then spin and then knit again...I realize that this is not all bad...but I accomplished almost nothing else during the entire month of January and I still have to update my website and complete writing, editing and mailing the winter issue of the Tea-and-Roses Quarterly before the winter is over!! My 'sock knitting addiction' keeps growing and I have three different pairs on needles right now...I am totally committed to the Magic Loop method of sock knitting and next time I will be casting on two socks at once...no more second-sock-syndrome for me. We have had a wonderful winter in NJ...lots of cold weather and just enough snow to keep everything white but not really get in the way of life (unlike the poor people in the Midwest) since before Christmas and I really don't want it to end...no I am not crazy...I just love cold weather, snow and warm hand-knit socks (so does my DH) and turtlenecks and warm hand-knit sweaters and a raging fire in the fireplace and a steaming cup of tea and my knitting needles and hand-dyed and/or hand-spun yarn and my books (when I need a brief respite from knitting and spinning), good music (listening to the Met's production of Lucia di Lammermoor as I type)...doesn't get much better than that...IMHO :-)

Fingerless Gloves...aka: Gauntlets

Many people on my Christmas list will be receiving Gauntlets this year. They knit up fast, come in all varieties of patterns...with and without thumbs, and they really do keep your hands warm. They only need a small amount of yarn and so are perfect to knit using my hand-spun of which I only have small amounts of. Wrapped in a festive bag with a tin of 'Tea-and-Roses' own Fireside tea blend, this gift will help keep my friends and family warm on a cold Winter's night.