A Little Spinny

I recently received a pair of carders (that's those wooden spiky brush things in the picture), as well as a little wool, a wool winder and some inspiration.  I have spent my time learning to card and make rollags.  Rollags are what you get when you roll the carded fleece off the carders to make spinning that much easier.

It's all about the prep work and understanding what it takes to go from the freshly shorn sheep to the completed garment.  You wash it several times to get the fleece clean.  You pick it to get the various bits of grass, seed, wood, sawdust, moss, and other bits and pieces of stuff you wouldn't want to spin into your wool.  Then the wool is dyed or left in it's natural state depending on what you want to do with it.  After dyeing there is more picking... It seems you never get all the stuff in the fleece, you'll be looking at it and suddenly see something in the shadows... lo and behold it's more detritus.  Then you card it, which is taking two wire brushes and pulling them in opposite directions to get all the fibers in the same direction for better spinning results.  Once that is done, you spin it all up, and if you are so inclined you ply it, but you can leave it as a single.  Once that is done you have your yarn and it's up to you what you make, but you still have to make the item.  This is what I do.  From start to finish I can create a garment.  I love the work, there is something extraordinary about sitting there and peacefully picking through fleece, cleaning, carding, spinning and then knitting (my preferred method so far).

I just spent the better part of 4 days picking through some lovely dyed fleece that was given to me.  I was certain it wouldn't take more than a day, but by day two I knew just how compact  that fiber was.  I have enough for at least 7 full spindles which is 4 ounces each... That's just under 2 pounds of fleece.   There is more fleece in the offing and a bakers dozen of acid dyes for me to play with.  when I say more fleece, I mean it... I'm not sure how much there is, but it fills one of those clear garbage bags over halfway.  That's a lot considering it's in it's raw form.  It needs to be scoured, dyed, picked and cleaned, spun and turn into something glorious, but right now I'm catching up.

The same friend who brought me all that fleece also went to Fibrations, a place where fiber fanciers meet and sell their goods and have a wonderful time showing off and discussing their passion for what else... fiber.  Next year I'm going, nothing could keep me away.  While she was there, spinning on her wheel, she picked up some Romney dyed fleece in a gorgeous blue for me.  So I went to work and spun my finest and most even thread so far.

 I like the way it turned out, and it's so soft.  This needed something regal made from it.... so I started my search while I was picking and cleaning the delicious blue and purple mix, to find me a pattern I would like.  I checked out shawls, and cowls in abundance and finally have settled on a wimple.  Once it's done I"ll be posting the outcome, but for now all you get to see is the wool.

So this is what my last month has been filled with, woolly adventures in spinning, dyeing, cleaning and prepping.  And of course I chose to switch things up during a blue moon and return to my passion for knitting,  which is what started all this need for spinning in the first place.

Prepping A Fleece From Start To Finish - day 1, washing

I have some fleeces in my clostand today I'm working with Prime Lincoln sheep.  This has been untouched from the time it was shorn so of course it's full of bits and bobs of grass and dirt and other things that sheep roll in or walk through.  It still has its curl in it, and looks a right mess, but in its own way there is beauty.

As you can see it looks like there are some grey locks.  This is a white fleece, so that's not the color of the fleece that's dirt. Small sticks, bits of bracken, and grass and seed, lay tangled in the fleece, as well. All of that needs to be gotten rid of before I can go on to the next step of the process.
The next step is to fill the sink full with soapy water, I use cheap dollar store dish soap, it works well at lifting out the dirt, because I'm not going to agitate it at all.  Agitating will cause the wool to felt, and I don't want that. I'm going to be spinning this up.  I keep the water warm and then gently plunge the locks in and leave to soak, I ensure that all the locks are covered in water.

Almost immediately there is a brown tinge to the water as the fleece soaks.    After about half an hour I remove the locks to a large bowl.  I carefull pick them up and allow the water to drain out.  I avoid the desire to ring to squeeze, to otherwise felt the wool.  The water now looks like this:

It's pretty gross, and the wool is still dirty,  I give it a rinse soak, this one is short, about 5 minutes or so.  And then it's time to remove the wool, very carefully again, like I did the last time and it's going to soak in suds again, for another half hour.

As you can see the water is less brown, and only a bit of detritus remains, but it's still pretty murky, so I fill the sink with more suds.  The wool isn't clean yet, by a long shot; however, it is looking better. More white, less grey.  We're getting close and now onto the third rinse.

I keep the water roughly the same temperature for each rinse.  It's important not to shock the wool and could possibly mat it and felt it.  This could take a while, but it's worth it in the end.  My last fleece, Angora Goat, which is also known as mohair, took 5 soaks in the kitchen sink.  I like to use the kitchen sink as it's just the right size for the amount I'm washing and it's easy to scour it up and disinfect it after.  I don't like to  use plastic because it is porous.  Hard to clean, hard to keep clean and I don't want to cross contaminate fleeces when I wash them.  Now it's time to let the soak do it's job and remove more dirt.  Another half hour wait.

As you can see each wash becomes less murky.

The fleece becomes more clean.
It's a slow process and my batteries have just died on my camera, so I'll keep you up to date on how many soaks and rinses there has been.  I'm putting it in the last soapy rinse.  I don't want to remove every last shred of lanolin in the wool.  I just want it clean.  It's soaking for another half hour and then it will be clear water rinses until the water runs clear.  I'm not worried about getting all the detritus out of the fleece, that will come later in the picking and fluffing/teasing part.  Ah but I get ahead of myself.
The water is not nearly so murky after the third soapy rinse, and the next 3clear rinses were much quicker.  The water is much more clear, not murky, just a little dirty.  I let each of these successive rinse sit for about 5 minutes.

The next step is something I do to get the water out.  I put it in a mesh laundrey bag, like you would use for washing nylons, or fine washables. and I hang it over the faucet in the bathtub until no more water is runing out.  I don't like to squeeze, I can't emphasize that enough.

After the water stops running out of the bottom, I give a very light squeeze to the bag, yes now you squeeze, just to make sure the water, which will have pooled at the bottom of the bag, is removed.  Now for the towel.  Like when you hand wash a wool sweater, you put the fleece in a towel.  And then you press down on the towel to soak up as much residual water as possible.

The next step is the final one for the wash aspect.  You hang to dry.  I find a nice shady spot and hope for clouds.  I like it to air dry as much as possible, outside.  It still has a lot of stuff in it, but that's ok, because you will be picking that stuff out later. Tthis way works best for me.  I hang the towel as well.  It's the one I always use for wool and I keep it separate.  As you can see, the wool is much cleaner than when we started and it can be dyed or spun then dyed or kept pristine.
I put a day aside for washing.  In total there were 3 soapy washes, 5 clear rinses.  What I have discovered is that working with fleece is a slow process from getting the fleece to the finished product.  You slowly and carefully wash wool, clean it, spin or felt it, dye it, turn it into an item whether you knit, weave, crochet.  You take your time and are rewarded with something that will last a long time, keep you warm and you can proudly say you made it from start to finish.  It is especially exciting when the product you are processing is locally sourced, as mine was.
I like this process, it just takes a little planning and knowing you will be home for the day.