In a spin

All this...

I've dedicated a fair bit of time this summer to improving my very rudimentary spinning skills. I was fortunate in being given plenty of raw material on which to practice  - a mountain of raw Jacob fleece, dags an' all.

One sunny morning back at the end of June I spread the mass of smelly fleece out on the patio and sorted it into three piles, gently pulling out the dags and worst of the vegetable matter as I went. I ended up with three large garden refuse sacks of fleece - one for black wool, one for white and one for the mixed / grey fleece. Then, working on small batches at a time, I scoured the fleece and prepared the fibres for spinning.

...from this!

Something I've come to appreciate is that the key to a good yarn lies in the fibre preparation before spinning - no surprise there. For this reason, I've abandoned carders for combs. Picking through the fleece and carding just wasn't enough! There really were too many short fibres, neps (or should that be noils) and hard-to-remove bits and pieces for my inexperienced skills to cope with. This may have something to do with the fact that the sheep were not sheared with home spinning in mind and consequently less care may have been taken with the shearing. Carding produces more waste, but a smoother end product.

I've got three spindles: a top whorl, a Turkish (bottom whorl) and a Rakestraw. I've been practising with all three, but the one I feel most comfortable with at the moment is the Turkish spindle, so I'm sticking with that for the time being. There's been a bit of a learning curve and my first efforts were pretty dire. I've still got a long way to go, but I'm getting to the point now where I like what I've done and could see myself actually using the yarn.

The yarns are all singles as I intend to weave rather than knit - and, anyway, being self-taught, I haven't quite got to the bit in the book about plying yet.

I dyed the yarns myself using Ashford acid dyes and I'm really quite chuffed with the results. There is something so very satisfying about turning a mound of smelly fleece into a silky, smooth yarn with just a little effort and a minimum of equipment.

I must give the carders another go, though - perhaps when I get another fleece from a different breed to work on. These articles on fibre preparation seem quite useful.