Fleece

Alpaca Farm Days & Hat Tags

/ LDSVenus / 8 Comments

Ok, as promised :). The top pictures from left to right – The first picture is my son’s sock machine, it was rather windy – you can see the yarn blowing in the breeze, lol. He can whip out a pair of socks in about an hr, pretty cool huh? It’s made of metal and he lets the kids that come take turns turning the handle making a tube, they love it. Next picture is my spinning wheel, a Rick Reeves double drive wheel. It’s the smallest of my two wheels and will actually fit in the back seat of my car. My Kromski Polonaise is much bigger and would have to be taken apart to travel in my car, and nope not gonna do that! I’m not as sharing with my wheel at the event, it’s not replaceable, lol. I spin and people watch and ask questions that I am very happy to answer about the alpaca fiber and the wheel and making yarn, I do let them feel the alpaca fiber :). That cria fiber spins like a dream!! The 3rd picture is my son’s drum carder that he makes batts with for the dryer balls he sells at his farm store. I have two and put lavender on them before they go in the dryer, makes my clothes smell nice :). Behind the drum carder you can see his little tractor, that makes it easier for all the farm stuff he and Ev have to attend to. The 4th picture is the skirting table he made so it would be easier for them to skirt the fleeces and let the dirt fall to the ground and behind that you can see the frame with seats he made and attached on the trailer (that he pulls with the tractor) for hay rack rides he does once a week, everyone seems to enjoy the ride and the fire pit making smores afterwards :). My son is very handy with making things. The bigger picture to the left are his pea fowl and a family member who came to help. The peacock is starting to color out on the feathers on his back and a little on his tail, but it will be another 2 years before he has full color on all his feathers. He already looks at himself in the mirror that my son set out for him, the peacock is a narcissist, lol. The next 3 pictures to the left are of some of his herd. I did cover up faces of two people who were there because I didn’t get to ask them if they minded being in my blog. The last of those 3 pictures is the newest cria that was born a month ago, they call him Wish, but his full name is Wish Upon a Star, because his mother’s name is Star. He’s a cutie.

The last picture at the bottom is a hat with the new tags I ordered. I didn’t get leather because I was worried about how they would handle being washed and I wanted these to be easy care hats with a little something extra, so these are faux leather (a thick vinyl, lol) I chose the one that looked like bamboo. I think they look nice and everyone likes something nice. For the shelter I will make some with Child of God showing and some with the knitted heart showing so they have a choice. I think when I reorder I will get the ones I have to sew on instead of the snaps so they won’t come off in the washing machine. I’m a worry wort and I worry about everything, lol.

Prayers are going still going out to all those who were affected by Helena, please keep asking Heavenly Father for peace and comfort and help for them all. The devastation was massive and the emotional toll, for those who lost family and/or all they had, is great :(. I saw that there are many people out there trying to start helping with clean up and bringing things in, water, food etc, even tho FEMA and the Red Cross weren’t out there yet (where the heck are they?). My church always assesses what is needed and sends truck loads of things and there will be some of my church members from all over going to help with the clean up as well. I know that Ryan Hall Ya’ll (a YouTube weatherman) also sends trucks of things out to help from donations from those who watch his channel. Because food and things are coming in, I think clean up and housing will be the biggest issues, along with accounting for everyone that is still missing. :(. My heart is broken for all of them.

FOs and Better Late than Never

/ LDSVenus / 8 Comments

I finished the latest of the Hats for Warmth project. I liked the colors, hope it will keep someone warm next winter. I really like the cotton yarn I got at Hobby Lobby, I love this Cotton. It’s very soft and this was the 2nd wash cloth I got from it with some left over, tho I’m pretty sure I’d lose a game of yarn chicken if I started another, time to buy some more :P. This is the Granny’s Favorite dish cloth pattern, you can tell it’s a diagonal knit with the stripes. I’m going to start, some time this week, the 2nd bobbin of my multi color tweed spin. Still not sure if I want to chain ply each bobbin separately to keep the colors separate and have two half skeins or just go ahead and do a fractal ply. That’s me, last min decisions!

I try to have a picture of the Robbins when they first come back for spring. But they are not helpful in that aspect. I saw the first one about 6 weeks ago but they were only out where I could see them when I was driving and that wasn’t helpful. I was parked at the drs office earlier this week and lo and behold one where I could get a picture!!! He was running back and forth staking out his territory. I don’t get them every year because they are not always worried about rather I can get their picture or not lol. I have a feeling the males out there looking now probably missed the boat on a companion this year :(.

I forgot to get pictures when I was out at the farm :(, but I will try hard to remember to do that this next week. In the mean time here is one they took at the farm. I am calling the alpacas the motley crew right now because they are in need of sheering, which happens next month lol, then they will look more dignified and a lot thinner, their fleece is very thick. Can you find Libby? She’s only about 7 months old and already the size of the adult alpaca. They changed the llama’s name from Belle to Libby because my son has an African grey parrot named Belle (who is a character). Libby’s registered (call) name is When Liberty Rings. Libby the Llama has a ring to it, lol. She is friendly, no fear and sweet.

Fiber back from the Mill, Woot!!

/ LDSVenus / 5 Comments

I had skirted the fleeces shown on my July 20 post and sent them to Mystery’s Meadow Alpacas fiber mill. The fleeces were very dirty and because I had to skirt them heavily, I wasn’t even sure how much I would even get back. But I got them back today, and oh my goodness, they are so clean and beautiful! I love them and can hardly wait to spin them! I was very impressed with how well these were processed. If you have fiber to have processed into yarn or spinning I can absolutely recommend them!! The white at the bottom of the grey fiber is part of the clear plastic bag the fiber is in, it’s not the fiber.

Skirting 2 fleeces during the Tour de Fleece.

/ LDSVenus / 4 Comments

I signed up last spring to have two fleeces that I have had for about 4 years turned into roving to spin, and I needed to ship them to the mill around Aug 1st. I tried to skirt them in April but rain and wind made it not fun to try to do outside, so I put it off. Now it’s too hot so I decided to do these on a sheet in my living room. They made a nice sheepy smell in my living room lol. I did the white fleece today, and the grey yesterday. These were very dirty fleeces and I lost about about 1/3 of them to parts that were so dirty they were past cleaning up. These were not coated sheep because are meat sheep, however they were polypay ewes and their fleece is next to skin soft. They were given to me so I’m not out any money and I will have some nice fiber to spin when they come back from the mill.

The first picture is what was left of the white fleece after skirting. The 2nd picture is the unskirted grey fleece, and the 3rd picture is a little bit I pulled off the grey and washed so I could see what color it really was and the last picture is that sample after it was dry and I put it through my drum carder. It’s fluffy and soft and a medium grey as I suspected. I will be excited to get it back! One more thing off my list of things I need to get done!

I have been spinning but not as much as I wanted to. I should have the 2nd bobbin finished tomorrow and hopefully plied, but it will be Saturday before I get a picture of the yarn because I will need to wash it and let it dry. 🙂

Next week starting on Tuesday our temps are suppose to be in the 90’s. Sigh. I just keep telling myself, better than -50.

Skirting Some Fleeces

/ LDSVenus / 4 Comments

Well the first picture isn’t a fleece :P. Try as I might each year to remember to get a photo of a Magnolia tree flowering, when I drive by there are cars behind me so I can’t stop to get a picture. I love Magnolias because they are generally the first to bloom before the rest of the trees are even budding their leaves, so they mean spring to me. However this year other trees bloomed or spouted leaves first, then yep we had two nights of freezing temps in a row. Guess the Magnolias aren’t fooled. 🙂

The second picture is a grey (kind of looks like a light black but I’m sure when it’s washed it will be a medium grey) Polypay fleece. I also have a white one to skirt also, which is picking out shorter pieces from the longer pieces (basically I’m separating the saddle fiber from the neck, belly and legs and second cuts fiber) and picking out as much of the vm (vegetable vegitation matter, I stand corrected :P) as I can, you can see a big piece of straw, and there are also lots more vm scattered in it, and lets not forget any sheep poop by the back end. I started skirting this a week ago but the weather wasn’t really warm enough and this table wasn’t quite doing the job because it has a bench that I had to bend over to reach the fleece and the wind was blowing more than I hoped, so that wasn’t doing it for me. So with less than a 1/3 done, I put it back in the bag and took it back in the house and will bring them both out when it warms up a bit and no wind (I don’t feel like chasing pieces of fleece all over, lol) so I can lay them out proper and skirt them. I don’t have to have them skirted and ready to ship until August, I just don’t want to do it in the heat of the summer. I’ve had these 3 years maybe 4 so the lanolin is pretty set into the fleeces, good luck to the mill that gets these beauties :P.

Hope everyone is having a good start to your spring and that you avoid the storms I am seeing coming on the weather reports.