Twisp of Fate

I have so many ideas in my head about things I want to try, and/or a queue of projects I am trying to get to, that it sometimes almost seems like a random choice as far as what to dive into next.

However, I had so much fun dyeing those shawls a week ago – and Sara at Ashford Gallery in Winthrop keeps asking me for spinning fiber (you can tell fall is on its way – knitting and spinning are coming back into people’s minds around here) – that I decided the fiberarts project for this week was to dye up some fleece and drumcard some spinning/felting batts.

I used about 3 lbs of a white Romney fleece I bought last year from The Pines Farm in Maple Valley, WA.  The Schwiders raise white and natural colored Romney sheep, and Angora goats.  They are well-respected breeders and also chief organizers of the Shepherds’ Extravaganza held each April at the Puyallup Fairgrounds.  Judith MacKenzie McCuin recommended them to me for a fiber source.

I dyed 4 colors using Judith’s dyes (Mother MacKenzie’s) in various combinations of Blue, Magenta and Violet.  I used the dye samples from the workshop in Preston this past summer as a guide, and am happy to report that the colors came out quite similar even though it was fleece and not yarn.

3 colors destined to be carded together into layered batts:

3 colors all using Blue-Magenta-Violet

The 4th color was a similar to the color on the right above, only a little more purple, so I used it by itself and then added a “frosting” of dyed kid mohair locks on the second pass:

4th color carded on first pass

after adding dyed kid mohair locks

I got eight 2-oz. batts from this color plus the kid mohair.

Here’s the drumcarder in action.  Love this tool!  It was built by Judith’s husband, Nick McCuin.

I failed to take pictures at some point.  This blogging is very demanding.  The 3 colors shown above were put on the carder in layers:  blueberry, most of the fuchsia color, then the violet, then a light frosting of the fuchsia again.  I got 16  batts, each 2-oz. of fiber.

After taking 10 batts up to the gallery this morning, I still have this nice box full of lovely batts, ready to spin or sell at the holiday sales coming up in November.  I know, I won’t get rich doing it- but every time I do a project like this I get more confident about what I am doing, and it is really a blast!

Box full of spinning batts