How to spin from a batt

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker.

Most everyone knows that fabric comes from yarn or thread which comes from cotton, sheep or synthetics. But how does it really GET there? From farm to cloth? In the past few weeks, I've worked through and documented the process. You can read them all here. Today's the last step: The Spinning.

Finally! The exciting part - turning fluff into yarn!
Every time I've posted a video about the process of turning this fleece into yarn, I get the question, "But how do you SPIN it?". Well, here's the answer. In this video I show I how I spin one of the LocalSpun batts into a Local Spun Yarn:


The finished yarn looks like this, all soft and squooshy:



This yarn is Hilly Bourn and is available here. The name (and all of those in this line) are inspired by the John Keats's poem "To Autumn". I shared the entire poem here.

I'll be posting more yarns from this fleece throughout the week, so check out the Boutique! Also in the LocalSpun line are handmade spinning batts and dyed locks.

Now, a question for you: Have you enjoyed see the life of this yarn? Would you like me to continue this series with a different fleece from a different farm?

Life of Yarn - Carding

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker.

Most everyone knows that fabric comes from yarn or thread which comes from cotton, sheep or synthetics. But how does it really GET there? From farm to cloth? In the next few week’s I’ll be working through and documenting this process. Today: The Blending.

The one question I seem to get most often when doing spinning demonstrations is "How do you get the wool like...that" with a gesture to the roving I'm holding in my hand. Most everyone understands that the wool comes from sheep and the fleece gets washed and dyed...but what takes it from a pile of fiber to the fluffy batt in my hands?



The fiber can be combed or carded to make it more spin-able and I chose to card this fleece with my brand new drum carder! (still so excited about it!) You can absolutely spin fiber right from the lock, but I wanted to card it, to make it fluffy and separate the locks. I want to keep some of the inherent "sheepiness" of this yarn, so I'm not carding it until smooth, just until nice and airy, with some of the little curls still intact. What I end up with is a batt (you can read the defintion of fiber terms like roving and batts here) - a pile of fluff with a lot of air and most of the fibers parellel-ish.

Since it's a simple process that's sort of hard to explain, I'll show you how I do it in the following video.




If you're unfamiliar with this step in fiber processing, the video gives a quick rundown of the general idea. If you're very experienced with drum carding, I'd love to hear your feedback, as I'm brand new at it!

The batts I'm carding will be available in the Boutique this Friday, October 31, along with the dyed locks (pre-carding). Next Monday I'll share a video on how I spin these batts and the yarn from this fleece will be available Monday, November 3. The locks, batts and yarn are part of my new LocalSpun line - a collection of yarn and fiber that all come from the same, local fleece. I hope to produce this line each month using a different local fleece, which I'll wash and dye by hand, share the process and offer the fiber and yarn. Each month I hope to use a different breed of sheep (or alpaca or goat) and share what I discover about the farm, the breed and the process.

Any questions about drum carding?
What else in the process would you like to see?
What breed should I look for next?

Life of Yarn - Dyeing

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker.

Most everyone knows that fabric comes from yarn or thread which comes from cotton, sheep or synthetics. But how does it really GET there? From farm to cloth? In the next few week’s I’ll be working through and documenting this process. Today: The Color

After the fleece is clean and dry (although, really, I don't see why it needs to be dry), I dye the fiber. This is hardly the only way to do it. In fact, it's time for a digression on the creativity of the process.

There are 1000s different way to move fiber from animal to yarn. I've been showing how I did it, for this one fleece. If you're following along, planning for your own fleece, just keep in mind that there are a zillion little chances for creativity. You can dye the fiber in lock form (like I'll demonstrate), once it's carded or once you've spun it into yarn. You can card it or comb it or send it out to be processed by a mill. You can mix all different colors together into one batts or spin rovings of different colors together. This process is full of little decisions. Don't get confused or bogged down in choosing one or the other. A fleece is a lot of fiber, plenty to play with, so experiment! Split it up into 1 lb sections and treat each section differently. With this fleece I'm leaving a pound undyed and dyeing the rest in 2 oz (or bigger) sections, then carding together the different colors (by the way, I'm creating a limited edition line of yarn using only the fiber from this one fleece, it'll be in the Boutique in late October). When this is fleece, I plan on doing it all over again (documenting and sharing it here, of course) using different dyeing, carding and spinning techniques.

Ok, now on to the dyeing.





When it comes out of the microwave it looks like this:

I know I say it a few times in the video but by all means, leave it alone and let it cool!
Once the fiber is cool and has been rinsed, I put it back outside, on a rug, to dry.



Oooh, such pretty colors! ALL of them from Easter Egg dyes! I've achieved different depths of color by pouring off some of the dye liquid into another glass jar and adding water.



Once dry, they get carded and spun, tune in next week for carding!

Life of Yarn - Washing the Fleece

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker. Most everyone knows that fabric comes from yarn or thread which comes from cotton, sheep or synthetics. But how does it really GET there? From farm to cloth? In the next few week’s I’ll be working through and documenting this process. Today: The Fleece.

I purchased the fleece from Hobby Knob Farm, during my last farm visit.

It's a Coopworth, shorn just last March from one of Elizabeth's herd. It's around 7 lbs and I loved the locks, even dirty:

When I was ready to wash it, I spread it out on my back "porch". My cat was fascinated:

I was a little nervous I'd ruin it, so I gathered all the bits around the edges that were dirtiest and washed those first. The fleece had already been skirted, which means all the dung tags (uh, poop) and really dirty stuff around the edges had been removed before I bought it. But I found the dirtiest, shortest locks and put them in the washing machine.

Here's where my fleece washing differs from everyone else. Usually you fill the washing machine up with the hottest water, but, well, my hot water line isn't hooked up to the washer (we always wash with cold water), so I had to get a little old-fashioned. I took my big dyeing kettle, filled it up with hot water and put it on the stove. When the water got really hot, I added it to the washing machine. It took about 2 kettles to get enough water to fill the washing machine, so I only washed the fleece with hot water once. I added a shot of Dr. Bronner's shampoo (all natural, organic ingredients!) and then left it alone for 2 hours. I came back later, drained the water, filled it up with tepid water and let it sit again for 2 or 3 hours. After these two rinses I couldn't believe how clean and white the fleece was!

No dirt, no grime and so much brighter white than I expected.

I put the fleece back outside, on an old, clean rug to dry.

After it was dry, I brought it in and dyed it, more on that next week!

Life of Yarn - at the farm

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker.



Most everyone knows that fabric comes from yarn or thread which comes from cotton, sheep or synthetics. But how does it really GET there? From farm to cloth? In the next few week’s I’ll be working through and documenting this process. Today: On the Farm.



Specifically Hobby Knob Farm in Weaversville, NC. This is one of the first farms I visited in my search for local wool and it continues to be my favorite sheep farm. Elizabeth is always generous with her time and information. That’s her (and my mom) you can hear in the videos. The sheep on this farm are bred for their fiber and conservancy. The flock includes colored Romney and Cotswold with a focus on Jacob’s, since they are a rare heritage breed that needs conservation. You can read more about Hobby Knob’s history and conservation efforts on their website.

On this visit, I purchased 2 beautiful cream fleeces which I just washed last weekend. For that adventure, tune in next Fiber Friday!

The life of Yarn - in the studio

The Life of Yarn series is my attempt to share the process from fiber (on the animal) to finished yarn. Each is just a glimpse into a moment in the life of yarn and yarnmaker.

I recently confessed that most of my freshly dyed fiber spends some time in the trees, but once it comes inside, it has a much tamer life. The handdyed fiber is stored away from my kittens and puppy, in a closet. When inspiration strikes, I pull it out and it spends some time in my "studio" (also known as, my living room)


Here, it lounges on my spinning chair, on cushions made by my Grams (check out that piping! It's not "my" colors, so I'm looking for fabric to cover it with), along with a pillow I made (these are the colors I want to cover the chair cushions in). I love this photo because it shows I've "integrated" the fiber and yarn into my living space: the handknit sweater on the back of the chair, the fiber on the bookshelf for my Ravelympics project and just out of frame (on the left) is a vase full of handspun. I like to think the visible fiber desensitizes my family into believe there's really "not that much".


The other "half" of my studio is the coffee table (which is right in front of me when I spin), it holds the swift, bobbins for plying and finished skeins. Here, the spun fiber relaxes on a bobbin while I spin another bobbin of singles. It will be plied with the other bobbin and then wound onto the swift (the big thing with four arms)
This table gets cleaned off after every spinning session: the swift goes under the couch, the bobbins get tucked away next to my wheel and the skeins of yarn take up their residence in a bookshelf in the guest room (locked away from all kitties!)


(because, the kitties, they like the spinning chair!)

The yarn shown (as fiber) in this post will be unveiled in all it's 2ply squishyness and available in the shop this Friday, by noon.
In fact, this week I'm trying something completely different for the shop. Instead of posting a yarn every day, I've saved up all my yarny goodness for one BIG update on Friday. I have some new fibers like organic merino and farm-fresh llama AND a new summer-inspired series of squishy bright yarns!
Mark your calendar - from 10-12 am E.S.T , Friday, 8/22/08,
10 new eco-friendly handspun yarns will be listed right here!

The Life of Yarn - on the tree

Hanging freshly dyed wool out to dry, I was struck by the ridiculousness of the sight: huge swaths of brightly colored fiber, adorning a unassuming tree.

From the parking lot, my tree seems harmless, the dogwood of any normal resident:On closer inspection, it becomes obvious these residents are a bit more colorful.

And by the time you get to my door, it becomes clear that this is a house of those possessed;

possessed by a need to drape everything in color, to soak up the bright summer, to imbue the yarn-world with sunny goodness.

This weekend I dyed pounds of wool, all in bright, happy colors, mostly in semi-solids, as seen above. While I stood outside, hanging dripping wool, I thought about the path these fibers take on their way to becoming yarn. I have, through this blog, tried to delineate this path. I shared the path from inspiration to finished yarn, and I've shared moments from visits to the original source - sheep and alpacas. But I still find that an incomplete picture of the real process.
Most knitters and crocheters know that yarn starts on an animal's back and through some magic alchemy becomes the yarn they hold in their hands. This path can take so many forms that it in sharing one path, I am necessarily omitting the other possible paths. Obviously commercial yarn - sold from farmer to wool pool, processed (usually with chemicals), cleaned, combed, dyed and spun by huge machines - has path so different from handspun yarn that they are barely the same product.
Even the yarns I create take different paths - some from mill-ends, some from local farms, some recycled from Nepalese women's co-ops! I either handdye it in many shades, making the color decisions at the dye pot, or I kettle dye it in bright solids and decide on the color combinations at the wheel. The fiber above will be the latter - many times throughout the next few weeks I'll grab a handful of various colors and combine them in new and inspiring ways.
The time in the sun is just a moment in the fibers life, next stop: the wheel!