Merrily We Card Along

Or, sort of merrily. The carding is fun. And, unless I’m doing something drastically wrong, it’s very easy.

The hard part comes when I try to spin what I’ve carded. I haven’t learned how to spin from a batt, and the “rolag” that some tutorials have you make from the carded wool is very close to a batt. I wonder if you’re supposed to unroll it later. Hmm. Anyway, I’ve taken to leaving the carded rectangle flat, then removing chunks of fluffiness in three to four inch sections.

That makes it a bit more managable. I say a bit. The carded wool slides all over the place as I try to spin it, and I end up spinning from the top, bottom, side, fold, tangle, and bump. Key word being bump. I’ll be spinning along and suddenly the wool will slip through my fingers and make one of those annoying, squishy, lump-puffs. I’ve never had to deal with those puffs before. It’s rather humbling to think that what I just spun is worse than my first attempt on the drop spindle. However, I’m not going to take this lying down! There have to be some instructions somewhere, and I intend to find them.

Now, don’t let all that make you think I’m not enjoying it. It’s very fun to take the washed wool and transform it into light clouds of fluffy stuff. And the spinning is fun too—I just want to be able to spin well! I’ve got two pounds of raw wool sitting under my desk and I’d like to spin decent yarn from them. Not stuff that’s so thick it won’t fit through the orifice! (For you non-spinners, the orifice is a small hole that the yarn has to go through to get onto the bobbin.) I’m having to ply the yarn on the drop spindle because there is no way it’s going through that hole.

I do plan to put this stuff to good use, though. It’ll make a perfect test yarn for kettle dyeing.