And to prove how nuts I am, go take a look at my queue and favorites on Ravelry. (I’m LoveFiber on there.)
Not only am I knitting my first big knitting project now — and here’s a picture of my lovely sweater so far — but I have plans for another sweater, two or three giant shawls . . . no, four or five shawls, and a myriad of socks, wraps, and various things that will only overrun my closet. Which is already overrun. Although hopefully I will be able to use things from the closet to make things which go back into the closet and therefore pioneer self-sustaining closet environments.

My goal is to not. Buy. Any. More. Yarn. Until I’ve used up at least some of what I already have. Not too much. Just enough. *cough cough* Will someone please take the KnitPicks and Webs catalogs off my desk?

And this includes fiber! As few personal fiber purchases as possible. Not until I turn a good sized chunk of what I have into yarn. And that just got larger with the arrival of an unexpected and large box of new fleeces from Iowa. Yay! I have lovely fiber now. At least, I’m sure it’s lovely. I have yet to be able to open up the box because it persists in raining outside. And I’m not hauling a delicate fleece (three fleeces, actually) out onto the wet back porch and exposing them to the dangers of the elements. I’ll just have to wait a bit, because there’s no way the other inhabitants of the house would look kindly on my spreading the as yet unpicked fleeces out on the kitchen floor. Bad idea.

But, on the subject of fiber and the uses thereof, I’ve been making some more progress on the handspun sock yarn destined for Etsy. I should guess I’m about two thirds of the way through spinning the singles. Once they’re spun the plying goes much faster. I dyed this fiber myself, and I’m really enjoying using it. I think I shall have to get more. . . aha! Caught myself. No. No more fiber for awhile. Not for personal use at least.

See, one of the benefits of running a fiber company is that you can purr over plenty of fibers and yarns without the guilt of adding to your stash.
And I’ve got some gorgeous new products planned and in various stages of production. And they enable me to get a fiber rush without spending my money. I get to oogle things like this boucle I dyed and know that, while it’s pretty and I love it, it’s not going to be trapped in my closet forever while I feel my way through a sweater pattern. It’s going to go up on my Etsy store and make someone else happy. A definite bonus.

Oh, yes. I promised pictures of the Baroness Beret. Here you are. A nice large shot, complimented by a close up on the yarn.

I just wish the yarn had been spun a little more recently. It came before I had grasped the concept of a pre-planned, and therefore gorgeous, yarn. It was a bit dense to work with, and the gauge made it stiff. However, the colors are beautiful.

You know, it’s been awhile since we’ve done a Beginner Series. I wonder. Should we do one on dyeing? I could go into acid dyes and natural dyes. Various techniques and tutorials. Or I could do one that focuses on some of the kinds of spinning fiber available. Bamboo, silk, soysilk, angora, that sort of thing. And, come to think of it, doing either of those would involve purchasing some nice new dye stuffs or fibers. I think I’m liking this!

Thank you for reading!

Wool is one of the easiest fibers to dye. It responds readily to Kool-Aid, commercial dyes, natural (plant- or animal-derived) dyes, and even food coloring.

There are dozens of different ways to color wool, and, as I’ve only tried a few of them, I can’t give you detailed tutorials for everything, but here are some of the ones that have helped me along and given me some really great results. I use Jacquard Acid Dyes for most of my dyeing, with the odd natural dye thrown in. The Jacquards are really nice because the only chemical you need to set the color is vinegar!

Kettle-Dyeing

If you’re a knitter you have probably heard the term “kettle-dyed” before. It pretty much means that the yarn will be mostly the same color, with a slight shift in intensity in some areas. This is achieved by cooking the yarn (or wool roving) in a pot of dye solution. The actual process will vary depending on what kind of dye you use.

This tutorial is for doing more than one color at a time, and I did it a couple times awhile back. You can read about them in this post and this one if you want to see the results. This method is quite fun.

Rainbow in a Pot

This is my favorite way to dye yarn. You just mix up the dyes and pour them in!

Roving for Supper

And this is the way that I do practically all of my wool rovings. No open flames on the stove top to worry about! Sometimes, if I don’t feel like heating up the oven, I’ll put the wool in a pot and treat it like the yarn in the “Rainbow” method.

The Kool-Aid Way

If you’re looking for something less “toxic” than usual dyes and something that you can do on the stovetop or in the microwave, this is the way to go. I have a friend who has gotten beautiful colors out of this.

I tried it, but as a school project for some young friends of mine. From the moment I found I couldn’t fit a mason jar into their tiny microwave, I knew things were going to be a bit rocky. Thankfully the colors still turned out well. We just set each jar into a big pot of boiling water and let it sit there and steam until I figured the colors were done.

Batts, Slivers, Tops, Rovings, Clouds, what on earth do these all mean? How’s a spinner supposed to know what they want with all these choices? Thankfully, learning what each of these styles gives you (and how to spin from them) is not as hard as it looks.

Rovings:

This is my personal favorite to spin from. It’s so nice and smooth, and spins easily. Roving can be spun short or long draw. It’s kind of your basic format. The individual fibers are laying straight, side by side with each other, which allows you to spin a very smooth yarn.

Top:

This looks like roving, but the fibers aren’t aligned quite as nicely, giving you a little lumpier yarn.

Sliver:

This looks like top and roving, but the fibers are a little different.

Yes, I know. It’s crazy. I have yet to wrap my brain around the differences, and I practically never see sliver for sale in the places I look.

Batts:

This is my second favorite spinning weapon. They’re so light and fluffy! You make a batt on a drum carder. And to spin it you just peel a piece off, fluff it up a bit, and spin. I prefer using the long draw style with batts. They behave better that way. In most batts the fibers are not quite as nicely aligned as in roving, lending itself to a fuzzier yarn.

Rolags:

This is what you get when you hand card. It’s a little roll of the fiber you’ve carded. You can either roll it the way she shows in the video, or, like I’ve started doing, roll it from side to side so all the tips are at one end and the bottoms at the other. This works perfectly when I turn it into homemade roving. With a rolag, you can either spin directly from it by grabbing one end of the roll and drafting from there (like you’re pulling the filling out of a twinkie), or you can draft the whole thing out into a homemade roving and spin from that. I can’t find the original video that I learned this from, but I shall try to locate it or create my own.

Cloud:

I’ve never spun from this personally. No, wait. I have, but it wasn’t wool. It’s basically a pile of lots of fluffed up loose hairs sticking every which-a-way. The only way you can sanely spin from this is with a long draw. (If any of you readers have mastered short draw from a cloud, please tell me how you managed it.)

After you have washed your fleece and it’s all squeaky clean, you need to get it ready to be spun into yarn. There are options for doing this, but thankfully not too many options. It’s pretty easy to decide.

From The Lock

First option is to spin it from the lock. If you look at your fleece you’ll see that the hairs are sort of clumped together into standard-sized sections. These are called locks. If you’re gentle, you can pull one of them apart from all the others.

Fluff up the “tip” end, which is the part that faced away from the sheep. Usually it’s all stuck together. All right. Now you have a little, very short, roving. Very very short. This method is really only recommended for sheep with a looooong staple length. Like a four inch minimum.

If you want to go this route, but you’re having trouble fluffing up those ends, you can get what’s called a “Flick Carder.” It’s the little one in the lower part of the picture. Here is a great demo on using it.
But be warned. For any spinner, this sort of video is rather like grocery shopping when you’re hungry.

Hand Cards a.k.a. Hand Carders

Second option, moving in the direction of cheapest to most expensive, are hand carders. They are the little gizmos that are all around the flick carder. A brand new pair runs from $55 up. I got mine for a lot less, but they were very old and aren’t holding together so well. A downside with hand carders is that they are rather heavy, and if you card a large amount of wool (or go nuts and do it all afternoon long, like myself) they can cause blisters on your fingers and make your wrists ache.

A less expensive option are dog combs that look like this. These work best for coarser, high-crimp wool.

Here are a few little videos that show how you use hand carders. It’s quite simple. Notice that she doesn’t load the carder clear to the handle, only about two thirds of the way down. The videos are over on the right hand side, and the text/picture version is in the middle.

The Big Ones

Third option is a drum carder. These babies run from $300 up and are really geared toward those who will be processing a lot of fiber. My favorite brand is Strauch. And although I have yet to possess a drum carder (my wallet passes out at the thought) it’s definitely the brand I’d pick. I recently got to play with a drum carder that was less “main stream,” so don’t think those few brands on the website are the only ones available!

Unfortunately, I can’t seem to find a nice, complete video demonstration on how to use these. If you’re like me, you want to know what parts of the drum carder do what, and all the little details of how to get a perfect batt, and I have yet to find that type of video. If I had a drum carder I’d make one myself. This video is the best one I’ve found for giving an overview of the process.

There you have it. Those are the main three. There is also something called “combing” the fibers. It’s rather like hand carding, but I’ve never done it. Here is a little info to get you started.

Tomorrow we’ll get into the different forms of processed fiber.

I had barely cut my teeth on roving; in fact, I hadn’t even been introduced to a batt yet, when I felt the urge to get a raw fleece and process it for myself. There was just something so appealing about starting as close to the beginning as I could get. And from the moment I walked into a sheep barn an hour away from my house I knew this was going to be a love affair to last the rest of my life.
Sometimes, if I close my eyes, I can still smell the lanolin, and less pleasant things, that made up the smell of that day.

Choosing a Fleece

Would you like to learn what to look for in choosing a fleece? This is the best article I’ve seen on the subject. It gives you such a sense of knowing what you’re talking about. A little experience and you’re a natural. It makes walking into a room full of cut fleeces seem like even more of a candy store.

Buying a Fleece

Alrighty, so you’ve picked out a fleece that you like. A couple things you might want to know.

1) Fleeces are usually priced by the pound, as in their weight. This can range all over from five dollars a pound to twenty dollars a pound and beyond. Usually the price reflects the quality of the fleece. Use your buyer’s instinct and your eyes to tell you if you’re paying top dollar for a low quality fleece.

2) Because fleeces are priced by their weight, keep in mind that oftentimes the weight includes the grease, which you will be washing out. Your fleece can reduce in weight by next-to-nothing to about half, which is the highest I’ve heard of. (Merino is a very greasy fleece, and it loses somewhere in the neighborhood of half its weight during washing.)

3) Sometimes the seller will be willing to sell you part of a fleece, sometimes not. Ask and be friendly.

4) Keep in mind, if you buy a fleece over the internet, you’ve still got shipping to deal with. All those pounds of fluff turn into shipping costs.

Washing the Fleece

Most fleeces you buy are going to be “raw,” meaning they haven’t been washed yet. All the natural grease (like you get on your hair) and any dirt is still in the wool. You can spin it this way if you really want to, but it makes everything greasy and yucky and can get a bit stout smelling.

If you have a top loading washing machine, there is a way to wash your fleece in that. That article also includes a hand washing method. I personally don’t do some of things that are mentioned, but that proves that everyone washes wool in a different, yet successful way. There is really no single “right” way to wash fleece. Whatever you do, as long as the result is nice, usable fleece, it works.

If, like me, you have a front loader, or just don’t like the idea of putting a greasy fleece into your nice, clean washing machine, you can do it the old-fashioned way in a big pot. I like to pick over the fleece first and make sure there aren’t any big hunks of any unpleasant things or any large pieces of vegetable material. (This process called “picking” or “skirting” the fleece.) Then I presoak them for a few hours or overnight to get rid of the first layer of dirt. After one or two of these presoaks I go ahead and follow this process. It’s rather vague, I know. I shall try to rectify that soon. Since I wrote that I have played with the numbers a bit, but I’m very guilty of not writing any of it down.

There are lots of different things you can put in to the wool to remove the grease. I like using Simple Green (but it’s a pretty strong chemical. It’s bought at car part stores, for goodness sake!) and Dawn dishwashing liquid. Some people use hot water and vinegar. Some people prefer hair shampoo. It really depends on what you want to try.

The important thing is to not felt* the wool. Felting occurs when the fleece gets rubbed, agitated, or experiences a sudden temperature change. When rinsing wool, make sure the rinse water is the same temperature as the water the wool was just sitting in. Do not vigorously stir the wool. Bad things happen.

*Felting is when the fibers become so compacted onto each other they resemble a piece of felt. Very bad spinning material.

Drying

When the wool is done being washed, it’s important that you lay it out to dry. Balled up wool can start to smell musty very quickly. Gently lay it out on a towel and/or drying rack and let it sit for several days. Wool can hold . . . I believe 30% of its own weight in water before it even feels wet, so give it a while to dry. Laying it in direct sunlight is great, although I’ve only done that with white fleece. I don’t know if the sun would lighten the pigment on darker wool. (Does this mean I get to go buy a black fleece to find out?)

What do you do with it when it’s dry? You’ll find out tomorrow.

Why Choose?

When I first became a spinner the sheer number of wool types available boggled my brain. Was “Merino” or “Romney” a better choice for a beginner? How about “Rambouillet”? And what on earth did “staple length” or “crimp” mean? Did it really matter what I chose?

I wanted a complete list of every kind of fleece available and information on how it spun. To the best of my knowledge a list like this did not exist (yet!), so what I ended up doing was scrolling through the fiber websites looking for something — anything — labeled “good for beginners.” In my first months of spinning I found a few favorites, maybe branched out a bit, and wound up only spinning certain types of wool because, well, the others might not turn out nicely.

Thankfully this attitude of wool ineptness left after a while. I’m now willing and eager to skim the offerings at fiber fairs and on websites. I can pick a wool with confidence because I have a good bit of head knowledge that tells me how a type of wool will behave.

This article is designed to equip you with the knowledge you need to look at a type of wool and say “Perfect!” or “Run for your life!”

What To Watch For

When you look at a type of wool, whether you’ve run across it or researched it, you want to keep these things in mind. They are the keys to picking the golden fleece, so to speak.

1) Staple Length

This is how long the individual hairs are. If they’re really short they will slip and slide off each other and fall apart. (Not good beginner material.) If they’re really long the twist can get away from you and you’ll end up constantly reversing the twist to rectify an error. The perfect beginner staple length, in my opinion, is two and a half to three inches long.

Sometimes websites will not list the staple length. The good news is that staple lengths are relatively consistent within a breed, so research around a bit and see what you can find. The term “staple length” is usually used when buying a non-processed (raw) fleece, but sometimes it’s applied to roving or other prepared fiber forms.

2) Crimp

A describing word referring to little kinks in the wool. If you look at a lock (small section) of the fleece you’ll see little zig zags in it, rather like someone gave it a very tight perm. (Think: the edge of a Ruffles potato chip.) This is called “crimp” and it’s usually measured in crimps per inch.

A high crimp count means the yarn will have tons of elasticity. Think sproing-sproing perfect yarn for something that needs to stretch and return to its proper shape. Low crimp means not as stretchy. Again, this term is mainly used when buying a raw fleece.

3) Micron Count

Oh dear. A technical term. And one that I have yet to fully wrap my brain around. Micron count actually refers to (are you ready for this?) the diameter size of each individual hair. But, before you rush out to buy a ruler and microscope, let me just give you the reason for this measurement. The thinner the hair, the finer the wool (obviously). A thick hair means coarser wool. A thin hair means a fine wool, like merino, the queen of soft.

So, wouldn’t it be easier to just say thin and thick? But how thin is thin? Is it thinner than this thin or that thin? Thus micron count came into the picture. You might see a merino roving that says 64 micron count, and one that says 100 microns. Which is finer? Well, this is where things get tricky. While the actual micron count means you want the lower number, some times the wool is actually graded according to the Branford count, which means you want a higher number. (And to make matters worse, sometimes the two get confused and incorrectly labeled.) Here is a nice article on understanding the differences between Branford, micron, and an extra bonus — blood count.

4) Luster

I think everyone knows what this word means. The shine, the glow, the sparkle, the gloss that makes you weep. This is another “buying in the raw” one. (“All right,” you say, “We get the hint. You’re going to post about raw fleece next, right?” And to that I say, “Right! However did you guess?”) Sometimes the seller will mention the luster; sometimes they won’t.

5) Hand

This is a little harder to describe in text. It’s the “feel” of the wool. When you put your hand down in it and rub gently, do you think “this was a steel wool producing sheep” or “Ooooooooohhhhh”? It’s what gets us lady spinners into such trouble in a room full of fleeces begging to be taken home. One feel and it’s ours.

Sheep and Their Fleeces

All right, you have the basics; now, which breeds of sheep (and therefore fleece) go with which kinds of crimp and luster and micron count? Excellent question. The answer is, I’m still learning myself. Get out there and do your research! Call up a spinning friend, Google different sheep breeds, or just experiment.

Here are a few breeds to research to get you started.

Merino
Rambouillet
Corriedale
Cotswold
Jacob
Icelandic
CVM (No, it’s not referring to vegetable matter. It’s the abbreviation for California Variegated Mutant)
Finn
Tunis
Romney
Wensleydale
*If you can’t make up your mind what to try first, I found this wonderful Website on Knitty the other day. They carry packages of assorted raw wool in two ounce batches. Brilliant! I can hardly wait to try one myself.

And, just keep in mind, no sheep breed is set in stone. (Thankfully.) There are variations within breeds and crosses between breeds. These are usually marked by an “x” between two or three sheep names, such as a Tunis X Dorset X Romney, or a Corriedale X Cotswold. (The first raw fleece I ever got was one of those, actually. It had the ease of spinning and softness of Corridale, and the shine and strength of Cotswold.)

Now that you feel better equipped, go out there and start playing with fleece!

I’ll be focusing in on wool types and working with fleece. I’ll go into picking the right type of wool to use and how to choose a raw fleece, wash it, prepare it, and dye it. I’m so excited about these new posts. It’s a lot to cover in one week, but we’ll have a good time.

Posts start September 9th.

As always, these articles are intended to be wildly helpful, so please, don’t hesitate to leave a comment if something needs clarification or elaboration. These are for you and others who love learning. Share your knowledge.

I hope The Beginner Series proved helpful and encouraging. Remember, those posts are nothing but a brief overview. They leave plenty of room for you to learn new things and discover on your own. There’s a whole world of spinners and spinning out there. Techniques waiting to be taught, friendships to be shared, and new fibers to try. It’s waiting for you.

With the blessing of a seriously addicted spinner, go, spin, and learn.

~Rebekah

There are two different things meant by “drafting.”

“Pre-drafting” is loosening up the fibers before you spin so you’ll get a nice, airy, easy-to-work-with yarn. Here is a good video on fluffing up the fibers in a roving.

Regular “drafting” refers to how you handle the fibers that are being spun.

Drafting While Spinning

Here is a great text/image rundown on the main types of drafting while spinning. There are also videos down the side, but it’s kind of hard to see what she’s doing.

I also found these videos for long draw and short draw on wheel. Short draw is easier, in my opinion, although I love long draw. The short draw video doesn’t have any audio besides the background music, so you can mute it if you wish. The text gives a pretty good explanation, but I want to give another here. When you’re doing the short draw you have the fibers in one hand, and you’re pulling fibers out with the other. A little at a time, pinch the fibers and pull it out as far as you want to go – not too far or it will separate from the other fibers completely! – then, still pinching slightly, slide your fingers back to the main bulk of fiber and grab another pinch full. Sliding your fingers help keep the twist where it belongs. If the twist gets past your fingers and into the bulk of the fiber it will make your yarn lumpy.

With the way a drop spindle works, you’re pretty much going to use the “inchworm” or short draw technique all the time. The dynamics just don’t fit a long draw. When I spin I like to hold the cloud of fiber in my left hand and draft with my right. I used to pre-draft a lot, but I haven’t done it as often lately. You get used to working without pre-drafting after a while. Now I only use it when the fibers seem to be a little compacted and need to be fluffed up for optimal spinning.

Plying

I’ve touched on plying briefly in Yarn: The Low Down. Plying is spinning two or more singles together in a direction opposite to the direction you originally spun the singles. All you need is a few bobbins of singles that are spun and off the wheel, and another empty bobbin on the wheel.

Here is a bit about regular plying. Two ply, in particular. The basic principle holds true no matter how many plies you care to use.

And here is a tutorial on my hands down favorite standby plying method. The wonderful Navajo ply method. You can turn a single into a three ply yarn with only one one bobbin of singles and no cutting involved. Cool, eh?

Balance

While you’re plying, you need to keep one thing in mind. Balance. When a yarn has too much twist in it it will kink up and be a real bear to work with. Finding examples of how to see if you’re spinning a balanced yarn is a lot harder than I thought, so I don’t have any spiffy links for you this time. Just plain ‘ol text.

Ply a piece of yarn about three feet long. Grab both ends and hold them up so the yarn creates a “U” shape. (You’ll want to hold the tops no more than six inches apart. One and a half inches preferably.) If it doesn’t whirl back on itself, you’re good. It should hang there in an inert manner and look pretty. If it spins around on itself or wraps up it’s not right. You can try twisting one end a bit to see if getting more twist helps, or taking away twist is the way to go. Trial and error, my friend. That’s part of the adventure.

Finishing

And, finally, when you’re finished spinning and plying a yarn, you get to do one last thing. It’s called setting the twist. The school is divided over whether you always set the twist, or whether it’s only for over or under twisted yarns. Honestly, it’s easy enough, I just do it regardless.

Get a bowl of really hot water. Immerse the skein and gently remove. Pat dry gently so it doesn’t felt. Let air dry. Voila. You can do a dozen in fifteen minutes.

Sometimes, to be extra sure it won’t kink, you can hang it up on a hanger with a weight attached to the bottom like my good friend does. You’ll need to scroll down to see it. It’s quite ingenious.