The Spin-Off Scarf - International Year of the Natural fibre

The big adventure for April and May was participating in the Spin-Off Scarf Competition to honor the International Year of the Natural Fiber. It was quite an experience and I had an enormous amount of fun and learned many things. I also made ... A FINISHED OBJECT! Always a nice accomplishment. Sadly, I did not make the cut to the final selection. I heard today via email. I almost never participate in competitions and I am a bit on the sad side of things. A blog is not just about all the successes and the discoveries... it is about the journey, the problems and challenges. I hope that my mistakes help you.

Photos speak a great deal so here are are the highlights of the past two months.

Poking around at the Spin-Off Website there was an announcement that there would be a competition in honor of the International Year of Natural Fibre. (Now It is being called, 'All Wrapped up in Natural Fibers'). The basic rules were that one had to start with raw fiber of some sort and process it through to the end product. Any dyeing would have to be naturally dyed.

Karakul on the Bobbin.
I was so excited by the idea of the process to weave that I grabbed the only fleece in my stash, a karakul fleece. It was a prize winner from the Taos Wool Festival a few years ago. I washed it right away, combed it and spun it up at the same time ordering and waiting on another fleece from Colorado - a Teeswater.

The Karakul fleece was absolutely stunning. The locks were perfect, the color was varied (and I often like a variegated yarn since to me it gives more depth to the yarn). I realized after it was spun up that it wouldn't feel nice on the neck no matter how lovely the locks and how much fun it was to comb and spin... It is after all a rug wool. Sometimes I just want something to be a certain way... I need to respect its nature more.

Karakul Skein.
This is a skein from the Karakul. It is lovely and I am sure it will dye up well too. I will probably use it for something nice, but not clothing.
Then I realized it wouldn't feel nice on the neck no matter how lovely the locks and how much fun it was to comb and spin... It is after all a rug wool.


Black Welsh Mountain Skeins
The skein on top is combed, the skein below is carded. Both spun worsted.

Well, I was playing on Ravelry when I saw a lovely black fleece sample and without really knowing what I was getting I ordered my Welsh Black Mountain sheep fleece. It is an absolutely lovely natural black, but it is much too coarse to wear anywhere near the skin.

Teeswater Skein
I also ordered an incredible Teeswater, which was a joy to spin up. The locks are incredibly long and the luster is very strong.

Curly on the bobbin

I was a little discouraged that the Black Welsh Mountain sheep fleece was so coarse. I had spent a fair amount of time on it and I had limited time at hand. I was lamenting this fact to my wonderful friend, Leslie, and to help out she sent me a large portion of a clip from one of her Pygora goats, Curly. Curly's fleece told me that she loves to play outside a lot, however her fleece came beautifully clean and was lovely all spun up.

Last, I ordered some incredible true black alpaca from Bay Springs Alpaca. It arrived and it was delicious. I washed it up, combed it, spun up a lovely big giant skein. Velvet has a lucious fleece. The black absolutely glows. Sometimes when I was weaving I would simply sit and look at the black; it was so beautiful. It was also soft. I knew that I would love to have it on my neck and that it would keep me warm.

Some things I do not have photos for. As the deadline drew near I worked into the early morning. I put everything aside and I did not get all the photos I usually do. I was seriously running low on time.

I wanted to warp my loom, but Curly's skeins needed to be dyed first. I dyed one skein in onion skins with a mixed in bath of asafran using alum and cream of tarter as the mordant. The second skein I wanted to be red. I started a bath of cochineal. It turned purple because I have very hard water. I soaked my little skein of curly in the dyebath, but to no avail. It would not turn red and it appeared to have difficulty getting the red dye to strike deeply. The gold turned out well. So after some consultation with a friend, I made another dyebath using bottled water and a bit of pre-soaked madder (one has to pre-soak it since the first soak brings out an off yellow that is discarded.). I spent 3 days dyeing that one skein and in the end it is merely an off pink. However it is a respectable color and worked well in the final design.


Alpaca (Velvet) & Pygora (Curly) skeins ready for warping and weaving.

I wish I could say that I had taken pictures of it on the loom, but there again, I was so short on time I could not get it done. But lest one think that the weaving was easy... HA! For something that was plain weave in threading and treadling HA! I made a mistake in my warp calculations and so it was shorter than I wanted, but I had no time to spin more warp. I wanted to do a card woven border, but it looked terrible so I axed it. I wanted to do a sample first, but I had no time so I axed that. I wanted to do a tapestry design in the little squares, but the time it would have taken me would have precluded me from participating in this International Year of the Natural fibers so I decided to adapt my initial design.

To begin with the scarf was inspired by and ancient Peruvian piece from a book I have. Perhaps I will try again and do a better job.

I found that my reed and beater was abraiding my warp too much and so I used my mini-tapestry beater to beat each section into place. Since I alternated tapestry squares in the lattice work it made sense to do this. The tapestry work was incredibly time consuming. It looks nice, but the hours I put in were very intense. Eventually it was done being woven so I did my hem stitching, washed it, set it, and ironed it. Then I put together my entry notebook and sent it into Spin-Off.

The scarf in full view

Here is a full view of the finished scarf. My daughter has decided to adopt it (especially since the dog ate her Christmas mitts in half). She likes it a lot and to me that is a great success story. (Teenager likes scarf Mom makes... film at eleven). The creativity of the many fiber artists participating in this competition is intense and this scarf was not enough to make it even to the final cut, but it was still a worthwhile journey.

Sheep, Goats, ALPACA

Well, through a little comedy of errors involving the postal service... ;) ... and my neighbors... I have some lovely true black alpaca in my hot little hands. From Bay Springs Alpacas I have a pound of fleece. Bay Springs Alpacas are lovely people with great little Alpacas. They are able to break up their blankets (alpaca fleece) into smaller quantities for handspinners, they also sell top, yarn, and other fun things. So I have 8 oz of Florence, and 8 oz of Velvet, both stunningly black soft critters. If I can, I will update with their individual pictures, but meanwhile here is their fleece arriving and getting washed up ready to comb. ;)

The first photos are from Florence's fleece. She was the first out of the box so she got washed first. Alpacas aside from being yes, different from sheep (hey, no rolling your eyes), have no lanolin so their fleece is not greasy. This means less dirt. Never fear there is still dirt. It is tempting to just take those lovely locks and just spin them, but the dirt will spin into the yarn and some of it would not come out with washing of the yarn. Some dirt will cause the fleece to cling more and clump up. It is just better for the fleece to wash it first before processing. Cleaner tools, cleaner spinner, gritless yarn, and if you don't get it all spun up... you will not have dirty fleece with which to attract the evil four letter word M**H. If you don't get this for whatever reason... we don't say the word in order to not tempt our luck. The M**h is a flying pest, whose larvae eat wools. BLECH! Every handspinner's nightmare. In any case Florence had a bath.


Here is Florence being laid out before separating for washing. The tips are red due to amniotic fluid. When she is washed and combed those don't show at all.


Here is an unwashed lock from Florence's fleece. I always take an unwashed lock sample, a washed lock and later a spun sample. Ideally, they should go in a book... lately I've been rushing through stuff to get to my deadline.... Whooshhhhhh...



Even the cleanest Alpaca fleeces have dirt. ;)


Here is Florence, luxuriating in the warm sunshine and drying so she can be combed. Isn't the black impressive? And she is soft too... Admit it... you would love some alpaca...


Then Velvet had a bath. If you compare the photos of their individual locks you will see a difference. Same Breed,alpaca, different genetic line. Both are lovely, I just want to point out that there are differences to observe. I was sort of rushing through things so I didn't get as many photos as I usually due, my apologies.


Here are two locks from different parts of the blanket.


Here is one of the locks a bit closer. Notice the lovely crimp.

So tonight is comb Florence and Velvet, and then spin Florence and Velvet. Hopefully, I will do dyeing of Curly tomorrow and finish spinning, wash yarns, dry yarns, and then Sunday... I have to be warping and starting to weave. Heavy Sigh.. think good thoughts for my little self imposed marathon. ;)