Friday/sheepday

We had a last blast of winter weather this week, which has a way of throwing the best laid plans out of whack.  Wednesday, we cancelled classes at the shop.  Thursday, school districts around Minnesota had a snow day and the shop was closed.  The snowstorm included snow, sleet, peppered with lightning and thunder.   Friday, the weather was a little warmer and snowy.  Mary and I were able to adventure out as planned to help while the shearer was at her son and daughter-in-law's farm.  They have a small flock of Icelandic sheep.  Molly was the first to lamb, so we got to cuddle the twins.  They are sporting black and white spots, which will be beautiful fleeces as the lambs mature.  The shearer would shear a sheep and our job was to bag the fleece and then sweep the mat for the next sheep.  An autumn shearing is typically better than a spring shearing, so it will be fun to see the lambs in a few months.  The other ewes were about ready to pop.  B and A will be busy with lambing soon.

Last to be sheared, Marshmallow, was the largest in the flock.  

After the shearing was finished we had some last cuddles with the twin lambs before heading home.  

Speaking of fleeces, Mary has a cardigan (for her son) in progress with last year's fleeces from the flock.  After Mary washed the fleeces, Deb Peterson of Ewespun Fiber Mill at Old Man Wool Farm, processed them into clouds.  With her handspinning, Mary mimicked the characteristics of bulky Lopi yarn.  She attached some sample Lopi yarn to an index card and then proceeded to spin samples.  It took a bit of time and in the end she managed to spin light and lofty singles, which she plied together.  The result was just beautiful and she duplicated the same yardage and weight of a skein of Alafoss Lopi (100 g/3.5 oz approximately 100 m/109 yds.  The main color is a rich brown and the stranded colorwork is black and white.

Mary has progressed quite a bit since this photo was taken.  She is now ready to knit the sleeves.   Instead of a zipper, she will add front bands and buttons.

A day at the festival

On Saturday I went to Shepherd's Harvest Festival in Lake Elmo.  I did not take any classes, but did do a demo on top whorl spindle spinning.  It was such fun.  The demo area was in Building A and Andrea from Black Cat Farmstead was beside me.  Seeing the antique wheels lovingly restored is always a treat.  The first purchase of the day was a spindle sporting a glow-in-the-dark whorl 3D printed by Andrea's son.

A 3-D printed spindle whorl...

...that glows in the dark!

There were lots of vendors, some new some familiar.  I love the patterns from Ewetopia and purchased a few including Daisy and the October Cowl.

Sheep were sheared on the hour and Jody, one of my friends from Anoka Fiber Works, was skirting fleeces.  Between the shearing we talked about fleeces for sale in the barn.  I mentioned the beautiful Jacob fleece from Joxer's Jacobs.  Jody's eyes lit up and she said how nice they were.  I was not in the market for a fleece but her comments piqued my interest.  We went to the barn together and looked at the fleeces.  I had two in particular that I liked (Jody, you taught me well) and she agreed.  The smaller 3.3-pound fleece was mine!  Yesterday I roughly separated the colors.  Today I began the scouring process.  The wool is even nicer than I originally thought and nicely skirted.  ChiChi is the sheep with the lovely fleece.  The scouring is going well so far.  I worked from dark to light, which is my last batch.  The wool is fluffy and soft and the combination of natural black, gray and white is really pretty.  I will be interested to see how many yards of each color I can spin.  Perhaps enough for a Fair Isle vest?

Baaa!

Jacob fleece before dividing and scouring.

These little lambs were chilling in the barn.

It is always nice to know the names of the sheep.

Cinnamon Toast Crunch or Cookies n' Cream, although they are all cute.

The sheep surely look different when sheared.

Baa baa black sheep.  This little fellow was  so soft and sweet.

Pretty roving for sale in the barn.

My friend Jennifer.  It was so good to see her!

Mary from Anoka Fiber Works gives a spindle spinning lesson.

Andrea from Black Cat Farmstead grows flax.  Preparing the flax into linen is labor intensive. I did it one time before we moved to Minnesota.   

My new spindle, Stella with the beautiful Shetland wool roving I bought.