1890

That's the total number of yards of 2-ply yarn required for CF weaving project #1 - the production of 3, 3 colour woven scarves (there is less loom wastage if you weave more than one item in a run...).  I finished the final figures today, worked out (and I'll repeat the maths again before I actually dye any wool and wind the first warp) the actual figures - up until now it was an approximate guess.

The current yardage spun is 1212 yds and at around 200 yds average per skein that's about 3 or 4 more skeins to spin.  As you can seen in the photo I have no shortage of batts to convert to yarn (these are just the latest off the carder this weekend)!!

I'll tidy up my scribbled (weaving) figures and publish them in the next post

Skeins and batts (sample skein on top)

Interlude

Between CF skein #5 and #6 I decided to get another job out of the way that has been sitting waiting for attention.  Some months back a work acquaintance gave me some dog hair from his [very] mixed breed long hair dog that he had adopted while serving in Cyprus.  Already old when he moved down here from Canada - the dog didn't last. Luckily each time it had been brushed, the resultant hair went into a bag - that's what I ended up with (about a years worth of brushing).

I had heard that while reasonably fine - dog hair doesn't card well by itself, so I carded it 50/50 with some pure merino I had.  That seemed to work well and made a very nice soft batt (small).  I then quickly spun it into singles and plied it into two ply.  The result was 26 yards of nice lofty - slightly furry, and mildly coloured yarn.  Dog hair can 'shed' over time, but the addition of the merino may help thwart that - time will tell (although I have no idea what the owner wants to do with it - and it certainly won't make a 'whole' product.  Perhaps a 'feature' stripe in something though).

26 yards of 50/50 dog/merino

An Alternative

To explore what to do with the scoured wool that is shorter than ideal to prepare and spin - this is attempt number 2 (attempt number 1 was not highly successful!) at felting wool.  I ran some wool through the drum carder and made a VERY thin batt.  I then split it and put alternating layers at 90 degrees angles to make up a 5 inch square that I couldn't see through.  Then with some hot water and a little bit of Dawn detergent I rolled it in between two layers of bubble wrap about 200 times, a quick wash and wring and this is the result:

First felt.

With some better set-up and more care this could be relatively easily produced and ready for crafts, clothing, dying, etc.

Helpers

And you thought I was doing this alone...

Shawl/Scarf

I think I may have mentioned this before - the eventual 'first' project from the CF wool will not be a shawl but rather a scarf.  The main reason for this is relatively simple - to weave a shawl requires a fairly wide loom, and mine is in storage in NZ - the only ones I can rent here in the US are table looms (or small portable looms) which generally only go to about 24" or less.

So on that basis I looked around for some decent/challenging pattern and something that I can also experiment with dying some of the wool.  I found in one of my twill pattern books a scarf with a block twill design (they call it 'glacier' and I've entered that into my computer programme and am playing around with colour schemes.

I've also done some quick calculations on how much wool I'll need (I'll check that again, and probably again to make sure) before proceeding to the dying and warping stage.

Rough notes for 'glacier' scarf

The two designs were to compare colour schemes - I like the one with white, it represents a strip (with two pattern repeats) across the scarf.

Production

Starting to ramp up the production now - running just the best locks through the flick carding process, and then drum carding into batts.

At the monthly spinning group meeting I asked if anyone had a 'picker' - and now have a couple of avenues to pursue to try out a picker (either at another club or possibly on loan) to see what difference it makes (obviously speed over flick carding) and if the quality will be the same.  It will remove the vegetable matter from the scoured wool - essential if I end up storing for some time and/or taking any home.

Lock (left) and flick carded lock (right)

Finished skeins, batts, and flick carder ('pillow' wool residue in background)

The latest skein was from a bobbin I filled to the max and came out at 226 yds and 1.9oz.  If I continue that then I would only need 6 of them for the 'scarf' project (next blog)

Just for fun

Now I know my eyes are failing - I had to resort to a jeweler's loupe to see how this turned out.  I wouldn't want to be spinning a bobbin full!!

Two-ply wool thread