Fleece of Many Colors

Remember this?Well I washed it (something I will never do again as it took hours, countless gallons of water, and a toll on my knees....and I can have it done at a fiber mill for $5/pound!) and it came out like this:
Then I spent over a week picking out hay and seeds and such. (Well, I've still got about a pound to go!) Here are a few picked locks:
Teased, you can see the nice crimp:By the way, this stuff feels like a cross b/w bunny fur and baby hair. It's very pleasant to work with.

Next step, dye the locks different colors:So far I have dyed the purple you see above, red, blue, green and yellow locks. To dye, I place the locks in mesh lingerie bags and immerse in my crockpots, just as when I dye roving and top.

So now what? Here's the really fun part....I've been combing the different colors together! Here is how it works....

First, combs are spiky, sharp things. If you note some small holes in my thumb and fingers, this is why. Combs work in sets of two. I'm using small combs I have borrowed from the spinning guild. One comb is clamped to the table (that's our kitchen table, which now serves as dye workbench, combing station, and, soon, carding station!) The free comb is used in a motion first perpendicular to the stationary comb, then parallel to it. In the process the fiber is transferred from the stationary comb, to the moving comb, and back again, as many times as necessary to blend the fibers sufficiently.

There is an excellent tutorial on combing here at Red Stone Yarns, and I couldn't explain it any better than that! But, just in case that's not enough for you, there are some pdf tutorials here on the Majacraft site. Oh, and I'll say one more time...combs are sharp things.

First the locks are "loaded" onto the stationary comb: (I doubt this is the origin of "locked and loaded" but it could be!)Combing purple locks:Comb is moving left to right. Note fiber beginning to accumulate on moving comb.

Once all fiber has transferred to moving comb, it is combed vertically (though the moving comb remains held with tines to the side), transferring all fiber back to the stationary comb. Below, see the nice, fluffy, combed purple fiber.
Now I repeated with yellow locks:And ended up with two fluffy piles....one purple, and one yellow:
They are both loaded together onto the stationary comb:
And repeat the combing process. Remember trolls?
With the fiber back on the stationary comb, it's time to pull it off into a sliver (sly-ver). The fiber is pulled through a diz, or, in my case, a button with large holes.Here's the nice, blended purple and yellow combed top, ready to spin:
Rolled into a nice ball of fluff:Now, I will note here that combing produces more waste than carding. What's left are short fibers that are picked off the combs after each step...here's my pile:My husband would like to save this to make a dog bed for Her Royal Majesty Seven of Nine. He's welcome to it. Some people use it for felting, or in their gardens as mulch. Who needs irises if the mulch is purple and yellow?

Anyway, here.....drum roll please....is the resulting 2-ply sport weight yarn created after spindling the above troll's hair:This is about 6 grams of yarn, 1/4 ounce, or, enough for a large sweater for a small rat.
One final note: Had I continued combing the yellow and purple together, eventually I would've had brown. Purple and yellow are complements. Complements make wonderful visual partners, but you have to be careful to keep them from blending too thoroughly! You will note that the finished yarn is much more subtle in color than the starting locks. The complementary colors have blended just enough to give it an overall more earthy look while still retaining some of the individual purple and yellow detail. That is the beauty of combining colors "dyed in the wool."

The Sheep in my Living Room....

or.... Why my House Smells Like a Barn!

Meet Kelsie Sprite: (she's the white one) Is it just me, or does she resemble John McCain?

Anyway, does she look cold? That's because her winter coat is on my living room floor:
(Don't worry, Mom, I put it on plastic, see?)
Here is a picture taken without flash, which shows the true color:
This is a Shetland fleece from Windswept Farms in Michigan. It weighs about 2 1/2 pounds. I'd like to learn how to process it into spinning batts. I'd also like to try just spinning locks, as I hear that Shetland locks spin nicely.

One of the first steps will be "scouring" the fleece. That really just means washing it in hot water with Dawn dish washing liquid. Then I can sort the locks, pick out the hay and other "vegetal mattern" and dye them into an assortment of colors. Then I'll be borrowing a drum carder to blend the different colors into heathery combinations ready for spinning.

Well, that's the plan.

Top or Roving?

CARDED ROVING

When I first started spinning, this confused me too. (I'm *still* fairly new at this, but I've learned a lot. )

The essential difference, as I understand it, is this:

Top is combed. (Please scroll down that page, Jenny's photos of combing are worth it!) The fibers are all of about equal length and all orientated in the same direction:

Roving is carded. There are different lengths of fibers, and they are less organized:These above are not the same colorway, but I think you can see the difference. Below are some close-ups, and these are in the same colorway:

CARDED ROVING
_______

COMBED TOP

The different processes result in quite a different spinning experience. Carded wool contains fibers of various lengths, different types of fibers from the same animal. "Neps" and "noils" are terms used, respectively, for the pills and short fibers often found in carded roving. There is very little waste in the carding process. Often you will find bits of sticks and straw in there too! Carded roving is great for woolen spinning. (lofty, warm yarns)

Top fibers are all of about equal length. There is quite a bit of waste fiber left after combing. Tops spin smoother and are great for worsted spinning. (dense, smooth yarns)

I have also noticed these differences:

~Top is more "slippery"
~Roving is a bit more "fuzzy," both in the fiber stage and after being spun and plied.
~With Shetland, both preparations lead to a soft, springy yarn, though the irregularities of that derived from the carded fibers lend it a more "traditional" or "rustic" feel, especially for a Fair Isle yarn. To me, at least.
~The carded roving I am using has several types of fibers in it (there are technical terms for the different types of fibers that come off one sheep, but I'm not very familiar with those yet), that give the roving some "character." The top, on the other hand, is completely "homogeneous."
~In dyeing, I prefer the way the regular rovings take up dyes. I get a bit more visible variation of the colors I've mixed, and less irregularities in the saturation. (This latter probably due to the fact that the rovings are much thinner than the tops)

***If any sewers have made it this far, let me say that I'd liken carded roving to silk dupioni and combed top to silk charmeuse.

Here are some photos. These red yarns are not from the same colorway.

Fingering 2-ply from top:Fingering 2-ply from carded roving:Roving on top, top on bottom (sigh...I really didn't plan it that way):I can't really decide which preparation I like better so for now I'll continue to dye both.

One final note: Often the term "roving" is used for any long, continuous, cylindrical preparation of fibers for spinning. So you will often see a length of top called roving. Technically, a long length of top though, may better be termed a "sliver" (sly-ver) but that term is less commonly recognized.

This Weekend's Fiber Action

Now I have 3 crockpots so I was able to dye the same amount of wool as in the past two weekends, but with much less scrambling. I am about to get a 4th pot, and then I'll be able to dye 1 pound lots, which is nice for people who are interested in making larger projects with their handspun.

Here are some of the results:
Shetland Tops, all about 4 ounce and available in my etsy shop:
Threw some suiting wool in a couple batches for rug hookers:


Dyeing woven wool is a bit easier than the roving. The roving requires gentle handling to make sure it doesn't turn into a felted mass. But the fabrics had already been machine washed and dried and it's actually preferable if they are completely or partially fulled...you don't want them raveling away as you work with them. I have to say though, I enjoy dyeing the roving more....it's squishy soft, what's not to like?

What's Roving For?

So asked Mimi. And so I thought I'd provide a little introduction for those of you that don't knit, spin, or felt.

Roving is a preparation of fibers into a loose, puffy, rope-like length, for dyeing and/or spinning. It's almost like a long thin quilt batt, but with the fibers mostly running in the same direction, parallel to the vertical length of the roving.

Roving is made in wool, alpaca, cotton, bamboo, silk, tencel, and blends.

Roving can be used not only for spinning (on a spinning wheel or with a hand-spindle), but for wet or needle felting.

Spinning of course is the process of twisting parallel fibers for strength. A rope is spun sisal. Yarns are twisted fibers of wool or cotton. Woven fabrics are made of threads that are also twisted fibers.

In sewing, needle felting has become very popular lately for embellishing. I've even seen felting machines, shaped just like sewing machines, and a lot of packs of multi-colored rovings showing up in quilting stores and catalogs. I've found that the packs of assorted colored roving "puffs" on my etsy site are selling better than the larger balls of roving for spinning (which aren't selling at all!)

Needles for needle felting, or "punching" are barbed almost like fishing hooks (on a much smaller scale). When you punch the needle through the wool and into a layer of fabric beneath, it carries some of the wool fiber with it. When the needle comes back out, the wool fibers stay embedded in the fabric.

I have done some needle felting embellishment on knitted and felted bags. Here is an example of the "Sophie" bag by Julie Anderson, pattern available free from MagKnits, embellished with random (i.e. fun) swirly things.other side:

Those were done with yarn scraps, which gives a fairly distinct line. Felting with roving gives you a much broader range of detail (or not) with which to work, because with roving it is easy to work with just a few fibers at a time, or a whole cloudy mass of fibers at a time. I have used roving to felt woolen balls. Why? Just for the heck of it I guess! They can be pretty in a bowl on the coffee table, perhaps mixed with those wicker balls you see so much of lately, or smooth stones from the shore. I have also used wool roving to needle felt pin cushions.

Some of the things that artists are doing with wool felting is amazing. Landscapes, portraits, and sculpture, jewelry. Check out the work by this etsy artist. And this artist will render your pet or favorite wildlife creature in a felted wool sculpture.

Of course there is also wet-felting which I know much less about. I do know it produces gorgeous results. Here is wet-felted wool on silk chiffon. A wet-felted meshed scarf. An unusual collar. A lesson in simplicity.

So that's what wool roving is for, and why I've been dyeing it!

It's Not Haggis

Nope, it's Shetland wool roving! I spent the entire weekend, including Friday, dyeing wool fiber in a crockpot. This was pure, unadulterated, creative fun!

First off, I got to use a color wheel, like some kind of "real" artist! I also referred often to two dyeing books that I'd highly recommend to anyone who wants to try this out:

The Dyer's Companion by Dagmar Klos is an essential collection of formulas, conversions, and general information for dyeing fibers.

Color in Spinning by Deb Menz is a thorough guide to not just dyeing fiber and painting roving, but also working with color when carding fiber or plying singles.

The second reason I had a great time dyeing this weekend is that I got to be a scientist again. I studied microbiology in college and was always in some kind of lab or other....everything from organic chemistry (which sucked, frankly) to electronic microscopy (which was really cool.) I got to use a gram scale and measure crystalline citric acid onto coffee filters. Calculate grams of dye in solution, and the amounts of each solution to use when combining colors in specific strengths. Nothing near as precise or important as the 6-hour process I used to go through to prepare chopped chick embryo livers for the transmission electron microscope...but just enough of a challenge to be fun without stress.

The third reason that I had a blast dyeing was that it's a mysterious process. I experimented with different ways of applying the dyes....all once when the dye bath was cool, all at once at 160°, one at a time at 170°, squirted on , squirted in, and stirred in..... And, every batch was a mystery until the very end...when I finally, after hours, took it out of the water and hung it to dry. Beyond that...when I later fluffed up the fibers and rolled them into a neat ball...they looked different yet again.
And I've still got a big pile of dried fibers yet to be fluffed and rolled:
Note to sewers: This wool roving is the best stuff for the needle felting embellishment that we see so much of lately!

Something magical happened in that dye bath you see in the top photo above. Somewhere in the narrow window between 175° and 180°, the water became clear and the fiber became colored. I know it was just a chemical reaction...but it was pretty darned cool to behold. You see, when you pour off the water at the end of the process...it's water again. It's not blue or green or red, all the color has moved from the water to the fiber and stuck there!

Next weekend I may or may not be dyeing, depending on whether any of this stuff sells or not. I do have an idea for a cool sewing project, also related to spinning that I may work on instead.

Oh, and I may need one of these (and I bet that my sewing friends will appreciate this piece of equipment even if they have no idea what it is...b/c it's just a really neat machine.)
Drum Carder