A busy day

Pure Wensleydale Fleece Drying

Wnsleydale X Suffolk Yarn

  Dyed Wensleydale X Suffolk Wool

A busy day today starting with washing some pure Wensleydale fleece and setting the spin on the yarn that I have spun from the fiber that is seen in an earlier blog on my drum carder.  A sunny day and all these were dry by the evening and now I have to weigh and measure the hanks of yarn and think of a name for it.

The pure Wensleydale wool is still pretty dirty but by the time I have teased it out most of the dirt will have fallen out as it has no lanolin to hold it.  I intend to spin this without dying it.  You can see how different it is to the Wensleydale cross fleece

The last photo is of Wensleydale X Suffolk which has for some reason taken the dye green at the tips and yellower towards the cut end.  Not sure why this has happened as I have dyed lots of the fleece and this hasn't happened with other colours

Some stages of preparing fiber for spinning

The next lot of wool from Susie's lamb is underway.  I was lucky to get a fine day to dry some of it outside on my slate table.  The wool dries so much faster outside if I get the weather.   Next into the dying pan, yellow this time but I am only using a little mixed in with the blue.   This I do with my drum carder,  hard work and slow as I can only feed in a little fiber at a time and before it goes onto the carder it has to be dried again and then teased apart by hand or it will break the teeth on the carder.  Almost ready to spin,  most of the work done and now the real fun

Setting the spin

Just finished the first yarn from the wool from Susie's lamb.  This yarn is made from 3 separate dye lots which I blended on my drum carder  and added a little yellow, red and orange wool which were from dye lots that I did last year with the wool from Susie's 2010 lamb.  I also added a little Angelina which gives the yarn a little sparkle.  I have over 800grams of the color way and it is Aran/worsted to chunky weight.  I have listed some of it on my Etsy web site, www. etsy.com/shop/MarkreeWoolCraft  If you are interested in more please contact me on my e-mail, mary@markreewoolcraft.com.
 The yarn that is hanging is a process called 'setting the spin'  the last part of producing yarn. The wool is soaked in warm water, I add a little essential oil, and then hang it out to dry with weights attached.  This takes any kinks out of the yarn and is a bit like putting your hair in curlers and it makes the twist permanent

Susie's Lamb

This is Susie's lamb that was born in 2011. Susie is my only non Wensleydale sheep and I have had her  since she was a lamb.  She had a very heavy fleece which I have just started to prepare and spin.  The wool is beautiful, very long and soft and I am really enjoying working with it.  It will be interesting to find out how much wool she had after washing when most of the natural lanolin has been removed

Natural White Wensleydale Yarn

This is a sample of my pure Wensleydale yarn.  It is Aran/worsted weight and can be knitted, crocheted or hand dyed.

 

It can be bought on my website www.etsy.com/shop/MarkreeWoolCraft

Welcome to Markree Wool Craft.   I am a wool fanatic based in the North West of Ireland.  I own a small flock of Wensleydale sheep and hand dye and spin all their wool.

The sheep before shearing

Wensleydale wool dye and carded ready for spinning

Sheep with new born lambs