Rooted in Mississippi

I washed another fleece, the four pound Shetland that I purchased at ROC Day from Fire Ant Ranch. As I was flicking the washed locks and making a giant fluffy cloud of wool for the carder, I decided that I needed to take a picture of my soft cloud.


Then I decided to take a photo of the cloud, the washed fleece and the raw fleece all together. I wanted to show how a dirty yellowed fleece can be transformed into a light and airy fluff in a single day. To bad I can’t share how much the smell improved along the way.


I wash my wool in the kitchen sink. I am spoiled, I have something that makes my kitchen sink the perfect place for this activity…an Insinkerator Instant Hot Water Dispenser that dispenses water at 190 degrees. I have the original model H770, because my plumber was uninspired and did not let me choose for myself…it is just part of a long painful remodeling story that I won’t bore you with. I did finally replace the kitchen faucet he installed just a few weeks ago, because I needed something taller with a better sprayer to accommodate stock pots and dye pots. The hot water dispenser only holds about a half gallon in the tank, so I have to mix it with hot water from the regular tap, but it sure beats boiling water and moving it from the stove to the sink!

I place a white plastic wash tub into the right side of my sink and fill it with hot and super hot water. I stuff my fleece into a mesh sweater bag or lingerie bag, then submerge it in the very hot water. I use a Pyrex bowl filled with water to weight the fleece down. It will get a huge amount of dirt and lanolin out of the fleece on the first pass. Then I pull the mesh bag out and set it aside to drain, while I pour off the dirty water and refill the wash tub with very hot water. This time I put in my surfactant (usually original blue Dawn dishwashing detergent) just until the water is slick…trying not to create many suds….then I put the mesh bag of fleece back in and submerge it with the Pyrex bowl. As I check on the fleece and shift it around, I use the bowl to trap any suds that are created and pour them down the left side of the sink, to keep them away from my fleece. When it cools, but before it is cold, I lift the bag out and set it aside to drain. I toss out the dirty soap water and refill the wash basin with hot and super hot water for another rinse. Occasionally it will take two rinses, but most of the time, the water is pretty clear at this point. If it is the last rinse, I will add either citric acid or distilled white vinegar to the last rinse and allow it to sit until it cools thoroughly.

I use the drain/spin cycle on my washing machine to get rid of the remaining excess water. Since I have a front loader, I either have to turn off the water supply or start the cycle with an empty machine then hit pause after one minute, which gets the initial water spray out of the way, before I put the bag of fleece into the tub. With a front loader, there is no need to try to balance the load. When the cycle is finished, I remove the fleece from the mesh bag and fluff it up while I turn it out into a plastic basket. If it is a sunny day, I set it outside to dry. If not, I put it in the room with my dehumidifier.

I use separate tools for all of my washing and dyeing, but I do use my kitchen sink, so I am very careful to clean up afterward. So my last step in the process is always to clean the sink and counters with bleach and hot water!

At this point in the fleece processing, I can either store the fleece, dye it, or use a flicker brush to open up all the tips and create a big pile of fluff that is ready for the carder. I can wash a whole fleece in small batches in a single day. That leaves huge amounts of time where I can spin, check the computer, clean the house or watch TiVo.

And for Vee:

I wanted to show a new photo of the lavender cheviot fleece now that it is dry. It lightened up significantly and it looks great. I still have not decided if I will make batts or just spin from the lock. She also asked me how I got this color. I was aiming for muted, more subtle colors….but I did indeed use Wilton’s Icing Colors.


I got a big stock pot a little over half full of acidified water and heated it to 160, then added a small amount of Wilton’s Pink to the pot and stirred it vigorously to help it dissolve. Then I added the clean dry fleece and let it submerge. Most of it took on a pink color immediately, with the brightest/darkest concentration on the bottom. Then I mixed a small amount of Aster Mauve (it only comes in the Garden Tone 4-pack) into a two quart jar with water from the instant hot and poured it slowly over the top of the wool. I had turned the wool to see the strike pattern and I poured the muddy color on top of any place I noticed was too bright and needed muting. This a technique I have been using to get large strikes of different colors in the same dye pot.


I use a thermometer to make sure that the water reaches 180 degrees, because I discovered that judging by sight was tricking me into under-heating. I was so afraid of letting it reach a boil, that I was not letting the dye bath get quite hot enough for quite long enough.

If you made it all the way through this post, I hope you found at least some part of it helpful.

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I really enjoy the whole process of dyeing. I love playing with fleece, roving, top, you name it. I am thrilled by what happens when I dye. It is so fun to play and experiment and then get to enjoy the fruits of my labor. This weekend I dyed Corriedale Cross, Montdale, Merino/Targhee/Rambouillet blend, mohair/romeny blend, and the rest of the Cheviot fleece that I washed months ago. Part of the fun of organizing, is seeing everything…getting ideas & making plans…then following through with them.

First, the rovings and top…

I use window screens, then sort and spread the washed/dyed fleece across them. These screens are long and narrow and balance pretty well across the arms of my camoflage chairs.

Close-ups of the Cheviot:

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I was shopping this morning and I got an idea for how to better organize the cedar wardrobe where I keep most of roving and combed top. I got a couple of sweater organizers and then added one shoe organizer on each side, they hang from the bar in the armoir. Then I went through and put up all of my dyed rovings. This way they are out where I can see them when I want to feel inspired!

Of course, I have about twenty pounds of undyed roving neatly placed in a large breathable plastic hamper in the closet under my stairwell. Plus I tossed in the bags of washed fleece in there. I use zippered pillow protectors for those. The impressive part is that everything is actually labeled. Of course, I did most of that over the New Year’s Holiday…but I think I have found a great way to utilize my space.

Oh and just for sheer drool factor, I thought I would include a close up of some of my roving. On the left, rovings from Kae/FaeryLady Fibers. On the right, roving that I dyed myself.

I even got some time to spin this morning and I have a little over half a bobbin full of my hand-dyed merino…in a rose inspired colorway…and I dyed about 9 ounces of Corriedale Cross.

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The latest issue January 2006 (Volume 5, Issue 1) of CQMagOnline.com is now available for public consumption! It sure took a lot of work to get this issue ready, but it is finally done…and I sure hope y’all enjoy it. There are several very cool projects available and you can’t beat the price…it is free!

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I finally finished stitching my chapter’s piece for the EGA South Central Region’s Traveling Exhibit. It needs to be washed and blocked before I send it off to the coordinator. The stitch I chose was Shadow Work and although I was only obligated to stitch the outline of the logo, I thought it made a good subject for this technique, so I did the whole enchilada. It sure was fiddly! But this is my first intricate embroidery project since Katrina. I had to put something dark behind it to get the camera to pick up on the white-on-white subtleties.

Oh, and I meant to share a photo of this really cute fiber back-pack that I bought from Joan in MS at Saturday’s Chimneyville Weavers and Spinners Guild meeting. I fell in love with the fabric and the design is very cute. Joan is one creative gal. It is a back pack style that will fit lots of fiber with pockets inside for my spindles and other stuff. Pretty cool, huh?

And, finally, I wanted to add a better photo of Ben wearing the Muppet Guts socks.

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Well, I finally got it set up and ran some waste wool through my drum carder! The I got out some hand-dyed Romney from a swap, that was just beautiful, but I could not make it draft at all. I re-carded all of it and now have a big fluffy pile of batt ready to spin. It is very pretty and this way, I might actually get to spin it!

That was so successful that I got out some of the roving that got yucky when it dyed it. This was originally a brown and white roving from eBay that I dubbed “Look to the Cookie” as an homage to Seinfeld. Then I dyed it with Wilton’s black and got a very cool roving, but it was super hard to draft and very compacted. Okay, maybe it was a little felted. After two passes through the carder, it came out pretty darn cool and I am looking forward to spinning it.

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I did manage to finish spinning the hand-dyed top that I started at my spinning guild meeting. I managed to get them same yardage on the two bobbins…with only about 18 inches difference when it was all plied together. It came out very nice and very vernal!

I also did manage to get the drum carder assembled. Next I need to run some washed locks through it to get the machine oil out of it before I start trying to card any of the food stuff. It is set up in my living room, on the same small table my ball winder and one of my swifts. I am a little embarrassed to have taken over so much of the living room with my spinning equipment when I have a studio upstairs, but I will get over it.

My friend Lisa is taking an art class at Millsaps starting tonight and she talked me into calling them. The class was full when I called, but I left my phone number. Before noon, I was registered. So it looks like I will be missing knit night for the next eight weeks. I am actually very excited. This is something I have wanted to do for a while, but have never gotten around to it. I would *really* like to teach embroidery classes in their Enrichment program. Maybe someday.

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At least that is what my fortune cookie told me!

Yesterday was a good spinning day. It was a guild day and several of us brought along our wheels. Despite slicing my thumb while slicing a bagel, I got several ounces of roving spun. My hand was sore, because I was holding it funny, favoring my wound. Plus, I was getting used to my new stretch drive band. I changed to the stretch band so I would not have to keep changing cotton drive banks every time I swapped between the two flyers on the Ashford Traveller.

I worked on some more of the blue GCNI roving, then I switched to some soft wool blend stuff that I hand-dyed. The soft wool blend is spinning up very nice and it is such a joy to spin after fighting with the GCNI. With luck there will be enough of it for a pair of nice spring socks. It is sort of a soft minty green with yellow and pink splashes. I am very pleased with the way it is spinning up.

It was nice to see new faces at the meeting and even nicer to see an old acquaintance. I am seriously considering my future and it was very cathartic talking to like minded people.

Oh, and I got the drum carder partially assembled!

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Okay, so I complained that I did not have enough time at home to put together my drum carder, next thing you know I am home sick with a GI virus. I still have not put together the drum carder. Instead, I have spent most of the morning working feverishly on the upcoming issue of CQMagOnline. Feverish being the operative word. LOL

I decided to take a break from all of that to post an offer for trade day on the Yahoo Spindlers Group and to update things here on my blog. I finally finished a second bobbin of GCNI last night and started plying it. I will post a photo of the plied yarn sometime this weekend. I moved my wheel to a better spot in my living room, where I could sit in a comfortable chair and spin while I watched television.

I have limited myself to tea and toast (okay, a toasted bagel if you must know) and so far, no improvement. I hate feeling puny. But with my lousy constitution, I pick up every virus that goes around and there are LOTS of them going around right now.

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I tried to buy a used Lace Flyer Kit for my Double Drive Traveller today, but it turned out that it was actually a high speed flyer and whorl. Oh, well, I really did not *need* it, I just wanted it. After all, the bulky flyer has been a big success.

I still have not had time to put the Strauch Petite Drum Carder together. I had so many errands to run on my day off that I never got around to it, then it was back to work, so the carder is still sitting in its opened box. This was a busy weekend, I had company, a Mississippi NeedleArts meeting, a CyberStitchers meeting and I was working on the January issue of CQMagOnline, which is due to be published in a few weeks. But I did find time to spin, so I guess the drum carder assembly must not have been a priority.

On the plus side, I got a box of fiber in the mail today. Two pounds of hand-dyed GCNI and a bonus of some hand-dyed silk. Thank you Kae!

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