spinning alpaca

The mail truck pulled up outside my house this morning, and my veneer of nonchalence wore through as I eagerly opened the package to find Winner's fleece from Rainbow Mountain Alpacas in Pennsylvania. Here's a pic of Winner from their website and the fleece on our living room floor. I have new admiration for fleece photographers (do you suppose there are specialists?)--it's much more work than I'm willing to put in to get accurate colors. Winner's fleece is black with brown tips. It's his 7 month fleece and is 20 microns and 1.8% greater than 30 (which for non-spinners means that it's super soft and not in the least bit itchy). Diane also included a little sample of two of her suri fleeces, soft and silky. So tempting, especially the medium brown. I held back this time, but might have to contact her again soon.





Meanwhile, the alpaca singles for the circular shawl have had their twist set and are waiting for me to ball them up at the craft center. Spun another little skein this am. I can't wait to work on Winner's fleece, but first (after the shawl) I need to do the coarse alpaca for the August show and then there's that Romney fleece I'm still working on for the sweater and the merino and merino/romney fleeces just waiting. Those would be beautiful combined with the black alpaca for some colorwork. Hmm...

Sean has been working hard on the garden. Not sure when he found the time, but today I found the strawberry bed weeded and mulched. Death to privets! They can be used for dyeing but don't produce the most exciting colors.



Planted this 3 years ago, it's supposed to be Fuller's Teasel (used for brushing/raising the nap on wool cloth) although I thought it was supposed to have more curved spines (also is supposed to be a biennial and flower in the second year, but oh well).

And a much more skillful spinner than I: