#no I'm not doing tour de fleece yes I am gonna use the tag

[viciousewe]

All the cool kids are posting their fun spinning projects and I felt left out.

My friend sent me about 300-400g each of three of her alpacas fleeces and when I saw the lightest colored one I knew I had to make the Cybele corset vest by Katherine griffin-grimes from French girl knits and I knew I wanted it in a rustic thick thin two ply at an Aran weight. I also wanted to add in some merino wool from my stash because vest needs stretch; but therein lies my problem. I do not have any blending tools nor do I have the money to buy some. (I mean I could spare a solid 60$ for the Ashford mini carders but I already own carders so it just feels like a waste.)

I got to work processing the fleece and came to the conclusion that I would spin from the cloud and trust in my hands so after the alpaca dried I measured it out to 75% to 25% merino and then pulled the merino into little tufts and then mixed it into the alpaca by just grabbing handfuls of the fleeces together and pulling it in the same direction and then folding it over and pulling it again kind of like I was making taffy but also kind of the way I knead bread and it worked???? I mean the merino is now evenly distributed and now I just portion out little handfuls (like literally 1-2g) and do the same pulling and folding motion until I’m happy w the distribution and then start spinning.

I’m not sure how this is gonna affect the final yarn because tbh the merino is still kinda chunky in there, but it’s been an interesting spin thus far and aesthetically? Perfect. Anyways I thought it would be the alpaca that would be the problem because I have only processed fleece once before but it was actually pretty good fleece aside from some very very minor tip bleaching and some shortcuts, but ohhh boiii the merino…..I’m not a fan of drum carded batt and I was so excited for local ny wool that I didn’t stop to think about how it’s a, ya know, drum carded batt. And idk how or why but it’s quite compressed so I’ve really had to put some muscle into spinning those parts but the alpaca slides along so nicely. And then after all that I actually read the pattern and realized it is side to side constructed so I probably could have gotten away with a full alpaca yarn esp since I’m planning on fulling it just a little when I’m done. I’m a little worried that the white and ginger will cause self striping that will detract from the cables even tho all signs point to a marled look more than anything. Also I haven’t spun this thickly for a while and have never spun for a project so uuhhh not looking forward to the Gauge Swatch Sacrifices. I’m also just now remembering the merino humbug top I have which would have blended in so much better because it has so much of the same gingery alpaca color in it, and also would have spun better due to being roving. :/

Anyways if u have any tooless fleece processing/blending tips lmk.

#yarn #handmade #handspinning #spinning #wip #work in progress #knitting #handspun #wool #tour de fleece 2022 #no I'm not doing tour de fleece yes I am gonna use the tag #i want ppl to look at my yarn :/