Monday, May 4, 2009


From Fleece to Batts
Encouraged by the dyed roving, I moved to the ten year old fleece.  Sometime in the past I must have sorted and cleaned it as it was in good condition.  So I just soaked it in hot water, heated up a pot of water and mixed some dyes in a few jars.  Then I found a brick of tussah silk and decided to dye that too.  For each colour, I added a batch of wool, some tussah silk and some mohair rovings (did I tell you  I had a stash!).  Once dry, I started to learn about drum carding and decided to card each colour into a sepeate batt.  I was careful to take each lock of wool and tease it apart.  Once I had done the pile I carefully placed each lock tip first into the carder.  Then once the carder was close to full (which I discovered on this carder that meant about 1 oz of fleece) I took it off, split it into four and recarded the batt.  Each batt I carded twice and twisted the batt into a bun for storage. Later, I can mix colours and fibres.  So here's some pictures of the silk and spun rovings drying, and the various stages from dyed fleece to batts.


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