As Ron and Tara at Ambriel Acres Alpacas have noted on their blog, I am currently in the middle of a spinning project. I wasn’t going to talk about the project, but since it’s on their blog, I feel like I can go ahead and do so. I’m spinning Anna’s 2007 fleece and I’m really looking forward to doing so.

Originally, this was going to be a complete fiber processing project – wash, card, spin – just like I did back in the house in Oregon. Anna’s fleece arrived and I started the project. Then reality hit.

The fleece wasn’t skirted. Normally, I would spread the fleece out on the skirting board to skirt it (remove the vegetable matter). We left the skirting board in Oregon, and due to a lack of space in the apartment, I haven’t build a new one. I couldn’t skirt the fleece in the usual way, so I spread an old sheet – long ago designated a fiber sheet – out on the floor and skirted the fleece clump by clump. I sat over a trash and combed the vegetable matter out of the fleece with a metal dog comb. (Plastic combs have little pieces of flashing that catch the fiber. Metal combs generally don’t.)

After skirting, the next steps are washing and carding the fleece. The house in Oregon has a nice, deep, laundry sink – ideal for washing fiber. I’ve described my washing process in the old blog. The laundry sink is wonderful. Unfortunately, the apartment doesn’t have a laundry sink. I’m left with my choice of a bathtub or the kitchen sink. I suppose I could use either in a pinch, but they’re both a long way from ideal. I thought about how I was going to wash the fleece.

Then I thought about where I would use the drum carder. Right now, my drum carder is still in a box. It’s not a good place for the drum carder, but it’s a safe place. I don’t have a good place to store it or use it in the apartment. I explored several options, but I really don’t want to use the drum carder indoors and rigging the carder on the little tiny porch … Well, lets simply say I think I can make it work, but I’m not particularly happy with the idea. That other option is clamping my carder to one of the picnic tables on the grounds, which is functional, but not really ideal.

I thought about all this, and I decided to outsource the carding and washing to Mette. I feel bad sending the fleece off for processing, but it’s just not feasible in this apartment. I’ll still spin the fleece which is the fun part – and the important part.

And, I’m still really looking forward to spinning that fleece!