We have been busy these past few weeks as our little herd of angoras were showing signs of molting and that meant it was time to harvest some fiber!

One of Elaina's Holland Lops

 A little history of our rabbit experience before we get into todays story. When my now 20 year old daughter was 11 she started raising Holland Lop bunnies. We were not lucky enough to have a 4H group near us so I actually got her the courses that 4H puts out and we went through them and she raised and showed very successfully on her own for quite a few years. She even had a few angoras at one time but I was not spinning at the time. She made enough money to keep her little rabbitry going and had a lot of fun doing it. She eventually moved away from the rabbits as she got interested in horses and that took over her life.

Mr. Happy Jackals the day we brought him home

 So there have been no bunnies for a few years. Now last year my son who is 12 accompanied me to many fiber festivals. He loves to weave and he also loves the animals. There were many cute bunnies at these festivals. So of course we brought home one. He is a sweet bunny with gorgeous crimpy locks and while I let Christopher think this was his bunny I knew it was mine! Or at least his fiber was mine! Mr. Happy Jackals as he is known by.....has not dissapointed us and over the past year has produced amazing fiber while also continuing to steal everyone's heart.

And right before a plucking session

Mr. Happy Jackals is a german and satin mix

 Then as luck would have it we were able to adopt a group of Angora's from a family wanting to find them good homes. So we ended up with a german and 3 satin angora's. And then last fall I brought home my newest and  sweetest boy Asch who is a English angora. So we pretty much have a representation of most of the popular angora breeds now.

Snow Flake our German Angora

Cinna Bun a satin angora

  This past week it was time to harvest their fiber. Most angora's molt their coats. If you talk to different people they will tell you it's best to shear.....it's best to hand scissor......it's best to pluck. But one ladies advice has stayed with me. She said to do what is right for the rabbit and you. Some of them have coats that lend to hand plucking, some to scissoring and some to clipping. Do what makes you and the rabbit comfortable. So we have experimented with different ways of getting that fiber off over the past year.

Hand Plucking

Here you can see where the fiber has been plucked

Freshly plucked locks lined up and ready for spinning

Ember sporting her new coat of fleece

  I tend to hand pluck the backs and sides of my rabbits. As a hand spinner this is the prime way of getting the best fiber for spinning. I pluck and lay the locks in a box aligning them as I go so I can spin straight from the box when I am ready. Angora fiber is very clean and does not need any washing before spinning. I will then scissor some of the longer locks around the neck and bottom. And I finish with shaving the underside and any matting. They look pretty funny when I'm done but we put cute little fleece coats on them and in a week the new coat is already coming in.

Hand  plucking Snow Flake

This is what works for me. Everyone you talk to is different and will tell you what works for them. I am also a newer Angora owner and am learning as I go. I love the rhythm of hand plucking and our rabbits seem to as well. It does not hurt them as the hair is molting and loose. They love getting rid of that extra coat and I think they feel good after a session of plucking.

Asch my English Angora after a blowing session

To keep their coats tangle free we blow them with an animal dryer once a week. This is good for their skin and their coats. By doing this we have not had to comb ours at all. I think it also depends on the angora. Some are just bred to have less matting. We have found these weekly grooming sessions work well for us.

Since we have had the angoras I have been experimenting with their fiber. Spinning 100% angora and also making blends. It is an amazing fiber and a lot of fun to work with. If you are interested in hand spinning angora I highly recommend Angora A Hand Book for Spinners by Erica Lynne. It is out of print but I found mine used on Amazon.

If you are interested my son and I will be opening an Etsy shop very soon. We will be selling our fibers and other fiber related items. There will even be my hand spun blends. It is in the works and I will let you know when we are up and running. I want a shop that caters to the hand spinner and we are keeping that as our focus.

I hope you enjoyed peeking into our rabbit hutch. Which by the way will be growing soon as my son has developed a breeding plan and Mr. Happy Jackals will be a Daddy very soon!! We will keep you posted!!

Most of my time this week has been focused on a test knit for designer Susan Ashcroft aka stitchnerd on Ravelry. The pattern is Little Big Wrap and is set to be released in April. Not only has it been a delightful and relaxing knit but also a stash buster as I am using early handspun from my over flowing shelf of handspun skeins.



  Early handspun really means it was early on or actually with these skeins, in the first year of my spinning "career". Not sure career is the right word......no it's not .......but at the moment I can't think of another one.  So if you look at these early skeins and the skeins I am making now there is a big difference. Earlier skeins are not very consistent and tend to be a bit lumpy in spots. I am still proud of my earlier handspun. We all must start and learn and progress. And with spinning it is all about the practice. So when I look at these skeins I see how far I have come. All that to say these "early" skeins can still look amazing in a knitted project. I am finding that the knitting or weaving can make your handspun shine. And isn't that why we spin anyway. At least for me......I spin so I can create beautiful things and this pattern is really making my heart sing. It is designed to show off a beautiful skein of yarn, hand spun or commercial. I am excited to get this finished today and blocked. We might just have a few more colder days that I can actually get to use it!


I also finished my latest spin. I ended up with almost 900 yards of this lovely and soft fingering weight. I shared the fiber and the process in last weeks Yarn Along and here are a few finished photos.







I finally cast on for my March socks! Let's see if I can finish them before the end of the month! I'm just doing the Hermiones pattern on my toe up 2 at a time.

Mr. Happy Jackals

We are busy this week in the Rabbitry! I will be doing a post on how we harvest fiber from our angoras later this week. So if you are interested come back and check it out. I also did a post on the sheep shearing we went to last week and you can find that here.

So many of you are reading Knitlandia so I had to pick it up and start. I am really enjoying it!! Joining the Yarn Along over at Small Things today. Happy knitting everyone!

This past Tuesday Christopher and I headed out to a lovely farm in New Paltz NY. White Barn Sheep and Wool is a beautiful farm and fiber shop run by Paula. It was shearing day and we were invited to jump in and help and learn all we could about the process.


Paula has a herd of about 40 sheep. She has Cormo sheep and a cross of Cormo and California Red. This cross produces a fleece that is slightly coarser then the Cormo but still with loads of crimp. The red faced sheep are the cross's.






After the warmer weather  we have been having the sheep seemed happy to be rid of their heavy coats and after shearing they ran out to the pasture to sun themselves.






Just watching the shearing process was amazing. It is quite a skill and the shearer made it look easy. The sheep seem to just relax when they are placed on their backs and there is very little protest from them during the process.

After a sheep was sheared we took the fleece to the other side of the barn where tarps were laid out for skirting. Skirting means taking and removing all the really dirty bits and pieces of the fleece that are not usable. Mostly around the neck and rear area. Then the fleece is rolled up and bagged for sending off to the mill. It will then be made into roving and yarn which Paula sells in her shop.



 One benefit of working with the fleeces was the lanolin. I love the feel of the lanolin on my hands and although they were dirty they were super soft and moisturized! I also loved picking the fleeces up off the shearing floor. They still had the amazing warmth of the sheep radiating out of them!

Many people came by to help and young and old alike jumped in and took part in the process. Christopher helped to move sheep......carry fleeces and by the end of the day could skirt a fleece with the best of them.


As we were skirting I came across one of the cormo cross fleeces that just really spoke to me. That sounds silly but in a way it was true. It had beautiful crimp and not a lot of vegetable matter. I scooped up that fleece and put it to the side because of course I was bringing that one home! I love that I met the girl it came off of and was part of the process from the beginning. I now have 6 lbs. of fleece to process!



Paula is so knowledgeable and is more then willing to share what she knows with others. She has created a community of fiber enthusiasts and a place where others can learn and grow in fiber arts. I am planning a trip back very soon.

I will leave you with a little video of the shearing.........

 Two weeks ago the flu swept through here and took us down in a mighty swoop. Now the kids bounced back fairly quickly. But with my immune system still so weak I have not been able to get my health back to normal yet. You know you are really sick when you can't even knit on a plain sock to pass the time.It was brutal.
The past few days I was able to get knitting again and I finished my Waiting for Rain Shawl. To say I am happy with it is an understatement! This is my new favorite shawl and one I will be wearing a lot. It is just the right size and I love the color combo. It was a very fun knit and I highly recommend it!



Yesterday I cast on a pair of colorwork mittens. I only knit here and there but one mitten is almost done! I still need to knit the liner but I might be addicted to colorwork mittens so fun and fast!


We had some warmer weather this past weekend with some hints of spring in it! The kids and I are heading out hiking again on a daily basis. I am hoping it helps to bring my energy level back up! It was not a bad winter here but we are all very ready for Spring to arrive!


Being so sick there was no spinning this week but we did wash Apricot's fleece and we plan on getting it on the drum carder this week. It is going to make some super soft lovely alpaca yarn!



I'm joining Ginny over at the Yarn Along and I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone is up to this week! Happy Knitting!!

I've been spinning for over 2 years now and have been wanting to process my own fleece for a while. I guess it was a natural progression and the next rabbit hole to go down in my fibery pursuits. I searched the web and read many accounts of how others wash their fleeces, I talked to my fellow guild members and they shared their opinions and I also watched some youtube videos  and all of these thing were very helpful. So I gathered some supplies and just decided to go for it.



I had purchased 1 lb of corriedale from a seller on etsy a few months ago. It was washed and the pictures showed an amazing color. When I received the fiber it was washed but still had a lot of lanolin in it and so I decided to wash it again. It was a coated fleece and had no VM (vegetable matter) at all but I did not want to spin in the grease so more washing was necessary.

locks aligned and ready to wash

With this fleece I decided I wanted to preserve the lock structure for easier combing. I began making piles of locks all aligned with the tips pointing the same way.

I then placed these locks in neat piles inside mesh laundry bags. I filled a large plastic tub with hot tap water. Our tap water gets really hot and so I did not need to boil water to get it above 120 degrees. I squirted Dawn dish soap into the water about 1/3 cup and then placed my mesh bags into the water. I left this to soak for 25 minutes (approx. as I got distracted with other projects a few times)

soaking

After 25 minutes I took the bags out and gently squeezed the soapy water out of them. I then placed them into another tub of hot water to rinse. Another 25 minutes went by and then I repeated this procedure with another rinse soak.

When they were rinsed well I laid the bags on a towel and rolled them up to gently squeeze the water out of them.

I then pulled out my locks and laid them on wire shelves to dry in the sun. It was very breezy and they dried really fast.

A couple notes......water temp is important and must be kept high to melt the lanolin. It also must be kept constant or the cooler water will make the lanolin hard again and very difficult to get out. I only needed one wash with this fleece as it was already pretty clean....other fleeces might need more. Do not agitate the fiber in the water or it can felt.

washed locks

One benefit of working with a raw fleece are super soft hands from the lanolin!

I enjoyed this process a lot. I am really happy with the resulting fiber and can  not wait to process it. I will have another post on combing and spinning it.