I had such great intentions when I started this blog. I thought I'd keep up with it, post as I went along . . . alas, it was not to be. I got so busy a) learning how to make and making fiber art and b) acquiring fiber animals that I never had time to talk about what I was doing. Then I got so far behind I dreaded the thought of playing catch up.
So gist is, that hurray! There are finally fiber animals on my farm. For a long time I was bemoaning the fact that the only animals I had I could spin fiber from were my horse and my German Shepherd (I've since learned that German Shepherd fur spins up like angora and is, in fact, called chiengora so I'm saving that in a bag to make something with.) My friend Lucas finally took enough pity on me to locate a couple angora rabbits I could buy as well as trot me around to various farms to meet different kinds of sheep so I could figure out what I wanted.
To make a long story short I ended up with a Bluefaced LeicesterX (for the curls), a CormoX (for the incredible softness of the fleece), an Icelandic (for the amazingness of the fleece - my husband was laughing at me cause I was drooling over it as it grew out), and a Coopworth (for the springiness of the fleece and also the quantity.)
And that's where I stopped animal-wise. Two bunnies, four sheep. We've got the chickens, of course, and traded roosters (which is a long story), and the dogs, cat, my daughter has an exotic (non-fiber) bunny and some hamsters. But fiber animals...just six. But six is waaaaay more than I had in January when I was pining for them. There is also an alpaca on the way and I'm looking at getting angora goats in the spring because I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE spinning mohair and I'm SICK, SICK, SICK of pulling VM out of mohair locks. I want to coat my goats the way I coat my sheep.
So, here are the ladies the day Bronte was sheared...
So gist is, that hurray! There are finally fiber animals on my farm. For a long time I was bemoaning the fact that the only animals I had I could spin fiber from were my horse and my German Shepherd (I've since learned that German Shepherd fur spins up like angora and is, in fact, called chiengora so I'm saving that in a bag to make something with.) My friend Lucas finally took enough pity on me to locate a couple angora rabbits I could buy as well as trot me around to various farms to meet different kinds of sheep so I could figure out what I wanted.
To make a long story short I ended up with a Bluefaced LeicesterX (for the curls), a CormoX (for the incredible softness of the fleece), an Icelandic (for the amazingness of the fleece - my husband was laughing at me cause I was drooling over it as it grew out), and a Coopworth (for the springiness of the fleece and also the quantity.)
And that's where I stopped animal-wise. Two bunnies, four sheep. We've got the chickens, of course, and traded roosters (which is a long story), and the dogs, cat, my daughter has an exotic (non-fiber) bunny and some hamsters. But fiber animals...just six. But six is waaaaay more than I had in January when I was pining for them. There is also an alpaca on the way and I'm looking at getting angora goats in the spring because I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE spinning mohair and I'm SICK, SICK, SICK of pulling VM out of mohair locks. I want to coat my goats the way I coat my sheep.
So, here are the ladies the day Bronte was sheared...
Cute sheep!
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