Peanut!

Two skeins of Peanut, ready to be knit up into something awesome.

A close up shot of peanut.

Peanut ended up becoming about 100 yards of three ply yarn. I had one thicker single and one skinnier single. I plied the skinnier single back onto itself, but it was all overspun and coiled because I hadn't put enough twist in when I was plying. The thicker single was also coiling up on itself. So I plied the two ply with the single, and voila, it all ended up a pretty calm balanced three ply. Not exactly what I had planned, but it should work out just fine.

Shamrock Shuffle

Sandy and I ran the Shuffle again this year. It was cold but no blizzard this time around.

This is our pre-race snap shot.

And this is me, after the race, with a guy who ran the whole five miles in a Mr. Peanut costume.

We spotted Mr. Peanut somewhere in mile two, and we vowed that we would not let the peanut beat us. (We were successful, we soundly beat the peanut)

Dirty Sheep!

More Peanut!  I've been spinning up the second batch of washed wool.  You can see that it isn't quite as washed as the first batch.  The new batch is to the right, the first batch is under it, to the left.  It's not too different, enough that I feel like a slacker though.  I'm pretty sure that the rest of the dirt will come out when I wash the finished yarn.  We will see I guess.  

You should see the floor under my wheel!  I pull out the little burs, plant stems, and short bits of wool as I go.  It gets pretty bad by my feel.  I need to sweep.  

Peanut Gets a Bath

I've run out of clean Peanut, time to wash another batch.  I never took pictures of the process last time, so here goes.  

Very dirty wool, full of hay and poop.

I put on my "poop gloves," a pair of yellow dish washing gloves, now dedicated solely to wool cleaning.  Then I pulled hay and debris out of enough wool to fill a turkey roasting pan that is also dedicated to wool cleaning.

You can see the dirty wool in the pan, contrasted with the clean spun wool on the bobbin.    

This is the wool in it's second bath (already a whole lot cleaner) next to the gross water from the first bath.  

And the third bath, next to the second bath water.  

The fourth, and probably final, bath.  You can see my poop gloves as well.  Peanut is now much much cleaner.  I'll let her soak for a bit more, then I'll take her out and let her dry on a towel before starting to spin her up into more singles.  

    

Playing With My Wheel

I finished spinning the ball of brown roving I was working on.  I have another ball partly spun up on a drop spindle, and a ball of pink/purple to go with it.  

Then I started in on Peanut.  This photo is  a little deceiving because I transferred what was on the drop spindle to the bobbin and continued spinning.  But I did get a fair amount done tonight.  I'm almost out of cleaned Peanut.

Remember Peanut?!

This is Sandy (of the fleecy goodness hook-up), touching the nose of the infamous Peanut.


You're becoming beautiful yarn Peanut!

Peanut Update

How much I've spun so far, with some clean unfluffed Peanut in the background.  I've been fluffing the fibers with a dog comb to make them more spinnable.  It's not the same as carding, but it works.  

And again, the money shot (quite literally!)  You can see the slight halo that will make my Peanut yarn super warm.