When I was purchasing my foundation herd, I visited so many farms that I thought my husband would go insane or explode but I wanted to make sure I bought the perfect females to build my farm. One farm I visited, and did buy some alpacas from, had a girl that I was on the fence with. I didn't buy her because of various reasons but I loved her from the first time I saw her, which was when she was just a few weeks old.
Well, her owner gave me some of her fiber awhile back and I have started to play with it, which brings me to the FIBER ARTS portion of my blog. The fiber I was given was her seconds, mostly neck fiber, so it was short. Beggars can't be choosers so I decided to experiment in processing it.
Another part of my experiment was to blend the Suri with Mohair. Why? Well first because I had Mohair in a beautiful peach color that would look beautiful with this natural Rose Gray Suri and second because I haven't heard of people using Mohair and Suri together. I typically see Suri blended with Merino, Silk and Bamboo. Remember, because Suri is different than huacaya you need to mindful of what you blend it with.
The batt I created was gorgeous! It was soft and you could see the luster. I was concerned about the feel because this Suri was about a 20 micron and the Mohair was about a 24, but I was willing to try for the the sake of learning.
I began to spin the batt and the first thing I noticed was that it wasn't as silky smooth as my hand processed Suri that I've combed. I had more "hairs" sticking out. Now a couple of variables could cause this (I'm not a scientist nor do I pretend to be one) and since I was trying a few different ideas out, I'm not sure which caused what.
I plyed the yarn and I soaked it and it is soft and beautiful but looks nothing like Suri. If I didn't tell you it was Suri you would think it was Huacaya. I am going to try the same process again and this time I will use merino since I have blended merino with my suri before. I am really curious if it's the drum carding, the Mohair or the fiber length.
This is why I love fiber. There is so much fun in experimenting and trying new techniques.
I ended up giving this skein to my friend. She has since sold that beautiful girl so this is a little bit of her Suri she can treasure too.
What are you doing with your Fiber Arts?
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Your suri/mohair batt and skein are gorgeous! What a wonderful gift for your friend to remember her Suri girl.
ReplyDeleteWhoa, the colors in those batts are super pretty. Also, I love that you're going to do an experiment with using merino under the same process to see if it's the drum carding -- I'm all about getting scientific with my spinning so that I can repeat the things I want to repeat. Can't wait to hear the results.
ReplyDeleteI can't wait to meet you and see the farm & your girls & Bears and learn more about fiber & spinning and could I have used any more and's in there:)? LOL!
ReplyDeleteThat looks awesome! It was really nice of you to give it to the Suri's owner, too!
ReplyDeleteJess
O.k. I did my carnival blog sign up this morning. Where am I? And how do I get the button on my blog? I am so confused!! :) Help! And I need to change my picture from Sam to Me. Because I don't look like that!!
ReplyDeleteThe color of your skein is lovely. I really enjoyed reading about the process you went through to create it!
ReplyDeleteO.K. Calm is restored. I get it now. Thanks for the call. I think I need to just read instead of skimming. I already have my project for next week. This is so fun. Thanks for letting me know about FAF. Tamara
ReplyDeleteWhat an AWESOME post. I'm totally into dyeing fiber lately so this hit the spot for me. I'm fascinated with your bit about how adding some fawn to the white alpaca made the red deeper...I TOTALLY hadn't thought about doing something like that.
ReplyDeleteI have a white alpaca, a silver alpaca, and a black and white alpaca. I keep wondering how my silver boy's fleece would dye, but I love his color so much I keep using it undyed and never get around to experimenting with it with dyes!