Crazy time of year

Jerry is shearing EVERY day after work now, and I am trying to get caught up on what I need to do before my next ankle surgery.

All 33 of our sheep have been sheared. And, I have another 10 fleeces (as of today) from 3 other farms here.

I am hoping he can bring my skirting table up to the deck so I won't have to go far to process fleece after surgery. 😊 I am also hoping to get these 43 skirted, photographed, bagged, tagged, and weighed before next Friday! I can upload the pictures and update the blog while I am recovering.

So, stay tuned!

Shearing is starting up in full force!!!

We have 33 of our own fleeces and 10 other fleeces from 3 different farms. We are shearing every day this week. I am hoping to get the skirting table set up next Monday, and skirt and photograph the available fleeces Monday and Tuesday. Hopefully it will be a LOT warmer than it is right now.
My ankle surgery has been pushed back to Friday the 5th. So, I am going to be trying to get as many fleeces ready to post before that. I can upload pictures and create a new post while I am healing. Hubby can pack up fleeces and take them to the Post Office. 😁

Jacob roving

 $2.50/oz.

1 8 oz. ball in the back

4 oz balls in the front

 dark 2 oz. balls

 Hat knit with our DK/WW yarn

 Odd balls sizes as marked.

 

 The bag is crocheted in our yarn.

The front is the crocodile stitch.

 Overdyed Jacob.

The gray below is the original color.

Priced as marked.

I just ordered another 200 stickers for the Shave 'Em to Save 'Em challenge.
I hope that is enough. 
I wonder if that will get me though to the end of NH Sheep & Wool... We will see.
I have Horned Dorset fleeces, roving and yarn available. I have Jacob yarn (and roving if I can ever find it...but there will be plenty at festival in May) available. I have black raw Navajo Churro available.
Come NH Sheep & Wool, I will also have Tunis and Shetland roving.
Come VT Sheep & Wool the end of September, I will have Oxford roving and if I did not sell the Navajo Churro raw by the end of NH I will have that in roving as well.
That is 6 out of 15 of the breeds listed on the Livestock Conservancy site.

Shetland roving

I do not have a lot of Shetland roving left. I will have LOTS more and a LOT more colors in the fall when I am finished washing the fleeces. They will be dropped off with Sallie's Fen Fiber Mill at the NH Sheep & Wool Festival in May. I dropped off 50 pounds of wool, alpaca, and kid Mohair today to all be made into roving.
 The 3 lambs will be pure wool. There will be crimpy white wool blended with crimpy white alpaca. There will be pure white alpaca as well as pure black alpaca made into roving. There is a badger Icelandic fleece getting blended with a black and white Mohair fleece. This is one white and one black & white kid Mohair fleeces. And, more. All in all, I dropped off 7 contractor bags of fleece.

Now, I need to sell fleece and roving in order to pay what I owe. Fleece sales have paid all but $75 of what I owe Zeilinger Wool Company for the 3 BIG boxes I sent them Feb. 1st, and almost 1/2 of what I will owe Sallie.

On to the Shetland roving that I do have left.  All Shetland roving is $2.50/oz. I will break bumps into smaller amounts.

 The gray bump weighs 8.4 oz.

The yarn and shawlette are from the same gray.

SOLD
 The one ball of 'oatmeal' weighs 2 oz.

1 ball sold.
 The two balls in front of the bag are a 

light gray. They weigh 2 oz. each.

 The bag of white on the left weighs 1# 4.1 oz.
EDITED: when balled up this is actually a
pale, pale gray! When I get a bunch balled up
I will post them here.

The bag of light gray on the right weighs 1# 5.3 oz.

It is the same as the 2 2 oz. balls.

 

 The white batt is not something I had processed.

It is something I bought a few years ago, and has

been stored in my cedar closet. Compared to the 

roving made by Sallie's Fen Fiber Mill, this looks

a little choppy. I am sure in would needle felt well.

I took some of it and recarded it and blended it 

with white alpaca. It spun nicely!

What is left weighs 15.4 oz.

It has little gray hairs in it.

EDITED:I took off the outer 2 layers and it is much

better inside. It is not as smooth as Sallie's processing.

But, that is the nature of carding machines.

It should make no difference in the spinning if

you draft it out. I, personally, am a stripper.

I strip all roving lengthwise and then spin it.

None of this batch of white Shetland is pure white.

They are seem to have little gray or black hairs.