sheep to scarf, part 1

This semester I decided to offer a class for our Monday Homeschool Class group which I've called "Sheep to Scarf". The idea is to take a fleece from a sheep all the way through the process of creating a wearable garment. I actually wound up dividing the class into two sections, as it overfilled. We're at our half-way point in the class now, and I thought it might be fun to document what we've been doing.

I haven't been able to get any action shots of the kids at work, since I'm too preoccupied actually teaching, but I figured I could post photos of our products. This first photo, of course, is what the fleece looks like before shearing, on an actual sheep!

We then took the fleece and skirted it, which means we removed manure tags (stuck-on bits of poop, and don't think the kids didn't love that!), kemp (hairy fibers that affect the quality of the fleece), second-cuts (places where the shears went over the fleece twice, a big no-no in shearing, but it does happen occasionally and those bits need to be removed by hand), and larger pieces of vegetation.

Then we washed the fleece to remove the dirt and lanolin (the grease that is naturally in wool) and let it dry -- here's our clean, dry fleece.

Then we carded it on a drum carder to remove the smaller bits of vegetation and make the wool smoother to aid in spinning a more even yarn. Our end product from carding is wool roving (that pile of white wool on top of the carder), which, when spun, will make a woolen yarn. I also showed the kids how to comb the wool with wool combs, which aligns all the fibers in the same direction to produce wool top -- when wool top is spun, it makes a worsted yarn.

Then we dyed our fleece with Kool-aid dyes. We put the roving (having been soaked first in soapy water) in pots, sprinkled powdered Kool-aid thoroughly over them, filled the pots with enough water just to barely cover the wool, then boiled them on the stove top until all the color had been absorbed out of the water (between 30 and 45 minutes, depending on the color and how much powder we'd used). In experimenting, we discovered if we wanted pink we needed to use only a very small amount of the powder, but if we wanted red, we needed to use about three times as much as any other color for a good effect.

We also made felted soaps with dyed roving as something for the kids to actually be able to take home right now. The kids had a blast getting all soapy and wet!

J is in the class and is very much enjoying it. Zoo Boy is taking my related class for younger kids, "Fun with Fiber" where we are doing a lot of the same types of projects, just simplified for the younger set.

We still need to spin our roving into yarn, ply and finish the yarn, and crochet our scarves. Plus, the kids are all coming out to our farm for a visit to take part in the actual shearing of a sheep this coming Monday, which is a holiday so there are no regular classes. So I'll post a follow-up about how the rest of the class goes.

Needless to say, I'm having a total blast working with the kids and the fiber! I've got lots of ideas for other fiber-arts classes, now that I've got a group of kids hooked on it. In the spring I'll be focusing on crocheting!