A Mermaids Tale - my own blend

I had a crazy idea, quite some time ago now, to spin a yarn that was lime green and turquoise with sparkles and texture going on and to use some of the left over bits and pieces of Twilley's Goldfingering in the yarn if I could as one time I accidentally miscounted and cut far too many lengths for the fringing on one of the shawls and I don't want to just throw it away.  It just so happens to be turquoise.  I get lots of left overs of Goldfingering that can't really be used to make anything much so if I can incorporate it into my own handspun yarns that means less wastage and less going into landfill.

I already had a braid of merino fibre that was mostly lime green with a bit of turquoise but I bought a braid of turquoise merino fibre from the Wool Show that I went to just before Christmas.  I also had some Trilobal Nylon in Colbalt and Tussah Silk in a lime green that I bought in years ago and then some Tussah Silk Noil in pale blue and Hemp in Tropical Green that I dyed myself a couple of years ago.  I put these 6 fibres through my blending hackle in 4 equal lots, one lot for each ply of a skein and I am making 2 skeins.  I can't put the lengths of Twilley's Goldfingering through the blending hackle, they will have to be added in as I go.  My fingers did turn blue though and this was to do with excess dye in the turquoise merino braid, which was also ever so slightly felted in parts, not enough to throw anything away, it did all come loose eventually, but it was harder work putting it on the blending hackle than it should have been.  I didn't have any problems with the other braid of merino, that just pulled apart as easily as would be expected.

The blue goldfingering was already cut into lengths and there was 15g of that.  I then cut the lime green goldfingering into the same sized lengths but because there was only 6g of it I didn't get many pieces so what I did with the lime green was to then cut those lengths in half to give me more instances of when the green will be in the yarn.  I split the number of the lengths of each colour into two, for each skein, and then split them again into two for each ply.  I then put them into pairs of one blue and one green and then when I ran out of green I made pairs of the remaining blue.  In total I had 30 pairs

I worked out that the total length of Goldfingering for each ply was around 60ft.  The first fibre that I dizzed off the blending hackle measured roughly 30ft in length and the ones I dizzed off after that didn't quite measure that length but all I had to do was to work my way along pulling it out a bit thinner to get it up to 30ft in length.  The reason for doing this is that I can then break off lengths that match the longer blue pieces and I can add in the two lengths of Goldfingering, whatever colours they may be, randomly whilst spinning the woolly blend and at least they will then be distributed throughout the yarn as evenly as possible whilst still being random, if that makes sense. 

I did have a little trouble getting the ends of the Goldfingering to embed themselves into the fibres so that they wouldn't stick out or unravel but there were a few times that I had to go back and add a bit of fibre specifically over the join to try to help keep the ends in place.  Plying has helped this even more but I have noticed that there are still one or two that are sticking out.  I will leave them alone until I actually use the finished yarn to make something and assess what is happening with the those ends at the time of making something, because knitting or crocheting may bury any stray ends in anyway.  It was a bit tricky and a little time consuming but I love the finished yarn.

My fingers kept turning blue throughout the spinning process due to the excess dye having not been washed out thoroughly enough from the braid of blue Merino that I purchased.  When I soaked the finished yarn the water turned blue because of this and the finished skeins are now not as bright turquoise as I had hoped for but they are still nice.  I was initially a little disappointed but these things happen sometimes, especially with blues and reds, you can rinse and rinse and rinse and think its all done but then someone with a different water supply with different salts and minerals in the water and a different pH level comes along and puts your fibre or yarn in their water and it can start leaking dye again.  The vendors at the Wool Show had come from all over the UK so this is a possible reason, although it still shouldn't have gotten all over my hands.

So, the finished yarn?  It is Double Knit weight with one skein being 119g/313m and the other being 114g/270m.  The final fibre contents, rounded to the nearest half a percent is 79.5% Merino, 6.5% Metallised Polyester, 3.5% Trilobal Nylon, 3.5% Tussah Silk, 3.5% Hemp, 2% Tussah Silk Noil, 1.5% Viscose.

Blending the Purple Llandovery Whiteface Hill - Mist at Twlight

Yay, the last one!  Oh I really do ache now because it is tiring on the arms and shoulders loading up the blending hackle four times and dizzing off the blend, especially when you're using wool that you have stupidly managed to felt slightly during the dye process. I seriously need to look at my temperature probe in my dye kit, I'm positive it's on the fritz and I have tried changing the battery but that hasn't resolved the issue.  I think it's a damaged wire problem.  So, the Llandovery Whiteface Hill fleece that I dyed back in September.  I sorted out the additional fibres that I would be adding to all four lots of Llandovery Whiteface Hill back at that time and then dyed the lots of fleece colours to go with the additional fibres that I had chosen.  All of the additional fibres in the different colours are within a few grams of each other and I plan to use all of each bump of fibre so that the final fibre content won't be exactly the same for all four blends but will be very close.

The other fibres that I chose to put in this blend are, from left to right, top to bottom: 19g Tussah Silk in shade Twilight, 9g Trilobal Nylon in shade Violet, 9g Silk Noil in shade Sea Mist, 10g Hemp that I dyed myself in June 2023 using cold water dyes and finally 153g Llandovery Whiteface Hill fibre that I dyed in September.  I have decided to call this colourway "Mist at Twilight".

I discovered that I had somehow managed to felt the wool slightly during the dye process so I had a little bit of trouble getting it to open up again.  I didn't pre-comb this one again either.  I've ended up with 200g of a lovely unique blend ready to spin.

The fibre content of this one works out to be:

76.5% Llandovery Whiteface Hill wool
9.5% Tussah Silk
5% Hemp
4.5% Silk Noil
4.5% Trilobal Nylon

Blending the Blue Llandovery Whiteface Hill - Evening at the Bay

Pushing on with my quest to tackle the Llandovery Whiteface Hill fleece that I dyed back in September, today I am tackling the blue one.  I sorted out the additional fibres that I would be adding to all four lots of Llandovery Whiteface Hill back at that time and then dyed the lots of fleece colours to go with the additional fibres that I had chosen.  All of the additional fibres in the different colours are within a few grams of each other and I plan to use all of each bump of fibre so that the final fibre content won't be exactly the same for all four blends but will be very close.

The other fibres that I chose to put in this blend are, from left to right, top to bottom: 21g Tussah Silk in shade Evening, 12g Trilobal Nylon in shade Bay, 9g Silk Noil in shade Colbalt, 11g Hemp in shade Bright Blue and finally 155g Llandovery Whiteface Hill fibre that I dyed in September.  I have decided to call this colourway "Evening at the Bay".

I discovered that I had somehow managed to felt the wool slightly during the dye process so I had a little bit of trouble getting it to open up again.  I didn't pre-comb this one this time, I learnt my lesson on the last one.  I've ended up with 208g of a lovely unique blend ready to spin.

The fibre content of this one works out to be:

75% Llandovery Whiteface Hill wool
10% Tussah Silk
4% Silk Noil
6% Trilobal Nylon
5% Hemp
4% Silk Noil

Blending the Yellow-Orange Llandovery Whiteface Hill - Saffron Sunshine

It's been a few weeks since I last played with my blending hackle, I've been doing some spinning as well as preparing for the festive celebrations, but I really need to tackle the Llandovery Whiteface Hill fleece that I dyed back in September.  I sorted out the additional fibres that I would be adding to all four lots of Llandovery Whiteface Hill back at that time and then dyed the lots of fleece colours to go with the additional fibres that I had chosen.  All of the additional fibres in the different colours are within a few grams of each other and I plan to use all of each bump of fibre so that the final fibre content won't be exactly the same for all four blends but will be very close.

The other fibres that I chose to put in this blend are, from left to right, top to bottom: 15g Tussah Silk in shade Saffron, 7g Trilobal Nylon in shade Sun, 9g Silk Noil in shade Saffron, 9g Hemp that I dyed myself in June 2023 using cold water dyes and finally 139g Llandovery Whiteface Hill fibre that I dyed in September.  I have decided to call this colourway "Saffron Sunshine".

I discovered that I had somehow managed to felt the wool slightly during the dye process so I had a little bit of trouble getting it to open up again.  This time I decided to try combing it again before using it on the hackle to try to make it easier but I've lost quite a lot of fibre doing that and it hasn't made it feel any softer than just opening it up on the hackle during the blending.  I've ended up with 179g of a lovely unique blend ready to spin.

The fibre content of this one works out to be:

77.5% Llandovery Whiteface Hill wool
8.5% Tussah Silk
5% Silk Noil
5% Hemp
4% Trilobal Nylon

Blending the Orange-Brown Llandovery Whiteface Hill - Foxes and Pumpkins

Today I have been having fun with my blending hackle and tackling the Llandovery Whiteface Hill fleece that I dyed orange-brown back in September.  I sorted out the additional fibres that I would be adding to all four lots of Llandovery Whiteface Hill back at that time and then dyed the lots of fleece colours to go with the additional fibres that I had chosen.  All of the additional fibres in the different colours are within a few grams of each other and I plan to use all of each bump of fibre so that the final fibre content won't be exactly the same for all four blends but will be very close.

The other fibres that I chose to put in this blend are, from left to right, top to bottom: 19g Tussah Silk in shade Rust, 12g Trilobal Nylon in shade Pumpkin Spice, 10g Silk Noil in shade Pumpkin, 11g Hemp that I dyed myself in June 2023 using cold water dyes and finally 156g Llandovery Whiteface Hill fibre that I dyed in September that I think looks like the colour of foxes.  With this in mind I have decided to call this colourway "Foxes and Pumpkins".

I discovered that I had somehow managed to felt the wool slightly during the dye process so I had a little bit of trouble getting it to open up again but I managed it and I ended up with 208g of a lovely unique blend ready to spin.

The fibre content of this one works out to be:

75% Llandovery Whiteface Hill wool
9% Tussah Silk
6% Trilobal Nylon
5% Silk Noil
5% Hemp

Making my own matching reverse blends from some North Country Cheviot fleece

I'm carrying on with more blending today, although I might pay for this later with some serious shoulder ache.  I keep forgetting that I'm not as young as I once was and the old bones and muscles moan and creek these days.

A few days ago I dyed some North Country Cheviot fleece a gorgeous shade of green that is certainly different to anything you could possibly find in any shop.  Today I am going to blend everything together that I have picked out and I am going to do it twice, in reverse colours.  Bear with me, all will be revealed and will make sense shortly.

So, first up is the Lime coloured Cheviot with the natural or white textures. In this blend was 157g North Country Cheviot wool, 10g Tussah Silk, 6g Hemp, 5g Mulberry Silk Noil, 4g Trilobal Nylon.

Top left: Natural undyed hemp and below that is natural undyed Mulberry Silk Noil
Top right: Dyed North Country Cheviot hand combed nests
Bottom left: White Trilobal Nylon and bleached Tussah Silk

Next up is the natural coloured Cheviot with lime coloured textures.  In this blend was 137g undyed North Country Cheviot wool, 10g Tussah Silk in shade Caiprinha, 7g Hemp in shade Caiprinha, 7g Silk Noil in shade Chlorophyll and finally 2g each of the Trilobal Nylon in shade Caiprinha and Neon Green, the later I dyed myself a few days ago because I knew I hadn't got enough of the Caiprinha for this project.

Top left: Hemp in shade Caiprinha and below that is Silk Noil in shade Chlorophyll
Top right: Undyed North Country Cheviot hand combed nests
Bottom left: Trilobal Nylon in Caiprinha and Neon Green and Tussah Silk in shade Caiprinha

I did try and over-dye the Silk Noil in Chlorophyll a few days ago to make it more like the green of the Caiprinha fibres but it didn't want to take the dye, it might have done slightly, but not very much.

So the finished blended fibres are very pretty.  My favourite right now is the green with the natural coloured textures.  It's a shame that the silk noil in the other blend didn't take on the green dye as it would have made it less "yellow" but I'm happy enough with these.  The amounts are different between the colourways and so is the final fibre content because of that but once spun up I envisage that these two will be worked together in the same project in some kind of striped item.

The fibre content of the Green Cheviot with natural textures is :  86% Cheviot Wool, 6% Tussah Silk, 3% Mulberry Silk Noil, 3% Hemp, 2% Trilobal Nylon.  There is approximately 174g of this to be spun.

The fibre content of the Natural Cheviot with lime textures is : 83% Cheviot Wool, 6% Tussah Silk, 4.5% Silk Noil, 4.5% Hemp, 2% Trilobal Nylon.  There is approximately 153g of this to be spun.

Making my own yellow blend for the last day of the TDF2023

I've been playing with my blending hackle again today and making a yellow fibre blend in preparation for the upcoming Tour de Fleece 2023.  There is always a "yellow jersey day", usually on the last day of The Tour.  I'm not buying any fibre for this event this year, I will make do with what I have because I have plenty that needs to be used up.

I have already dyed some fibre for this purpose just a few days ago and I have sorted out what else will be added to it to make it more interesting.

Top row: unknown cellulose/plant fibre and Trilobal Nylon both dyed a few days ago
Middle row: Angelina, Merino/Suri Alpaca blend I dyed a few days ago, Sari Silk in shade Honeycomb
Bottom row: Bamboo in shade Clara and Mulberry Silk Noil I dyed a few days ago

So the fibres I have picked out are all yellow but in different shades and textures and some are matt and some are shiny/lustrous.  In total 140g of fibre went through my blending hackle and I got 130g back out all nice and ready to spin in four bumps of fibre, which when paired up give me two x 65g lots.

Look how soft and fluffy this is.  It's gorgeous and I can't but help think of cute little ducklings.

The final fibre content is: 50% Merino wool, 21.5% Suri Alpaca, 7% Cellulose, 7% Bamboo, 4.5% Angelina, 3.5% Mulberry Silk, 3.5% Trilobal Nylon, 3% Sari Silk

Making a blend using the Olive Green Jacob wool

I have finally found the time to decide on and sort out all the ingredients I need to make a blend using the olive green Jacob wool that I combed back in November last year.  For this blend, I have chosen to use an amount of white wool of unknown specific breed that I got in a "waste" bag a couple of years ago.

A = 3g of unknown superfine white wool
B = 6g of Silk Noil in Ivy
C = 19g of Tussah Silk in Powder
D = 39g of unknown fine white wool
E = 11g of 23 micron Merino in Olive
F = 13 of Hemp in Cyclamen
G = 22g of unknown medium coarse white wool
H = 5g of unknown fine off-white wool
I = 60g of 23 micro Merino in Coral
J = 24g of unknown cellulose based white fibre
K = 6g of Silk Noil in Olive Green
L = 5g of Trilobal Nylon in Olive Green
M = 242g of Jacob Wool in Olive Green

There are also a couple of small samples of wool that I got when buying fibre for the British Breeds Project.  I didn't take any photos of them but they are all natural white and are; 3g of North Country Mule, 3g of Beltex and 6g of Milennium Bleu.  These samples, along with the unknown white wools in the photo above totalled 81g and I decided to blend these together first on my blending hackle to even out the fibre types and remove any really short fibres.  What I was left with weighed 62g of mixed white wool.

I split all of the fibre into 4 equal amounts of everything which totalled about 112g per lot and then each of those was split into two, one for lot for each ply of a 2ply yarn plus the blending hackle can only handle around 50g-60g of fibre at any one time.  See the photo top right of the weighing out and the photo bottom left of one bundle.  I only put everything through the hackle once as I did not want it to be too well blended together.  The photo bottom right shows one of the 50g or so of blended fibre that will make up a single ply of a 2 ply skein together with my inspiration for the colour combination, which is an amount of fabric strips and ribbon that has been tied and twisted together to make a kind of twine and was made by my youngest not too long ago.  I'm not sure what they intend to use it for but its far too stiff and over-twisted to knit with it but very pretty.

I did loose a little bit of fibre during the blending process but not a great deal.  448g went through the hackle and 421g came out in the blends, so each skein will be about 105g.  The final fibre content is: 54% Jacob Wool, 16% 23 micron Merino Wool, 14% mixed white wools, 5.5% Cellulose, 4% Tussah Silk, 3% Hemp, 2.5% Silk Noil, 1% Trilobal Nylon.

Hopefully it won't be too long before I get around to spinning this but it's doubtful that it will anytime in July as that is taken up with the TdF and I have some more preparation to do between now and then.

Blending the Llanwenog

About 10 days ago I wrote a post about combing the rust/brick red Llanwenog fleece and said that I need to figure out what I want to blend with it to make it more interesting.  I have a few purchased braids of fibre of a similar main colour that have been blended with yellows or greens and I wanted something a little different.  The list of blend ingredients is quite large.

Top row: Llanwenog, 4g of Trilobal Nylon in shade "Sun".  
Bottom row: 5g of goodie bag blend, 31g Ceilidh in shade "Beltane"

Top row: 5g of goodie bag blend, 8g of Rose Quartz gradient pack sample.  
Bottom row: 4g Tussah Silk in shade "Saffron", 12g of 23 micron Merino in shade "Denim"

Top row: 2g of silk noil in shade "Colbalt", 4g of 70/30 Merino/Silk blend in shade "Soft Fruit"
Bottom row: 3g of Merino in shade "Red", 3g of silk in a fruity shade.

The result of all this fluff blended together on my blending hackle and dizzed off then braided is...

I'm not 100% happy, it's not quite as I had hoped but let's see how it spins up.

Blending the Suri Alpaca and Merino

I can't believe it has been a whole year since I combed the Suri alpaca and made a kind of a gradient with it.  I bought the merino I intended to buy to blend with it ages ago now but just procrastinated about it ever since but today is the day that I put my big girly pants on and deal with it.

The plan is to blend an equal amount of merino, made up of however many colours and blends of colours necessary to make it work, with an equal amount of Suri alpaca.  I will be making a 2-ply yarn so everything needs to be split into two equal amounts as well.  I will be using my trusty strong cardboard tube (was previously the inner off a large roll of Christmas wrapping paper, potentially a 25m roll which would need a sturdy inner, as opposed to a smaller 5m roll which usually just has a thin piece of card rolled in with the paper towards the centre of the roll).  I have made "stop ends" and a centre divider for roll by cutting large circles from a cardboard box and making a hole in the middle.  The fibre for each ply should fit on either side of the centre divider.

Using my trust blending hackle I started by taking the darkest alpaca fibre and the darkest of the merino and blending them.  The next one was a mix of the darkest alpaca fibre, the darkest merino and the next lighter shade of the merino.  I made my way through the alpaca and the merino, matching the colours/shades as best as I could, using a blend of 4 shades to where necessary to make a smoother transition on the gradient.

Top row: Merino shades Pearl and Chocolate.  Middle row: Merino shades Mink and Amber. 
Bottom row: The Suri Alpaca gradient and Merino shade Hazelnut

It took me a few hours of figuring out, deciding what to do, weighing out, a few "don't touch that", "don't move that" to the family, blending and dizzing off but I got there in the end.

There was one fibre nest on each side that I thought stood out a little too much from the others, maybe I put a little too much amber Merino in them, it seemed quite "yellow" compared to the others, but on examination its just that its not quite as blended in so should resolve at the spinning process.  Fingers crossed.

Blending again

A few days ago I combed some yellow Jacob wool and today I have finally made my choices using colour choice tools to help me make that decision and blended some extra bits and pieces into it.

Main photo is Jacob Wool with sunshine yellow merino, a blend of four greens merino and purple angelina underneath and then Elderberry merino, Saffron hemp and Caiprinha trilobal nylon (firestar) down the right hand side.

 I've not worked out the final fibre content just yet, would be pretty high on the Jacob and Merino though.  I didn't use all of the trilobal nylon in this as a little goes a long way and that is what is giving the fibre the shimmery glow.

Spinning up Slate & Chalk

Last week I had a bit of fun with the blending hackle and I have finally finished spinning it.  Its pretty, not as pretty and sparkly as I'd hoped for but there is colour in there amongst all that dark slate grey-blue.

The final fibre content is 65% Jacob Wool, 19% Merino Wool, 10% Corriedale Wool, 3.5% Other Fibres, 1.5% Silk, 1% Trilobal Nylon.  Its a Double Knit weight and there is 161g/371m of it and its lovely, not overly soft like Merino but its not really scratchy either.  I've not yet decided what to make with this but it won't take me long to decide.

Spinning the Aqua and Pink Falkland

I blended this fibre last week and now I have finished spinning it up.  I've got two skeins of double knit weight yarn and one smaller skein of worsted weight yarn from this.

The double knit yarns are 107g/308m and 106g/311m, lovely and soft and slightly sparkly and was spun short forward draw. The final fibre content worked out at 70% Falkland, 12% Other wool and fibres, 11.5% Merino, 3% Silk Noil, 2% Silk, 1.5% Angelina.  So now you're probably thinking "Other wool and fibres?", yes, there were some elements that went into the recipe that I didn't know for sure what fibres they included and that is one of the downfalls of buying bags of leftovers/oddments/botany lap waste from fibre producers/sellers but in my opinion the positives outweigh the negatives when you buy that stuff.

The worsted weight skein was spun using the blending hackle waste and I have 73g/153m.  I spun this semi-worsted/semi longdraw just as it come which has produced a slightly thick and thin slightly slubby yarn.  The fibre content is a little different on this one due to the fact that there is no silk noil in it but its not all that different at 70% Falkland, 15% Other wool and fibres, 11.5% Merino, 2% Silk, 1.5% Angelina.

Playing with the blending hackle again

Back in September I dyed some Jacob fleece using Logwood and the result was a mix of dark blue and dark grey.  I've combed that wool over the past couple of days and ended up with blue fingers and a lot of mess.  I discovered that an amount of it had felted or partially felted in the dye pot and so some of it was unusable but I still managed to get 111g of combed fibre out of the 247g.  It was a mixture of dark blue and dark grey, and me being me, I totally forgot to take photos of the combed fibre before I put it through the blending hackle today.  I did think about leaving as it was and spinning a plain-ish yarn but it really needed something, at the very least the grey and blue needed blending together again to even it out.

Using a colour grid tool that I have to help identify what colours work together I had a rummage through my "ingredients box" and picked out a number of small bumps of fibre that I felt would work with my Jacob and its mostly Corriedale and Merino fibres, I have no idea what the fibre is in the top middle.

Whilst I was loading up the blending hackle I had a couple of moments of doubt about my colour selections but once I dizzed it off the hackle and looked at it my doubts disappeared and I came up with a great name for it, Slate & Chalk, given that its a kind of slate grey, I used chalk in the dye-pot and the other colours look a like chalk on a blackboard .

Jacobs Gold

I am thrilled with how this has turned out and I am having trouble capturing the sparkles and shimmers that this yarn contains.  It positively glows in real life due to the Angelina and the Firestar (Trilobal Nylon) content in this yarn.

I blended it just a few days ago and now it is finished, soaked, snapped and dried.  I have 95g/246m of double knit weight yarn and its lovely and soft.  The final fibre content is: 75.5% Jacob Wool, 10.5% Trilobal Nylon, 5% Corriedale Wool, 5% Silk, 2% Merino, 2% Stellina/Angelina.

Blending some black Jacob fibres

Today I have got my blending hackle out and finally taken to task the small bag of Jacob fibre that I combed back in the first week of July last year.  It was from a fleece I got back in 2014.  This is the fleece it has come from, fleece 2 from Home Farm in Elford, Tamworth.  Its a lovely fleece but mostly white.  I am using the black fibres from this one.

I started out with 127g of black fleece last year but after it was combed this was reduced to just 77g of beautiful combed top.  I did forget to take any photos of the combed top but I have borrowed one from another Jacob fleece I prepared and spun a while ago to give an idea of what it looked like before I blended it with all the other bits and pieces, although the dark fibres from this fleece are less brown and more grey-black.

Top Row: Jacob, Yellow Silk, A sparkly white and gold blend
Bottom Row: Yellow Corriedale, Firestar (Tri-lobal Nylon), Bronze Angelina

 All the other bits and pieces have come from either one of the HilltopCloud Ingredients boxes that I've bought or from a big bag of lap waste that I got from World of Wool.

 I will be spinning this over the weekend and I can't wait to see the finished yarn as it is ever so slightly sparkly all over.

The Blue Llanwenog

Last year I bought a Llanwenog sheep fleece, split it into four amounts, left one undyed and then dyed the other 3 amounts in 3 different colours.  This is the blue part of the fleece that started out at 400g and now that it's been combed I only have 153g left due to some of it felting, and an amount of coarse fibres which I have removed.  That is a lot to lose, more than 50% but I am fussy and would rather not spin rubbish and waste my time spinning rubbish.

It is pretty as it is but I wanted to make it something special and to add things to it that would help to soften it a little.

I went and raided and supplies cupboard and came out with all these that work well with the turquoise blue Llanwenog and they come from various supplies I've brought over the last few months, mostly small amounts with one or two larger amounts thrown in.

I split everything in two and blended each half on my blending hackle to get this fabulously interesting fibre ready to spin.

I'm really happy how this has turned out, very interesting.  I have two skeins of double knit weight yarn, 99g/284m and 96g/262m and the fibre content is about 65% Llanwenog Wool, 12% Merino Wool, 10% Tussah Silks, 4.5% Sari Silk, 3% Bluefaced Leicester Wool, 2% Alpaca, 1.5% Shetland Wool, 1% Linen (Flax), 1% Sea Cell.

My own blend - Merino and Sari Silk

I've been playing with my blending hackle and some bits of fibre that I bought in December 2018.  I picked out a large bump of purple merino and sari silk and then added bits of white wool to it to lighten it slightly as I feel that its a little too dark to show off that fabulous Sari Silk properly.

The ingredients.

Its been through my blending hackle

I'm ready for my bath now. (This multi photo looks different to the others as it was made on my phone).

 This finished yarn is a Merino Wool/Wool/Sari Silk blend, I don't know the percentages because I don't know the percentage in the main purple bump of fibre.  I've spun it to worsted weight and there is 85g/172m.  I think its fabulous!

Spinning the Golden Carrot

I've sat and spun up something special.  This is the original post about how I made the dye and what fibre I dyed.  I added more to it and blended it all together in this post.  Now I have gotten around to spinning it and I am thrilled with the results.

I have called it Golden Carrot and its a fingering weight yarn 92g/316m and is 49% Falkland Merino, 28% Alpaca, 7% Mulberry Silk, 6% Angelina, 5% BFL, 5% Sari Silk.  Well, you certainly can't buy that in the shops!

Playing with the Blending Hackle

I've been busy creating two new fibres for spinning today on the Blending Hackle.

I've taken the fibres that I dyed with the carrot top, added a few more bits, including some from the goody bag I bought recently, blended them together and I'm over the moon with the results.

You might be wondering why I chose to put a bit of black in with the all the other colours.  Well, if you look at a couple of the other small samples you will notice that some of the them have black and grey in them and I felt that it needed a bit more to help break up the colour and add contrast.

I halved all the fibres as best as I could so that I could make two large nests of blended fibre, one for each ply of the finished yarn.  The photo on the hackle top right show how it was built up in layers, I then pulled this off by hand and then put it back on the hackle for another go.  I done this a couple of times as this helps to blend the fibres and break up large chunks as in the photo bottom left.  The photo bottom right shows what it looked like when I pulled it off through the diz.  I done this process twice as I was making two nests of fibre for spinning.

The photos below show the finished fibre wound up into large nests as best as I could and they are ready for spinning.  Looks very interesting and its very soft.

I then turned my attention to my second idea of a yarn taking white cotton, bright pink Bamboo, soft pink Soy Silk, Raspberry Angelina and pale pink hemp and blending them as best as I could on the blending hackle.  Due to the short nature of the fibres I really struggled with this one, it wouldn't diz off in one continual strip so I had to pull off large chunks by hand and stack them on top of each other in the photo below.  I don't like pink but then I wont be making anything for me so thats OK.

My third fibre was some Peppermint coloured Merino that I've had sitting in my fibre stash for a while but although its a pretty colour, I wanted to add a little bit of p'zaz to it. I found a few little samples from a Goodie Bag I'd purchased and a bit of silver iris angelina.  I love this one its so delicate and sparkly!