Simple Market Farm's "Spindle Keep"

Well, the mail brought me this very cool item from Jeanne and Paul at Simple Market Farms. I had been keeping wool on several handspindles, so that I could test this for them. Here is a front and back view with three high whorl spindles in place.





I have spent the last three days up to my eyeballs in wool! Here are some more photos of the progress on the free fleece. I ended up cutting off all those weird tips on the first batches, but cut them off before washing the rest. I still have not washed all of it, but I have gotten through about half.

The stuff in the pond insert is the part that was washed by mother nature! I added some Dawn the next morning. This particular fleece had a ton of vegetable matter, but the next one had a little less.




Unfortunately, the second fleece had the same problem with gummed up tips as the first. After spending an entire morning cutting tips off of wet fleece, I decided it had to be easier to cut them off while it was dry.




So after three days of work, this is the end result. Most of it will be pincushion and dog bed stuffing, but it looks like some I will be able to spin some of it.




No doubt this is a slow, time consuming process. That said, I really believe that it is something every spinner should do at least once; go from raw fleece to finished product.