Some serious domestic archaelogy has been undertaken over the weekend, and, as a result, I now have even more excuses reasons for procrastination. The archaelogy part involved almost literally digging into a small understairs cupboard and reviewing the contents once they had been dragged out. This particular cupboard is the one I designated to contain all my spinning equipment, washed fleece, unwashed fleece, hanks of handspun yarn etc. The fact that these items were consigned to this cupboard 20years ago meant that there was a fair amount of general grime on the outside of things, but I was delighted to find that the inside of things had fared very well and all the fleece (washed or not) was still very much usable. What I had totally forgotten was just how extensive my spinning stash was – more fleece (and lots of other fibres) than I am ever likely to work my way through in one lifetime (how similar to the fabric stash in this respect!). This picture doesn’t really do it justice – each sack contains at least one fleece and there are more than 12 sacks. I didn’t take a picture of the big apple basket packed to the brim with all sorts of other fibres, linen, cotton, silk, alpaca, camel (Debbie W, this will be for you!) – I can see a lot of spinning in the immediate future!
I also acquired a lovely fresh fleece last week when it was shearing time for the small flock that grazes part of the year on our field …. This re-acquaintance with part of my textile past is because I’ve been asked to teach some younger friends the basics of spinning, and I need to remember lots of the things I used to know. So, having put everything back under the stairs and cleaned myself up, I should spend some serious time with fleece and spinning wheel. One good thing about the rediscovery of the fleece stash is that I may be able to offload some on unsuspecting friends who have embellisher machines or make felt. One bad thing about the rediscovery is that it will be quite hard to let any of it go, because all fleece is very individual and there’s a range of breeds as well -Jacob, Black Welsh, Portland, Dorset Horn, Suffolk, Texel – so it really is like a fabric stash in terms of attachment. Here’s just the smallest of samples showing fabulous crimp and length in the fibre
Who knows, there may even be a demand for spinning classes!
Barbara Chainey quilts 
WooHoo!!
Makes me feel sooooooo much better seeing your stash. Haha! I condensed a lot of mine down into those bags that you suck all the air out of and I then stuck them in the loft where I can’t see them and feel guilty for not using it. That is just the wool stash – now what to do about the fabric stash!!!!
Shirley.
I don’t think I ought to get myself into yarn crafts as well as the quilting! Too much fabric and half finished projects already –
I had a run in with a small flock of sheep yesterday night in fact. Our beastly dog escaped from our garden by using the compost heap as a launch pad, and vaulted the wall into the field at the back. From there he made his way into one of our neighbours paddock which houses 5 elderly sheep. We could hear him barking because he was trapped by fencing – off I went in a pair of flip flops (why?) and a raincoat, and had to knock the neighbour up at just before 11pm because we couldn’t free the dog, despite desperately trying to pull him through an old iron fence. Could someone please remind me why I rescued this dog! Jacky
So glad you did unearth these. I am having fun with mine, thank you. Spinning classes – yes please!
Hi Barbara, thank you very much for visiting my blog and leaving a nice comment! Greetings from Slovakia 🙂
Spinning always makes me think of fairytales and those impossible overnight tasks – spinning a room full of flax into gold. Spinning in itself is a kind of magic too, I think.
My, what a huge under stairs you have!!
I picked up a few scraps of fence feece when we were in Wales last month and I’m still trying to figure what to do with that!
However, should you sort your threads….. Put my name down first as I’m in for a share and a G&T!!!