A new fleece invites me to open my mind and explore the fleece in all its possibilities, challenges and opportunities. It gives me a chance to learn something new. I treasure these experiences and keep exploring.
Smooth and pleasant
Today I encourage you to see possibilities and opportunities to learn from the fleece you have. I have talked about this several times because it is an important perspective to me. We may have perfectly consistent fleeces and prepare and spin just the yarn we have imagined. That is all fine and we get to practice spinning consistently and effortlessly.
Unruly and defiant
Sometimes, though, we don’t. I live in a country where most of the sheep breeds are very heterogenous within a breed, a flock and even over the body of an individual sheep. You can read more about some of the Swedish breeds and how I approach them here. These are often my favourite fleeces. The ones that challenge me with their sea of staple lengths, types and colours, the ones that resist my draft, tease me back when I tease and play with my mind as I try to figure them out. These are the fleeces I learn the most from and the ones I look forward to the most to explore. I let the wool be my teacher and enjoy the ride.
Explore and find the path
Every new fleece is an opportunity for me to explore. I can look at a fleece and see it as a lost cause and move on to the next (which I sometimes do). However, I can also embrace it and try to get to know it. I try to find out how it wants to be spun to become its best yarn. It may actually turn out to be the loveliest fleece to work with. Sometimes a fleece may seem easy to work with but it turns out to be unruly and defiant. I try to see every new fleece with new and open eyes, to find its soul and explore from there. The unruliness and defiance are obstacles in the way, but with a humble mind they can also become part of the path I take in this exploration.
So be bold. Explore the fleece you have in front of you. Embrace all its diversity, the challenges it brings you and the mistakes you make. See them as opportunities to practice and learn. Eventually they will become part of the journey to this individual fleece’s best yarn.
Here are some resources:
- Fleece through the senses challenge. Free challenge with one assignment every day for five days. This challenge has become very popular! 550 people have already accepted the challenge. Many students have shared their experiences with their fleeces in the comments. This is a huge asset to the course!
- Know your fleece. An online course where we go a bit deeper into a fleece. I show lots of examples and inspiring videos and you get lots of tools to investigate and explore your fleece.
- The hand spinner’s advantage. Free webinar where I reflect over my opportunity as a hand spinner to get the most out of a fleece.
- You are welcome to contact me for a zoom workshop for your spinning group or guild.
- I also offer personal coaching sessions.
Happy exploring!
You can find me in several social media:
- This blog is my main channel. This is where I write posts about spinning, but also where I explain a bit more about videos I release. Sometimes I make videos that are on the blog only. Subscribe or make an rss feed to be sure not to miss any posts.
- My youtube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
- I have a facebook page where I link to all my blog posts, you are welcome to follow me there.
- I run an online spinning school, welcome to join a course! You can also check out my course page for courses in Sweden.
- On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons is an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. Shooting and editing a 3 minute video takes about 5 hours. Writing a blog post around 3. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
- You are also welcome to make one-off donations on my Ko-fi page.
- Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
- Read the new book Knit (spin) Sweden! by Sara Wolf. I am a co-author and write in the fleece section about how I spin yarn from Swedish sheep breeds.
- In all the social media I offer, you are more than welcome to contact me. Interacting with you helps me make better content. My private Facebook page, however, will remain private.
- I support Centro de textiles tradicionales del Cusco, a group of talented textile artists in Cusco, Peru who dedicate their work to the empowerment of weavers through the revitalization and sustainable practice of Peruvian ancestral textiles in the Cusco region. Please consider supporting their work by donating to their causes.
