Today I offer you my brand new and free Be Kind five-day challenge. Every day for five days you will receive a theme to explore with the purpose of finding your inner spinning guide and being kind to yourself.
In this practical challenge you will get five text lessons over five days where I encourage you to be kind to yourself while you explore your spinning process. In each lesson I give you a background, an example and a task to work with.
What it’s about
The purpose of the challenge is for you to find ways that work for you, in your context, your skill level and with the tools you have. The goal is to explore your spinning process with an open mind. You can take this challenge at any spinning level. The challenge is just about you and your process.
To take part you need
a spinning project in any stage from raw fleece to yarn.
Around 30 minutes a day to work with the challenge
A clean and dry jam jar
pen and paper.
What you will do
You invest in this course as much or as little as you want to. Through my introduction and examples I encourage you to make your own challenge from the context you are in right now. You are welcome to explore the project you are working on at the moment, through the different themes in the challenge. There is also an opportunity to learn from other spinners who take part in the challenge and to extend the challenge beyond the five days and make a routine of exploring your wool on your terms.
The challenge is in written English, but you are welcome to write your comments in any language you prefer. Most of us can use a translate app to read comments in foreign languages.
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
Today I show you all the projects I have going on at the same time, perhaps as a way to get away for a second from stress at work and a world that isn’t always kind.
I cleaned out my bags and baskets of unfinished when I was putting together the last pieces of the manuscript for my book back in September. There was too much clutter in my mind. Once I had sent the manuscript to my editor I had time to craft, time that I had spent on writing for the past year, time I hadn’t allowed myself to craft anything other than words. Now I got that time back, a wave of projects came to me, many of which had lived in my mind for a while, projects I knew I wanted to explore. Techniques, designs or ideas that I needed to have gone through my mind.
Spedetröja/Danish night sweater
The spedetröja or Danish night sweater, a traditional sweater in Denmark and the southernmost regions of Sweden. A simple construction with patterns in panels and a knit and purl star pattern as the main event. I knit it in a handspun Svärdsjö yarn and I loved the result. Quite time consuming with the 2.5 millimeter needles and 700 grams of handspun yarn, but a lovely knit.
A muddy dye bath
My new project within that project was to dye it, with extractions from my homegrown Japanese indigo. I hadn’t made a vat before and it turned out to be difficult. I gathered the 8 grams of extracted Maruba indigo from my 2023 and 2024 harvests and played the chemist all over the bathroom. In all the stress of getting things right I managed to get some of the proportions wrong and the many times dipped sweater stayed undyed, with perhaps a light tint of mud.
I shed a tear or two but reminded myself of my friend Cecilia’s kind words, “You can always overdye it”. And I did. I got commercially grown indigo and set up a new vat, with the right proportions this time. I dipped and I dipped and there was no blue in sight. More tears were shed. Cecilia guided me into making a fermentation vat out of my mud bath and that’s where I am at the moment. The whole project makes me sad, but I stick to Cecilia’s wise words and knowledge.
Apart from the sweater I had prepared a piece of wool/linen twill from a small Austrian mill that I wanted to dye. My plan is to sew a bodice. But I don’t want to dip it in the vat until I know I can rely on it. Time will tell. As will the mud bath.
A contemporary Victorian walking skirt
The same bolt of wool/linen twill is the material for a Victorian walking skirt I stumbled upon about a year ago. I have sewn for many years, mainly clothes for myself, but stopped when my first child was born. I didn’t want to risk having pins on the floor. He’s almost 22 now and has his own apartment. He may still crawl around on our floor from time to time, but he and his sister, are big enough now to handle more complicated things than pins on the floor. As it happens, he is sitting right in front of me, sewing a laundry bag out of an old seat cover. And he is wise enough to baste. Anyway, I have found my way back to sewing lately and I’m enjoying it tremendously.
A Victorian walking skirt in a wool/linen twill (I honestly don’t know which side to use as the right side they’re both so beautiful), and a cotton/linen rose fabric as lining.
I cut the fabric for the walking skirt – in a contemporary length –feeling giddy of the idea of sewing it. Just the concept of something called a walking skirt from a time and a social tier when women weren’t supposed to walk for the sake of walking and the fashion didn’t allow a comfortable stride. A world about to change, giving the vote to women just a couple of decades later, women taking more independent steps into the world. Who wouldn’t want a walking skirt then? Also, the model is just smashing with the flat front and the gathered back. I eBayed a linen/cotton fabric with pink roses for the lining. I’m definitely not a rose person, but I firmly believe in scrumptious lining patterns, and so roses it is.
Trousers in Japanese
There was enough fabric for more projects, and I decided on a pair of trousers. The idea came quite recently – I had made two pairs of pants this summer from vintage handwoven Chinese fabrics and bought more for another two pairs, and when I saw the remaining fabric after I had cut the pieces for the skirt I knew a pair of trousers would be the thing. My mother sew lots of clothes for me when I was growing up, but never trousers. She was of the opinion that they were complicated to make and rarely had a comfortable fit. So I didn’t sew trousers either. I’m making up for that trouserless sewing experience now!
Some trouser sewing on the balcony in July (left), with rosy pocket lining. The sewing machine is my 1965 Husqvarna 2000, weighing about 17 kilos [37.5 pounds], and she works like a dream. To the right I’m cutting out fabric for another pair of trousers.
I had bought a book of a modular system for trouser designs – different styles, fits and details you could match to build your trousers according to your own preferences. A challenge no doubt, and one I was glad to take on. The biggest challenge, though, was that the book and the patterns are written in Japanese… Instead of letting that stop me I crawled around on the floor, chasing the right pieces for the pants on the three gigantic pattern sheets, with my Google Translate app as my saviour.
Why make sewing easy when you can cut the pattern from a book in a language and a writing system you don’t know?
And oh, I just had to start a sashiko mending project for a pair of much loved jeans. Despite an aching left thumb after pushing the needle through the denim so many times I did it in just a couple of days. It’s finished now and I’m very pleased with it.
I needed my trousers mid-mending and went for a walk. Now they are finished and the help lines are gone.
There is spinning too, don’t you worry. I have started spinning a z-plied yarn for two-end (or twined) knitting and I really love the result. I have spent many hours on the floor teasing the wool with my mini combs before carding and spinning.
A rose brown Värmland fleece has turned into a sweet Z-plied yarn for two-end (twined) knitting.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
I got a fleece black as the night and transformed it into two yarns showcasing its superpowers – one strong and shiny and one soft and warm. I call them Panther and Starling.
If you are a patron (or if you want to become one) you can see a demonstration of how I spin these yarns in my November 2024 video postcard.
Every year there is a Swedish fleece championships and I like to buy a couple of fleeces at the auction following the prize ceremony. At the 2022 championships I bought a black Rya lamb’s fleece as a challenge to myself.
25 centimeter staples of a black Rya lamb’s fleece.
I think it is difficult to spin dark fleeces since I can’t see the fibers properly. Also, I never wear black. But I had made my decision and the beautiful fleece was in my stash. For a long time. I had postponed spinning it, but this fall I decided to spin it before it got too old and brittle.
Separate
The shine in this black rya fleece is remarkable, with strong outercoat fibers of 23–27 centimeters and soft and fine undercoat fibers of 10–15 centimeters. I decided to spin two yarns, one worsted spun warp yarn and one woolen spun knitting yarn.
Carded rolags of the shorter fibers, together with recycled sari silk, and combed tops of the longer fibers.
I did the preparation in two steps for both of the yarns. To begin, I combed the wool. I didn’t doff the outercoat in a long top, though, instead I just pulled out the longest fibers and saved them in a box where I had marked the cut ends and tip ends of the fibers. In the next step I pulled the remaining (shorter) fibers off the combs and set them aside. I re-combed the longest fibers and dizzed them off the combs and rolled the top into bird’s nests. The last preparation step was the undercoat; I carded it together with small tufts of recycled sari silk.
Outercoat and undercoat
I say longer and shorter fibers here, not outercoat and undercoat. In my first trials I made sure to get mainly the outercoat in the top and mainly the undercoat in the rolag. But the yarn I made from the undercoat felt a bit too coarse, and so I used only the finest fibers for the rolags.
I’m spinning the carded rolags with an English longdraw. (screenshot).
This meant that there was a spectrum of fiber lengths – both outercoat and undercoat – in the combed top. You can see it in the bird’s nests above – the very shiny part is most probably outercoat and the more matte is most probably undercoat fibers.
The worsted spun yarn is very strong and it nearly broke my skin when I tried to break it (Screenshot).
Even if there is a spectrum of fiber lengths in the worsted yarn, it is still very strong and I will trust it as a weaving yarn. At least when it comes to strength, its inclination to cling to neighbouring warp threads remains to be seen.
Of the total weight, 60 per cent was the worsted yarn. It might have been different if I had chosen to divide it more strictly by fiber type. The total yield (raw fleece to finished yarn) was 65 per cent, which is higher than my average 55 per cent.
Panther and Starling
I reached the bottom of the wool basket this week and plied the last skein of each sort. I love how they turned out. It was a challenge to spin the black fibers, especially this time of year, but I did it. The long fibers were a challenge to handle, but my hands got used to working with them in the end.
Panther and Starling – nine skeins of strong and shiny warp yarn and five skeins of soft and warm knitting yarn.
I call the worsted yarn Panther – strikingly shiny, black and strong. The softness and the coloured speckles on the woolen yarn begged me to call it Starling, and so here they are – Panther and Starling.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
In September my friend Cecilia and I visited the Skansen open air museum, where one of perhaps five fulling mills in Sweden is situated. Outside the mill the visitors were welcome into a wooden tub for some walking waulking.
We were thrilled when we saw the fulling mill, I knew it was there but I had never seen it. Cecilia hopped right into the wooden tub outside the mill and started waulking with her feet. I was reluctant at first, but Cecilia persuaded me to hop in the tub. I did, and feeling the wooden tub and the wet wool against my bare feet was surprisingly thrilling.
Outside the fulling mill at Skansen open air museum the visitors are welcome to try walking waulking in a wooden tub.
As I splashed my feet in the tub I thought of a failed fulling experience at another fulling mill.
Fulling mill in Dala-Floda
Back in May I visited the fulling mill in Dala-Floda with my wool traveling club. I had brought six fabrics to full, three of which were woven with my handspun yarn. The fabric I had the highest hopes for was woven with Gute wool. I spun it back in 2018, and made a woven swatch that I fulled, just to see how it behaved. It fulled very fast and beautifully and I decided to use the yarn to weave a fabric with the intention of fulling it.
My wool board for the fulling mill with the evenly fulled woven swatch top right.
The strange thing was that the Gute weave was the weave that was fulled the least in the fulling mill – only 23 per cent of the total area. This annoyed me since I knew it had fulled so evenly and easily when I first spun it. My theory was that the lanolin must have stiffened and worked as a barrier against the fulling.
Enormous forces with only wood, wool and water at the fulling mill back in May. The Gute weave raw (center) and fulled at the fulling mill (right). The shrinkage was 23 per cent.
A tub in the living room
A couple of weeks after the tub waulking in the September sun, I decided to try it at home with my Gute weave, with the addition of soap. I figured that if the soap could clean the lanolin off the weave on top of acting as a fulling agent, chances were that the fabric would shrink properly.
No wooden tub and no September sun, but still a fully functioning tub for waulking my Gute weave.
I had no wooden tub and no fulling mill backdrop. Instead I spent half an hour every evening for a week or so waulking while listening to the audio version of Jane Eyre. I was quite generous with both warm water and soap to speed the fulling process up a bit. After a total of perhaps three hours I was happy with the result. The fabric had shrunk 73 per cent from the raw weave, and very evenly, just like my original swatch had. What was once more of a net than a weave had now become a heavily fulled 4 millimeter thick fabric.
The weave is finished after the walking waulking, 28 x 150 centimeters and 4 millimeters thick.
When I first got the idea to full the fabric my plan was to sew a vest from it. But now, at only 28 x 150 centimeters [11 x 60inches] there won’t be enough fabric for a vest. Even if there was, it would probably have been too dense and warm for me. Perhaps I’ll sew a pair of mittens and add some embroidery. The possibilities are many.
Read about the fulled pillowcases I made from three of the other weaves I waulked in the fulling mill in May.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
Many of the fleeces I buy come from sheep with stories, and it is these fleeces that bring that extra depth to whatever I make from it. Today I share some of those stories.
Pia-Lotta I, II and III
The first fleece I got was at a city farm where I took my very first spinning lesson. I got a box in my lap, filled to the brim with small and crimpy staples. The name Pia-Lotta was written on the side. Pia-lotta was a Swedish finull lamb, just relieved of her wooly fleece and skipping about outside the barn where we sat.
On a course in small-scale sheep farming back in 2015 I got to shear Pia-Lotta the Finull sheep. One of the things I made of her fleece was a Shift of focus sweater by Veera Välimäki.
Pia-Lotta wasn’t supposed to live beyond the summer, though. She wasn’t one of the lucky ones that would be allowed to stay at the farm. But just as a large van was coming to take her and her friends to slaughter, the sheep farmer changed her mind. The much loved ram who had fathered her had been bullied to death by some local children, and Pia-Lotta looked so much like him that the sheep farmer couldn’t bear losing her too. From that first fleece and a few more of hers after that I spun yarn for a couple of sweaters, a pair of mittens, an array of hats and a Fair Isle vest. Since then, Finull wool always makes my heart tingle and sprinkle memories from my first years of spinning.
Gunvor, queen of stripes
I asked a sheep farming friend of mine, Claudia, if I could buy fleeces from one of her Gestrike sheep over a few of years to see how the wool changed over time. Claudia picked out Gunvor, a lamb born white with large black spots. I got her first and second shearings. I used them both in the same project – a pair of pants with black and white stripes. The pants have been traditional in the Moroccan High Atlas, and Irene Waggener has adapted the orally transferred description for a western audience in her book Keepers of the Sheep. Women spun the wool on traditional spindles and their husbands, usually shepherds, knit the pants.
Gunvor the Gestrike ewe who was my longitudinal fleece study sheep. The life through her first two shearings shows in the fading stripes of my pants.
I used a Navajo style floor spindle to spin and ply the bulky yarn.The black spots in Gunvor’s fleece had faded some in the second shearing, something that is common with the breed. I placed the black stripes in a gradient with black at the bottom and lighter up the legs.
Unfortunately, Gunvor got two diseases that were painful for her and not advisable to breed on, so she had to be taken away. Her life as well as my project was cut short. But afterwards I realized that I did get a study of the changing of the wool over time after all, in the way I had placed the stripes in the pants. I wear them in the winter when I go down to the lake to take an ice bath, smiling all the way in my warm and wooly stripes.
Härvor full of cuddles
Härvor is also a sheep in Claudia’s flock. I met her a year ago when I first came for a photo shoot for my book and a few days later helped Claudia on shearing day. Härvor has the loveliest, rustic grey fleece, quite typical for the breed with conical staples with airy and warm undercoat and long and strong outercoat.
The Gestrike sheep Härvor is the cuddliest sheep. One skein of Härvor’s yarn (here together with yarn from the white Doris in the same flock) is part of a secret project.
Härvor is the cuddliest sheep. She was a bit sceptical at first, but then she kept coming to me, poking me until I placed my arms around her neck. How could I then not smuggle her fleece back home? I have spun one skein as part of a secret project.
Lotta and the red barn door
Last autumn I taught a beginner’s class in suspended spindle spinning in Uppsala, just north of Stockholm. One of the students, Åsa, has a flock of Svärdsjö sheep and on day two of the course she brought a couple of bags of fleece from her girls. Svärdsjö wool is usually white with fine and glittering wool in curly staples that sometimes curl back on themselves like ringlets. One fleece, though, stood out. The Svärdsjö glitter was there, but the staples were open and airy and had quite long outercoat fibers. Lotta was the name of the sheep. On a few places the wool was red since Lotta had a favourite barn door she liked to scratch her side against.
The glittering (and occasionally reddish) locks of Lotta’s fleece are becomingyarn for a Danish night sweater with its typical stitch and star pattern.
I bought the 1200 grams of wool and spent several hours picking it while I listened to an audiobook by Valérie Perrin. I spun it into a soft and fine 2-ply yarn for a Danish night sweater. As I approached the middle of the torso I realized I wouldn’t have enough yarn. I contacted Åsa and she sent me 300 grams from this year’s shearing of Lotta’s fleece. There were no red stains in this batch. However, Lotta seems to have scratched against the ground instead – I found of dark granules between the fibers. Luckily the fleece is quite open and a lot of the vegetable matter fell out as I picked the fleece while listening to Jane Eyre. The rest will fall out during teasing and carding.
Frida in my arms
I met Frida in April when I helped my friend Lena on shearing day. Lena shears her flock of Dalapäls sheep with hand shears and I was happy to help while my husband Dan took photos for the book. I started with Parisa, two years old and with very long and airy staples. Since it was so late in the spring, the lanolin was thick and waxy and a struggle to shear. On day two I turned to eleven year old Frida, Lena’s oldest sheep, whose fleece was a lot finer and airier and easier to work with.
From shearing through spinning and dyeing with Frida the 11-year-old Dalapäls sheep.
Dalapäls sheep is a forest breed with a distinctive flock mentality. They pay close attention to potential predators, as they should – this flock lives on wolf territory. I wouldn’t be able to come close to any of Lena’s Dalapäls sheep. But on shearing day Lena drives them into the narrow shearing pen where they have no way to go and I get to lean my body against the sheep I am shearing, feeling her warmth and her sheepiness.
A few months later I met my walking wheel for the first time. In my basket I had fourty-nine glittering rolags of Frida’s wool ready for a dance with the wheel. And we waltzed and twirled until the basket was empty. As a final step I dyed the skein with my homegrown fresh indigo leaves.
Tvaga of the Baltic sea
On yet another photo shoot visit to a sheep farm I met Tvaga the Brännö sheep. Dan and I visited Louise who lives in an archipelago a couple of hours north of Stockholm. Louise picked us up in her boat and took us to three different island where some of her sheep were grazing. On the final island, where Louise lives, I met Tvaga, a lamb. Or, I should perhaps say I saw her, she was too shy to answer my invitations. But I watched her sweet lamb locks in a gradient from white to almost black and knew I wanted to explore it. I asked Louise if she could spare it and before I knew it I got Tvaga’s fleece in the mail.
The staples from Tvaga the Brännö sheep comes in a range of colours, lengths and crimps.
As I picked the fleece, probably to the Jane Eyre audiobook too, I found not only different shades of grey, but a range of both lenght and crimp. I could have divided the fleece in numerous categories. However, the fleece was only 850 grams and I settled for three colour categories – white, light grey and medium grey. Perhaps there won’t be much difference between the greys and I might settle for only two categories.
Sheep with stories
All these stories add depth and dimensions to the spinning experience. Having met the sheep, walked its pastures or heard the sheep owned tell stories about the character of an individual gives the fleece life and an added value that is, in fact, invaluable. By having the fibers and the stories go through my hands I feel rich. The wool becomes so much more than just a material. It is a partner in craft and a song in my heart.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in seveal social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
Today I have a new post for you on Substack: Hearts of slöjd. I reflect over the kind and heartfilled conversations that emerge among crafters crafting.
”Making in the company of other makers brings something unique to the surface from deep within the heart. The act of making something in a natural material that is both esthetically appealing, sustainably made and useful, is for me a sign of respect to the maker and the made. I believe being in our hands makes us a little humbler, a little kinder and a little more responsive to the world. I know it makes me a better me.”
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
Over seven months after my friend Cecilia and I won an auction for a walking wheel I finally get to see the wheel in person. Meet Beata Sophia!
Back in September I stumbled upon an online auction for a walking wheel. Those of you who are looking for one know they are hard to find and rarely complete and working. This one was, though.
Space for a wheel
One reason why the walking wheels are so hard to find is that they take up a lot of space, few people have room in their homes for one, and many wheels have been turned into firewood. I looked at the auction page, longed and sighed –I knew she wouldn’t be mine, we don’t have space for her.
I texted my friend Cecilia and showed her the rare find. Cecilia lives in the countryside and happens to have a storage house with lots of space. She is my second cousin and has an interest in genealogy and likes to save and store things from our family. Together we decided to bid for the wheel and keep it in her storage house if we won the auction. Her son has a van for his business that would be big enough to fit the wheel.
Cecilia carved a new hub pin and added a felted band for the wheel rim. Apart from that, the wheel was in excellent shape. She also added a waxed linen drive band and sew the join with a thinner waxed linen thread.
The opening bid was 300 Swedish kronor, about 26€/$28, an insult to the wheel. My pulse increased as it drew closer to the closing time of the auction. It turned out that there were no other bids. Cecilia and I were over the moon, and a couple of days later she and her son picked the wheel up.
A true beauty
Since then Cecilia has carved a new sprint where one was missing and added a beautiful fulled wool ribbon to wind across the wheel rim in Swedish walking wheel tradition. Together we decided to name her Beata Sophia, after an old foremother of ours, who is mentioned as a spinner in one of the documents Cecilia has saved. Her oil portrait hangs on the wall in Cecila’s home and she looks remarkably like Cecilia.
The spindle is wooden, something I haven’t seen before. The wheel tensioning construction is simple and elegant.
Origin unknown
We know nothing about the wheel. It came with no provenience and no marking or other clues to either origin, date or maker. Of the Swedish great wheels I have seen (more than five, less than ten), all have had a simpler look, with plain legs and spokes as opposed to ours with lots of turned details. The same goes for image googling at the Swedish Digital Museum – all the walking wheels have a more plain design. Ours is also the only one I have seen with a wooden spindle.
The original picture was painted by Pehr Hilleström, probably around 1775. The wheel looks very much like the one Cecilia and I have, apart from the number of spokes.
Cecilia did show me a black and white reproduction of an oil painting with one just like ours, though. From the interior and the dress I imagine a wheel like this would come from a fashionable home. It was painted by Pehr Hilleström around 1775. The painting portrays a spinner at Näs herrgård in Uppland, a couple of hours from both Cecilia and me.
We meet at last
I haven’t had time to visit Cecilia and Beata Sophia since before we won the auction, but last week I took the train to see them both. The day before, I carded a basketful of rolags to maximize the spinning time.
Going to a dear friend with a basket full of rolags, can you think of anything better?
The wheel is such a beauty. Ornamented, but not excessively so. Simple in its execution and very well preserved. It was a lovely summer day and we took the wheel outside and placed her on a yard in front of the rural community center. With the right camera angle (away from the dustbins) it seemed a fitting context. I started the first rolag and kept going. She was such a joy to spin with! A bit fussy and noisy, but still smooth to work with. I had to stop myself from spinning all the 49 rolags I had prepared.
I’m doing the walking wheel dance. Do take note of my pants that came straight off the sewing machine. The fabric is handwoven in China in the 1930’s–1970s.
A photo shoot
After a lovely lunch with Cecilia and her family underneath the apple tree, Dan came. He was there to take photos for my book. I want to take as many outdoor photos as possible, with natural light and surroundings. We got some lovely shots by the rural community center and another series in a long alleyway toward the church.
Dan and I have had lots of fun on our photo shoots!
All in all it was a beautiful day and a treasure to remember. I hope we can meet again soon, Cecilia, Beata Sophia and I.
If you have seen this type of walking wheel before, please tell me all about it! You can read more about my encounters with the walking wheel at Vallby open air museum here and here. A couple of years ago I made a video at Vallby with the walking wheel. It is available in English and Swedish.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. Do subscribe!
I share essay-style writing on Substack. Come and have a look!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
In just a few weeks my wool traveling club and I will go on our 2024 wool journey to a fulling mill. We have all woven fabrics to full and today I’m presenting my fulling candidates.
I love planning our wool journeys. We have planned this one for over two years. On the 2022 wool journey we learned påsöm embroidery by Anna-Karin Jobs Arnberg in beautiful Dala-Floda. She also teaches fulling at the nearby fulling mill (one of perhaps five working fulling mills in Sweden), and we decided to spend the upcoming year and the 2023 wool journey weaving projects to full in the 2024 wool journey.
What to full
The fabric to full needs to be woven in a wool that actually will felt. The Scandinavian breeds usually felt very well. The wool needs to be evenly blended, spun and woven, and the sett needs to be loose. It is a good idea to add extra twist to the warp yarn to hold, and let the weft yarn be looser spun to enhance the fulling process.
Fulling mill
The Dala-Floda fulling mill is situated in Kvarna, a 17th century industrial site with several different types of mills. It is operated on courses and workshops, and by people who have the knowledge to use it.
The Dala-Floda fulling mill, photo by Dan Waltin in 2018.
Fulling candidates
I have woven five fabrics during the past four years, two of which are woven with my handspun yarns. If I’m lucky, a sixth weave (handspun) will be finished in time. All the weaves are different and I hope at least one of them will turn into something I can use. I have woven them all on my 60 cm wide rigid heddle loom.
Rough Gute
When I first learned about fulling fabrics and saw a weekend course in fulling at a fulling mill I started to plan for a weave to full. I had bought a lovely rough gute fleece back in 2018 and made a few woven swatches. It turned out that they fulled beautifully and very evenly. I had just spun a woolen 2-ply yarn that I used as both warp and weft and it was quite a fast weave. The finished weave has been waiting in my yarn closet for the past four years.
Plain Gute wool in warp and weft. Hand-carded woolen spun and 2-plied.
I think this weave might be the most straightforward of the weaves. It has the same fleece and the same yarn in both weft and warp. I’m sure I can make something out of it, perhaps a vest.
Raw weave size: 56 x 275 centimeters.
3 x 3 x 3 pillow cases
Pillow cases are one of my favourite test projects for weaving. They are small enough to finish, large enough to actually become something, and quite swift to sew. Usually I weave with my handspun yarn, but in this case (pun intended) I had lots of skeins of Shetland wool from a clearance sale a few years ago, and I thought I might as well weave something out of them. I used the same three colours in three different checquered patterns in three different weaves.
I wove the first commercial yarn pillow case at the 2023 wool journey at Boel’s house.
The yarns are quite old and brittle, and there is a risk that they will tear in the fulling process. There is also a risk that the colours will full differently, one of the yarns turned out to be finer than the others. If the fulling shrinks the fabrics too much, I can either get smaller pillows or weave bands (from a failed first warping) to join in the sides.
Three weaves in three colours and three patterns.
Raw weave size
Teal main colour: 54 x 128 centimeters
Fawn main colour: 55 x 128 centimeters
Navy main colour: 54 x 132 centimeters.
Icelandic twill
Mmm… my beauty. I think this is the weave I’m the most excited about. Last year I bought two Icelandic fleeces from Uppspuni mini mill in Iceland, one light and one dark. I separated tog and thel (outercoat and undercoat in Icelandic fleece) and colours. To enhance the characteristics of the fiber types I spun the tog worsted and the thel woolen, both as singles yarns and in different directions. To ease the energy of the warp singles I wound them up on tennis balls a couple of months before I warped. I set my rigid heddle loom up for twill and wove 2.25 meters. This may be my best twill project so far, it’s also my best singles warp project so far.
Worsted spun Icelandic singles tog as warp, woolen Spun Icelandic singles thel as weft. A few months before I warped, I wound the warp yarn onto tennis balls to ease the singles energy a bit.
I expect the weft to full more than the warp, so that the finished fabric will be a lot narrower and just a little bit shorter. The twill construction might also add to the sideways shrinkage. The fabric will have two different sides – the weft facing side will be soft and warm and the warp facing side will be strong and shiny. I have no specific plans for this fabric, the result will point me in the right direction.
Raw weave size: 54 x 209 centimeters.
Gute/Icelandic/sari silk
I finished the twill just a week ago, took a breath and warped for the final project. The warp yarn is a 2-ply woolen spun Gute lamb’s wool with recycled sari silk in it, and the warp is woolen spun Icelandic thel, also with recycled sari silk. I have no idea what will happen here, with one plied yarn and one singles, and with two different breeds. I expect the silk to full a little, but still leave some eye-catching colour specks in the fabric.
2-ply woolen spun Gute lamb’s wool with recycled sari silk as warp, singles woolen spun Icelandic wool with recycled sari silk as weft.
The warping went so well, the warp behaved and I managed to roll it onto the warp beam very evenly. Once I had threaded the heddle I realized I had warped backwards, though. I tied the ends on the warp beam, rolled the whole warp out again, fiddled, cut the cloth beam ends and tied them to the apron rod. I was very grateful that this wasn’t a singles warp. As I wove I looked at the thousand sari silk stars that lit underneath my hands and felt the warmth of the lanolin. I also noticed large quantities of Gute yarn kemp all over my top.
If I finish this weave in time I hope to be able to full it just slightly. I swatched a similar weave a few years ago and found that a lightly fulled fabric was just perfect, with both the fulling qualities and some drape.
Things I can’t control
There are endless factors that can go wrong here and that I can’t control. And that’s the beauty of fulling. I have no idea how much the fabrics will shrink. I have no idea if I can ask to stop the fulling for one of the fabrics or if they all need to go the same length of time. Perhaps my dyed commercial yarns will be banned if there is a risk of bleeding. Perhaps my gute fabrics will be banned because their kemp fibers may contaminate the other fabrics. One or more of the fabrics may have been woven in too loose a sett. I will find all this out sooner or later.
The fabrics will probably shrink in different amounts, and I am also quite certain that something will go wrong. I am convinced that I will learn a lot and that I will take another weekend further down the line to full some more.
I am so excited about the fulling mill wool journey and my weaves. My wool traveling club friends have woven a lot too, I’m particularly excited about Boel’s 5 meter twill woven on a grown up floor loom.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. So subscribe!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
Back in October I helped my friend Claudia with the fleeces in the autumn shearing. I brought the fleeces from the Gestrike sheep Doris and Härvor home, and I bet they hadn’t taken the bus before!
Just a few days earlier I had cuddled these two wooly ladies at a pasture photo shoot for my book. Getting to create yarn with fleeces whose sheep I have met and shared breaths with made me realize what a special opportunity that was, and it gave me an extra tingle in my heart.
Doris and Härvor take the bus to the city.
You can read more about the two visits to Claudia’s farm in the essay style post A breath of wool.
A secret mission
A few weeks ago I talked with A, a wooly artist who will remain secret for a while longer. She is working on a secret project and I suggested a collaboration: that I would send her handspun yarns from the fleeces of Doris and Härvor and she would incorporate them in her project. She loved the idea and we started to plan our different ends of the process. A and I don’t know each other and have never met, it is just one of those sweet Instagram connections that make my heart sing once again.
Typical and not
Neither of the fleeces is typical of Gestrike wool. The most common staple type in a Gestrike fleece would be a dual coat with long and strong outercoat fibers and soft and airy undercoat fibers. But it could just as easily be another dominant staple type. At the same time, Gestrike wool can be very variegated. The white locks from Doris’ fleece are very fine and crimpy and with a soft sheen, almost like a finull fleece.
Newly shorn fleece from Doris (left) and Härvor (right) the Gestrike sheep.
Härvor’s locks are more mixed, with both straight and crimpy staples, long and shorter, white and grey. A little rougher than Doris’ fleece, but still soft. Since the wool of Gestrike sheep tends to lighten as the sheep grows, chances are that Härvor was born a lot darker, perhaps with white spots.
The yarns
A gave med creative freedom with the yarns. I decided on two fingering-ish weight 2-ply knitting yarns. I wanted to create them so that A would be able to use them for the same project, should she want to, perhaps in a stranded colourwork. With that as my starting point I aimed for two yarns that had the same qualities, even if they came from fleeces that did not.
Doris (left) and Härvor (right): Staple, teased wool, carded rolag and finished 2-ply yarns.
I had already picked the locks right after the fleeces had dried after washing, so my hands had already made their acquaintance with the wool. In the next step I teased for each fleece around 50 grams of wool with my combing station. I wanted lots of loft in the yarns and decided on woolen spinning in one of my favourite techniques: English longdraw. So I carded my teased wool into the sweetest rolags and took my seat at the wheel.
Treadles and twist
English longdraw means that you gather twist in front of the rolag, make around an arm’s length draw to let the twist travel up the drawn section, and then add the final twist before you allow the spun yarn to roll up on the bobbin. As I do this I like to keep a consistent treadle count – in this case I treadle six to gather twist, make the draw, treadle ten to add twist, and then roll the yarn onto the bobbin. This gives the technique a beautiful rhythm, and also a consistency. Together with a similar counting in the carding, a yarn spun this way has the potential to become very consistent.
Doris and Härvor as finished yarns.
I used the same rhythm for both yarns and they turned out quite similar to each other and landed on a grist of 1700 and 1790 meters per kilo. The Doris skein may have a little more elasticity since her wool has more crimp than Härvor’s. I have cuddled these skeins numerous times, or just admired them. Today I sent them to A, so I will have to just cherish the memory of them. And, of course, I have the rest of the bags of fleece left, and I may spin them the same way as these first two skeins.
A new journey
So, Doris and Härvor are going on a new journey. This time in the shape of yarns and probably in a truck, but still, a journey to a new town and to a new home. I wonder how A will give them a new shape. I hope they all get along and that A can make Doris and Härvor shine! I’ll let you know when the secret isn’t a secret anymore.
Resources
Do you want to dive deeper? Here are some resources.
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. So subscribe!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
I’ve done it before, married a kempy Gute fleece with recycled sari silk with surprising success. Today I’m combining silk and kemp again, with even more success.
If you are a patron (or want to become one) you can see how I tease, blend and spin the Gute wool with sari silk in my February 2024 video postcard.
The combination wool from a primitive breed like Gute sheep, including kemp, with something as delicate as silk is quite intriguing, and I still giggle when I think about when the idea poked me in the eye a couple of years ago.
2021: First try
Back then it was a Gute lamb’s fleece. I teased the wool with my combing station, while at the same time blending it with recycled sari silk. A lot of the kemp stayed in the combs as I teased the wool. Sadly, a lot of the sari silk did too.
Lots of the sari silk got stuck in the tines of the combs when I teased and blended the first Gute fleece back in 2021. I got a lovely little skein and did a couple of fulling tests.
The result was a surprisingly soft yarn, though, with little specks of silk next to the quirky kemp. Sadly, I only spun that one small skein as a test when I bought the fleece, and when it finally was the Gute fleece’s turn in my fleece queue, it had gone old and brittle. With a heavy heart I placed it on my garden beds as mulching. I was quite crushed by this (even if the vegetables weren’t).
2024: Second try
A year or so ago I got myself another Gute lamb’s fleece, with beautiful soft undercoat and quite a lot of kemp. This one made its turn in the fleece queue before it got brittle.
Another Gute lamb’s fleece came home with me. Just as the first one it has lots of kemp.
This time I tried teasing it staple by staple with a flicker. And it really did the trick – by gently brushing the cut ends I got rid of a lot more kemp than I had with the combs. All that was left after the flicking were astonishingly soft fibers. Some kemp is still there, but I don’t let it bother me.
With a simple brush with the flicker I remove lots of the kemp and end up with fine and silky fibers. The rightmost image shows the original staple (middle), the flicked staple (top) and the waste in the flicker after flicking (bottom).
When I look at the flicked staples I can see that there are outercoat fibers, but very close to the fineness of the undercoat fibers. Just sweet locks of silky vanilla kindness, light as feathers and dying to spoon with some sari silk.
Flicked (left) and unlicked (right) staples of Gute lamb’s wool.
My usual yield from raw fleece to finished yarn is around 55 per cent. I expect this yield to be lower due to the amount of kemp removed, but the result is truly astonishing and definitely worth it. Flicking staple by staple is time consuming, but I do it while bingeing Downton Abbey, and enjoy the slow movements of the flicker. Once a staple is flicked it feels like a luxurious soap against my skin.
Enter recycled sari silk
My plan was to use combs to blend the sari silk with the teased staples. However, when I tried adding the sari silk straight onto the cards I realized that it worked wonderfully well. I just pulled a staple length of the sari silk off the braid, teased it sideways to match the width of the wool on the card and placed it on top. Carding was a dream and the silk blended smoothly and evenly into the batt.
I’m dressing the card with first the flicked staples and then the recycled sari silk.
When I find the rhythm I can card for ages. It’s like a dance and I swirl away to the muffled sound of brush strokes. The teased fibers make the smooth movements possible. My latest ebayed hand cards are a dream. I think they are from the -70’s, but made with old techniques. I have never experienced such smooth cards.
Shaping the gute/sari silk rolag into pure yumminess.
Woolen yarn and fulled dreams
I am spinning the rolags with an English longdraw on my spinning wheel and 2-plying it. I am spinning the yarn quite fine, around light fingering to fingering weight. As you can see in the picture below, there is still kemp in the yarn. Most of this will fall out during weaving, leaving air pockets that will make the fabric light and warm.
My plan is to weave it in tabby on my rigid heddle loom. I’m not sure how much yarn I will get, perhaps I will use it all as a warp yarn and spin some Icelandic undercoat wool the same way for the weft.
A 2-ply yarn spun with English longdraw from carded rolags of Gute wool blended with recycled silk.
In May I will go to a fulling mill with my wool traveling club and full the finished weave, along with some other woven projects. More kemp will fall out in the intense handling, leaving a magical cloth. That is my plan, anyway. I’m truly excited about both the wool journey and the results. I will of course keep you posted.
Happy spinning!
You can find me in several social media:
This blog is my main channel. This is where I write weekly posts, mainly about spinning. So subscribe!
Myyoutube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook pagewhere 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 or to book me for a lecture.
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons are an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
Read the 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.
I am writing a book! In the later half of 2025 Listen to the wool: A why-to guide for mindful spinning will be available. Read more about the book here.
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.
