June 20, 2009
Sheepie Dreams Farm
last month, urban fauna studio sponsored a one-day sheep retreat to sheepie dreams organic sheep farm in santa cruz. at the time, i couldn't find anyone interested in going with me but i signed up anyway and was able to car-pool to santa cruz.
the day was filled with many activities and the weather couldn't have been better!
there's a beautiful little tea house with a surrounding porch on the property.
it has an antique wheel, a drum carder and finished yarn and dyed locks inside and there are chairs and a rocking chair out on the porch -- a perfect place to spin and look out into the fields and watch the sheep.
we prepared and washed raw fleece:
we watched a dyeing demonstration with some of the plants on the property. we then got to gather our own plants and bring home some other things that would allow us to dye the fleece that we had prepped and washed.
there was hands-on dyeing, spindling, felting and a delicious lunch.
it was fun to watch the sheep being fed and to see the family snake, smoogles:
i bought some dyed romney locks (pink, yellow and blue) and natural dark brown wensleydale locks. here are the yellow and blue locks:
i used my drum carder for the first time and carded the pink into batts. i will be combining this pink batt with other colors and sparkle to finish the batts.
i used my hand cards for the first time and carded the wensleydale locks. i spun them into a single which i then plied with a single i had spun from hand-dyed merino wool from urban fauna studio:
i still haven't done the dyeing with the plants and the washed wool -- i'm saving that for another fun day.
Posted by lesleeroberts at June 20, 2009 05:26 PM