Yolo Woolen Mill visit

Yolo Woolen Mill

(Doesn't this look like Charly Chaplin's Modern Times Movie)

Mimi and I visited Jane at the Yolo Woolen Mill again.  Picked up quite a lot of wonderful yarn and brought alpaca and wool to Jane.  We are experimenting with 80% alpaca and 20% wool, in a DK weight. It has to be 2 ply and it has to have some wool to hold together.  This should be such a soft yarn, I can hardly wait to see how it comes out.

We brought home some wonderful yarns and are in the final throws of setting up the CSA. (Check out the preliminary write up at localwoolpastures.com).  We can see that we need to do larger lots, because the skeins go fast.  Mimi has been selling the yarn at the farmers markets and I have sold quite a lot from BMA.  I have also knit several sweaters to see how the yarn feels and works and how much one needs for larger garments. 

So our visit:

This time I took my camera.  I am always so impressed with the size of the machinery.  It truly is out of another era. This place could not survive without Jessie, who is the operator, the machinist and the mechanic for all these machines.

From roving to yarn

This is the back of the machine

This is the front of the machine

When we were there we saw fleeces from many people we know. It is wonderful to see and hear about  other shepherds and what they are doing.