Sunday, May 27, 2007

Doggie Heaven On Earth

Bagel experienced a new kind of ecstasy when "I Don't Feel Like Blogging Anymore" Barb brought over HER fleece for a little demo in fleece washing. Please note this is HER fleece, not mine. Kim brought her lovely children over to distract play with mine, and to discipline the dog.

Barb: First you lay it out, and look for any second cuts or VM, and you pick those out.

Bagel: First you lay it out, take a gentle sniff, and then dive in!

Bagel: When you find a particularly smelly part, you roll around in it.

Kim: No more sheep for you, bad boy.

The fleece was a small 3 pounds, so we divided it into two laundry bags.

And gently dipped it into a steamy bath of hot water and Kookabura wool scour.

We wanted to test whether the wool scour worked any better than plain old Dawn dishwashing detergent, so we filled a second tub with hot steamy water and added two big squirts of Dawn.

Jen: I knew there was a reason we've moved this tub from house to house to house to house.
After about a half hour, we gently raised the fleece out of the water, and let it drain. Refilled the tubs with soapy/Kookabura wash, and repeated.

After two washes, we did a rinse in the laundry tub and then tried to spin the fleece in the washer. This is where Jen realized she needs a new wash machine, as this one cannot spin without a rinse cycle, which is what you need to do when it comes to fleece spinning.
At this point we abandonded all hope, left the fleece in a tub for Barb to take home and spin, and we moved on to the next experiment - Mike's Hard Lime drink. Oh, and someone got a lesson in drum carding.

What A Day! Thanks Barb and Kim for a fun afternoon!

12 comments:

Barb said...

Thanks for washing my fleece! It came out lovely, and I had such a fun time visiting with you and Kim. Maggie sure took to carding and wanted to keep going far after I was through. It was a treat to see Bagel's reaction to raw fleece. He definately thinks you need more of that!

Anonymous said...

That looked like a fun afternoon. I think Bagel had the most fun though;-)
Elizabeth

Denise said...

Hi Jen! I still can't see the pictures though - darn it! My imagination is using your great descriptions to fill in the blanks!
:-D

Melanie said...

Bagel is just another fiber lover; het fits right in. I can't imagine a nicer way to spend the day.

Anonymous said...

I bet if Bagel had opposable thumbs he'd be a knitter/spinner, too! I love the Bad Dog photo! What a sweet face!

AREN'T FLEECES FUN????

Angela said...

What a wonderful day!

Is it time for us to start our Blue Moon tank tops?

jackie_knits said...

What fun! Wish I could have been there too!

vanessa said...

fun!!!

Marlene said...

If you shut the water off at the source the washer can "pretend" it is spraying rinse water all it likes and you can do a safe wool spin. I do it all the time.

Karen said...

Thanks, Bagel, for that lesson on carpe diem! I am sure the sniffing and rolling was worth the price of the scolding. Awww.

ChickenChum said...

Hey Jen!!
Wow, Bagel sure is having a blast with smelly goodness there! That looks like a fun day! : )

desperateknitwife said...

So I'm dying to know which one came out better, the dawn one or the other one?