Dear Spinning Circle,

This episode of Wool n' Spinning Radio has been a long time coming - Melissa and I have been trying to connect for a while, seeing each other at our local Knots & Hops each month, bumping into each other at Knit City and Fibres West throughout the years and so much more. It was a pleasure to sit down with her and chat about her business and love of wool - her enthusiasm is unbelievably infectious. You can't help but feel sucked in by her love of the process from her favourite part of the process, washing, to picking and carding.

Melissa's video on Picking Wool here

Thank you to Melissa for sharing her journey to date and I look forward to chatting with her again this summer to record a Part II. After we stopped the recording, she came up with topics for Part III, as well, so stay tuned!

Find Melissa:

• Instagram @mellyknits here
• Website here
• Ravelry @smellyknits here

If you would like to be featured on Wool n' Spinning Radio, have a story to tell or want to discuss your making, please reach out to Rachel. You can leave a comment below or message her privately!

Until next time,

Happy Processing!

Rachel

Dear Spinning Circle,

Today on the Radio show, Rebecca and I sat down to talk about the sheep and breeds that she came across at Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival recently. We chat a little bit about getting fibre preparation done, some of the road blocks to getting things started and more.

Patreon Post here

This was a stream-of-consciousness at 6am Pacific time - I hope you enjoy this off-the-cuff episode!

For more on Spinning Sheep Breeds and getting further down the rabbit hole of various classifications of wool, check out my workshop on the School of SweetGeorgia here.

We have explored washing sheep fleece in previous posts, specifically here. Within this post contains a list of posts that go through the classification of sheep breeds, including Fine & Medium, Longwools, Down & Down-like, and Double-Coated in multiple parts.

I also chronicle (through photos) a Farm-to-Yarn-to-Sweater prep, spin, dye and knit that I made several years ago, right after my dad died. It was a meditative project that offered a ton of quiet while I processed what had happened in such a short period of time. This sweater still holds an incredibly special place in my heart.

Comment below if there's a topic you'd like us to discuss & explore!

If you would like to be featured on Wool n' Spinning Radio, have a story to tell or want to discuss your making, please reach out to Rachel. You can leave a comment below or message her privately!

Until next time,

Keep Spinning!

Rachel & Rebecca

Dear Spinning Circle,

This month, on Wool n' Spinning Radio, Rebecca answered a bunch of questions from myself about preparing for a long trip. As many of you know, Rebecca and her family will be on Sabbatical from their work in Nunavut for 5 months. I wanted to understand more about how she prepared for the making she would be doing while away!

Patreon Link here

Here are the rough questions I asked Rebecca about her preparations to travel:

1. What were you thinking about when you were first preparing for your trip? What were some of the projects you thought about initially? Did that change in your preparations?

2. What kind of preparation did you do? Carding? Combing? Etc.

3. How do you envision travelling with your projects? IE. Do you see yourself crafting while you are actually travelling (planes, trains, etc) or are you prepping more for when you are actually staying in places?

4. Do you have any plans to pick up projects along the way? Purchasing while travelling? Any ideas about where you would like to go? Anything you are particularly excited about?

Thank you for tuning in today!

If you have a story to tell about how you got started on your handspinning journey, a project you're working on that you think others would be interested in or anything else, please reach out! We'd love to have you as a guest.

Be sure to check out last month's episode of Wool n' Spinning Radio here.

Until next time,

Rachel & Rebecca