Or in this case probably carding. This here
is the most gorgeous shetland wool ever, destined to become yarn for socks. I’ve washed about 4 times this much and there is still a huge fleece to go. I drag the fleece out, spread it on the kitchen floor (that’s Joe’s favourite part) and take handfuls to wash in the kitchen sink (Joe’s second favourite part) and wash it lock by lock, matching different parts of the fleece for staple length, quality and colour. When the locks are clean I roll them in a towel and walk on it to remove most of the water, then I spread them on the largish heating vent in the kitchen to dry. This is Ken’s favourite part,
because it looks like I’ve taken a liking to breeding rats in the kitchen.
If it’s summer, sometimes I put them in the sunshine in the back garden, but that means engaging in a bitter war with the %^&*!! fleece stealing grey squirrel who lives in the backyard. It wouldn’t be so bad if the little crapper just stole fleece (yeah…ok, that would still be pretty bad) but the worst part is that this squirrel will fight for the yarn. I’ve taken to covering the drying fleece with a screen so he can’t get it, but when I go out to bring my fleece back in, he threatens me. Think I’m wimping out? The squirrel doesn’t just yell at me from a tree. When he sees me advance on “his” fleece, he springs from the tree, screaming some nightmarish squirrel expletives at me and makes for my face.
I’ve got to find another way to dry fleece in the summer. What’s the lifespan of a grey squirrel?
Yarn Harlot
I think you just need to point out to him how much he resembles the little rat corpses that you’re drying in the sun…
Or borrow some friend’s dog that likes to hunt. Sometimes natural selection is a powerful deterrent.
Get a bunch of screens and put them up on 2 by 4s, OR, do what my spouse did for me, and find an old display rack from the beverage/grocery store. Mine used to hold cans of RC cola and was about to be thrown away before my resourceful engineer husband took it home for me. It has holes on each shelf, and dismantles completely (its made of a PVC type plastic). I can dry an entire fleece on its four shelves.
My uncle cleaned out a squirrel’s half-buried nut stash from under his front porch, and for the rest of that fall every time he walked out his door that squirrel chittered at him and threw a nut at his head.
Hmmm. Is your cat indoor-only?
Meantime, I once lost some pink wool to the birds–I found their nest later on my roof, twigs and leaves and koolaid-dyed bright lambswool. Lucky nestlings.
Carolyn that’s a good plan. When the weather warms up I going to try and build myself something.
Alison, I love the idea of technicolour nests. Maybe I’ll start putting fleece out on purpose!
Well, a bluejay did once try to make off with an entire four oz skein of cashmere drying out there–that thing had good taste–but it yanked the whole thing down on itself and scared itself off. I watched it, laughing, stick with just the fluff, bird. And ever since then I’ve put fluff out at nesting season.
Well, according to this the average lifespan of an Eastern Gray Squirrel is 9 years for a male and 12 1/2 years for a female. Other sites estimate between 4 and 7 years. 🙂 That really does look like a pile of rats, btw. It gave me a chuckle.