How does a Sheeples sweater get “from back to back”?

1. The wool is grown right here in the Interlake – our farm is located just north of Inwood. We feed our own pasture and hay, and locally grown grain.
2. We shear our sheep in the spring. Some animals grow so much fleece that they could be sheared again in the fall!
3. The fleece is “skirted” by hand. We remove all of the undesirable fleece immediately – anything that is too coarse, too dirty, too short, and just plain not nice.
4. Next the fleece is washed in HOT soapy water to remove as much of the dirt as possible. Much of the lanolin (a sheep’s natural weather-proofing) is removed at this time. If a fleece is destined to be made into an outer wear sweater, we do leave a little bit of lanolin in the fleece to retain its natural water resistant properties. If a fleece is destined for a garment worn next to the skin, we make sure that ALL lanolin is removed.
5. The clean fleece is then laid out on big racks to air dry. We can remove any remaining bits of hay and straw by picking them out by hand.
6. The dry fleece is then “picked” to open the individual locks. This creates a “cloud” of fibre.
7. The “cloud” can now be hand spun “off the lock” to preserve the natural colour variations of the fleece. The yarn created from this method will have bands and stripes of different colours and textures of wool. This type of yarn tends to be fuzzy and has a lot of “character”.
8. The “cloud” can also be carded to even out and align all the fibres. During carding, extremely short fibres and anything that is not fleece is usually removed. Carding creates either “batts”, rectangles of fibre, or “roving”, which looks like a long rope.
9. The “batt” or “roving” is now hand spun to create a smoother, more uniform yarn. The colour and texture of the fleece is homogenized, so that every skein of yarn from the fleece is the same colour.
10. The spun yarn needs to be “plied” so that two or more strands of single yarn are put together to create a stronger, thicker, balanced yarn that will knit easily into a sweater.
11. The finished yarn is washed to “set the twist” and to remove any of the oils and dirt transferred from the hands working with it. This also lets the wool “bloom” and reveal its natural softness.
12. Finally, the wool is ready to be knit into a sweater!
13. Once the sweater is finished, it is washed one more time. This lets us make sure that the sweater is the right size and shape, and that there is no unwanted oil or dirt left anywhere!
14. It takes about two weeks to take a fleece from Shearing to a finished Adult sweater. About one third of the time is spent on preparing the fleece, one third on spinning, and one third on knitting and finishing the sweater.