Dyer’s Rants

January is probably the most important month in the Scarlet Fleece calendar. It is my slowest sales month-but it is most important in setting the direction and priorities for the business. And it provides times to work on up and coming projects. One project very near and dear to my business….scratch that…to my purpose for being in business…is to develop a product that promotes American farmers, namely shepherds. And also my favorite heritage sheep-Shetlands. And I wanted to work with a mill I have had my eye on since she started it-Central Virginia Fiber Mill.

I was very excited when Mary Kearney started this mill. And she has done it right; buying equipment that is top quality, housing it it a huge built for milling building on her farm. And she has started out milling individual farmer’s clips and has taken the time to learn what her equipment will do and how to process all the different types of fiber that comes into her mill. And now she is ready to create a sustainable long term commercial product. Good timing for me. We have completed our testing and have come up with a lofty 2 ply worsted weight yarn that will be in sold in 150 yard 100 gram skeins in the natural colors as well as dyed in all the Scarlet Fleece colors. We are now in the process of signing up farmers-and the interest looks good. My hope is to have this yarn ready to introduce an the next trade show in June to measure the market interest.

This has been a long time coming. Right now-I can hardly hold back my enthusiasm as I gaze over my growing flock of these beautiful sheep I am lucky enough to raise. Last weekend-I brought back my visiting guest-a lovely gray ram-Morty.

Morty heading back to his home farm.

I can’t wait to see what lambs he has produced come May. I will leave you with pics of my growing 3 lambs from last years breeding season. And check out Scarlet Fleece’s facebook page to get info about another project-designing a colorway and knitting pattern virtually-and you can follow along and even win the knitting kit at the end of the process in June!

Black Dahlia

Pansy

Poppy