Exciting news! This past weekend saw the marking of my parents' 40th Anniversary! So to commemorate the occasion my Dad decided to buy an Alpaca for my Mom's anniversary present. We are so very excited! Fibre at our fingertips, literally! Al the Alpaca (no said my parents were very creative with the naming of beasts) is quite happy in his new and, I have it on good authority, that he's eagre to share his warm and wooly coat with the knitter in our family (okay this is mostly me although others have also given it a go).Although the picture above is not our Al, it is a great one to show the warm and wooly content of their fibre. I am so excited about this new member of our family. However, I shall have to wait patiently until next spring when he will be ready to sheer and then a little while longer while the fibre is cleaned and spun and ready to knit up into some wonderful creation. It is touted as being one of the warmest, softest and silkiest fibres known to knitters. Added bonus: they are just so darn CUTE!
Anyone out there who has any experience with Alpaca fibre, drop me a line. I am eager to learn all I can about the care of Alpacas, processing of their fibre and knitting with the fine yarn produced. I'm looking forward to learning all there is to know about this member of the camelid family and maybe writing it up into an intriguing article some day.
Happy knitting!
5 comments:
Hi Bonnie. What you said about socks is so true. I'm not surprised you have found a nice knitting community in Saskatoon. Some family lives there, and my neice learned how to knit in grade 5. they were allowed to knit while the teacher was reading to them, and everybody did it but for a couple of 'cool' guys. she is now a young teenager, and isn't knitting, BUT, she will. We all do.
PS, nice blog!
Thanks, Needles!
Alpaca drapes beautifully and I love it for shawls. Textures like cables tend to look pretty flat, unlike in wool, although that means it somehow looks more formal because it's more subdued. It has just enough hairy/wirey character to it that you can use a larger needle for the same thickness yarn than you might in a wool--so your knitting works up a bit faster. Anyway--have fun!
Thanks for the advice, Alison. This may be the excuse I need to give one of your shawls a try :)
I can hardly wait until spring when the first shearing is done and all spun up :)
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