You were an amazing cardboard architect, lettuce tester and carrot aficionado. Your gentle nose nudges and enormous bunny flops of happiness made my life sweeter. You taught me how filled with personality and love rabbits could be. I love how you could sense when I was feeling down and you’d come over to check on me or just lie down next to me. You were an amazing animal soul and you will be missed.

This particular skein was spun in April and May of 2008.  It’s around 225 yards of 40+ wraps per inch (without halo) two-ply pearly soft copper satin angora that was carefully plucked from Gus and spun from the lock.  It was spun on my trusty old Ashford Traditional scotch tension on the 14:1 ratio (that lovely wheel has since moved on to a new home).   All of this information was written on a small string tag.  I am so glad I got in the habit of labeling and recording notes on tags on my spinning a couple of years ago, otherwise I’d be just guessing.

It is one of my favorite skeins I have ever spun of any fiber.  His fiber is the softest thing I’ve ever felt on this planet, cashmere included.  The satin genes really add some amazing textural qualities to the already wonderfully soft angora – it has a pearly sheen to it and the fiber feels like it’s been blended half and half with fine silk.

The drape of the fiber is amazing, obeying gravity flawlessly despite the fibers weighing practically nothing.  The 225 yard skein pictured weighs 20 grams, and I am certainly not the finest angora yarn spinner – not by a long shot.   Although that really hasn’t been my focus – I spin my angora yarn to incorporate as much fiber with lots of twists to hold the fiber tightly together (which means room for air) which probably contributes to the nice drape.   I believe it’s also the reason why the items I’ve made from my angora have worn so well and don’t shed.   They are a little slow to develop a halo, but when they do, as this skein has from being fondled on a regular basis, it sure is pretty.  I have no idea what I will do with this skein.  I have paged through a couple of pages of patterns on Ravelry, and strongly considered knitting Alison’s Rabbit Tracks. but have yet to get past just petting it.

(Pardon the wrinkled sheet in the picture – I spread out my tools on top of an old fitted sheet which I use to protect the couch from fur)

I have tried tons of different scissors over the years.  The scissors pictured here are all winners.  At far left is a pair of  large shears.  I use these for clipping through matts I have already separated from the body enough to be confident there’s no skin pulled in (it can happen – ouch!).   The next two pairs are the same general type – spring loaded sharp tipped trimmers.  They work well for carefully snipping around the head and shoulders, and can be great for clipping the main body if I decide to scissor instead of using the electric trimmers.  Next are my tiny scissors that I use for clipping between the ears and close to the skin, followed by another pair of regular non-spring scissors.  I have found that titanium bonded scissors stay sharp much longer and are a better investment, although the high quality steel in the green and yellow spring scissors has held up much better than most.  You wouldn’t think angora rabbit fur would dull scissors, but most scissors work only for a shearing or two before they lose their edge.

The other implements shown are a pair of nail clippers and my two favorite grooming combs.  Nothing too special about either of these, but they’re essential pieces of my kit.  Back in the days of the ceramics studio, I also used an air gun (set on low PSI) to ‘blow out’ the bunnies’ coats in our spray booth.  It was the best way to do maintenance grooming that I’ve ever tried, and the bunnies really didn’t seem to mind it at all.  We don’t have that set up here, so I’ve been sticking to my combs and a couple of slicker brushes (not pictured).

Here are my pretty pink clippers.  I got them for a song when a local farm supply store decided to phase out this model, and I’m so glad I jumped on that deal.  I used to have a pair of Oster A5 Turbo clippers but they were so much bigger and bulkier and noisier.  The Laube Mini-Micro is adjustable speed (see the rotary dial on the bottom?), lightweight, quiet, and powerful.  I have absolutely no affiliation with the company, just a satisified customer.  The adjustable speed is perfect for me, since I can keep the clipper blades running slower and cooler when I’m trimming the nicely groomed fur but still be able to turn up the power when I need to trim through tough stuff like matts or webbing.

I have an assortment of blades that I use with the clippers.  I have two of the general purpose size 10 blades (one is on the clippers).  This allows me to swap them out when one gets hot.  I also have a size 10 wide (in black) that I picked up on clearance that works well for covering wide areas of well groomed fur.  The size 3 and 7 blades tooth leave the fur longer – I used to use them in the winter when the bunnies were living outside and I didn’t want to leave them naked.  The size 40 and 50 blades are used for trimming tight matts.  They don’t leave much fur at all, but are the only blades that can fit in the tight space between the skin and the matted fur.  I also keep clipper blade oil, neosporin in case of any accidental nicks, and a styptic pencil in case I over trim a nail.

I store all of my grooming tools in an old plastic toolbox, repurposed from my days as an art student when it was filled with pencils, charcoal and other drawing implements.

If I am trimming to save the fur, I have four half-gallon plastic buckets that I sort the fiber into as I go.  One of them is reserved for prime fiber – the long beautiful fibers with zero to few second cuts.  Another gets the seconds – the stuff that is almost prime but perhaps needs to have the second cuts sorted out or is just a bit shorter.  The thirds are where all of the untangled but not quite as pretty stuff goes; most of the stuff from around the neck, chest and hindquarters goes here.  And finally the fourth bucket is used for matts, short little pieces and other stuff that’s probably not usable.  After I’m finished with a haircut I try to move the fiber into paper bags that are then stored in plastic storage containers.  I’ve found that storing it in plastic leads to felting, especially if the fiber is compressed.

On days like today, however, as I clip the fur goes into a paper grocery bag, unsorted, which I then offer to the outside birds for a day or two before taking it out to the trash.  I know it might sound criminal to toss such fluffy goodness, but at this point in time I am clipping before the fiber reaches its longest length just to keep the bunnies comfortable, so there’s not much prime fiber there, and  I already have several bags of less than prime fiber that I keep around for blending and felting.

Gus approves.  He’s a lot happier with less of a fur coat, but he really likes to get the grooming over with as quickly as possible.

What grooming tools do you use, if you have angoras?

Spike, lounging under the Country Craftsman spinning wheel I used to own.

Today was a bunny grooming kind of Saturday.  I have three rabbits – two angora boys and a netherland dwarf little lady.   They’re our only pets right now, although we’d love to get a dog and plan to as soon as our lives recover from this whole start-up experience and we have more of an idea of what our work schedules will be like.

Bunnies are great pets, I’ve discovered.  I never really was into them as a kid, although my sister had a lovely white dwarf rabbit named Marsha (short for Marshmallow, of course) that was best friends with my awesome guinea pig, Abby.   I don’t really remember much about Marsha, other than how much fluffy white fur she shed.  I have clear memories of my mom vacuuming her with a long extension hose on her canister vac.  Marsha didn’t seem to mind, as I recall.

Fast forward to seven or so years ago.  I was a new spinner, absolutely enthralled with the incredible world of natural fibers out there for me to try.  I really wanted sheep – but I lived in the city and there was no way it was going to happen.  I started thinking about angora rabbits.  I read what other spinners think about angora and how the yarn they spin turns out:  it’s softer than cashmere, warmer than wool, and when handspun in the correct manner, barely sheds.   It all gets my mind going, and when I attend the WI Sheep and Wool Festival that year, I come across a very friendly breeder who has a couple of french angoras to sell.   I didn’t make a decision that day, but after going home and talking it over with my family, my sister said she would love to get a pet rabbit, and as long as I helped with the grooming she’d be happy with an angora.  So my mom and I headed back to the festival the next day, and we took Spike, a wonderfully sweet Siamese Sable buck home with us for my sister.

I ended up adopting Spike when my sister’s life no longer allowed her to take care of him a year or so later.  In the mean time, I had also gotten two adorable Jersey Wooly girls – what most people would refer to as dwarf angoras.  And a year later, I added a stunning Copper Satin Angora who was named Ferguson by a close friend who I owed a naming favor.  He soon became known as Gus.

For the longest time I wanted to keep my rabbits indoors with me, but I had experienced horrible allergies (leading to chronic sinus infections) when I had the girls in my bedroom for a while, and the places I lived weren’t very pet friendly.  Instead, the bunnies lived in outbuildings, sheltered from the weather in spacious cages.  It wasn’t up until we bought our house in August of 2010 that I was able to bring them indoors to live in our basement.

Since then, the bunnies have slowly but surely been expanding their territory.  Unfortunately, I lost both of my little girls last year.  It was so sad, because they were only six years old but there’s no doubt in my mind that they had a rather insidious little parasite called e. cuniculi that slowly but surely wears at a bunny body and attacks strongly when stressful conditions occur.   While I was nursing them I brought them upstairs so that I could keep a closer eye on them.  Spike came upstairs to keep one of them company after the other passed, and soon my ‘craft room’ was more accurately referred to as the ‘bunny room.’

We’re still in a transition period, but at the point, Spike is a 24/7 (mostly) free range house rabbit, spending his days lounging around the living room, occasionally joining us to watch a movie in the TV room/office, and spending every night in my craft room.  Gus lives in a generous sized dog exercise pen in the basement next to Puff, the little bossy but smart rescue bunny who came to live with us last summer.    We bring Gus and Puff upstairs to play a couple of times a week (we’re trying for more) and when we do, we just close the door to Spike’s my craft room.

The bunnies are almost completely litter trained, and other than Gus’ love of electrical cords they are very well behaved.  Spike has earned his spot upstairs by being so well behaved we have no problem leaving him out while we’re gone.

So I’ve come to terms with the fact that my primary reason for owning rabbits is because they’re wonderful little animal souls with adorable antics and soft sweet furry noses that just beg to be petted.  At this point I’d be happy to have short haired rabbits, since grooming is less than my favorite activity by now.  Don’t get me wrong – the fiber is beautiful – but I have a lifetime supply already.  Angoras shed every 3-4 months, producing about a paper grocery bag full each time.  Multiply that by two full size and two pint size bunnies and five years and you’ve got a LOT.  Even when I do use their fiber in projects, a little goes a long way.  I have spun some beautiful pure angora yarn, but I prefer to blend it 1 part angora to 3 parts wool or other fiber.

However, grooming still has to be done.  I thought it might be useful to share a little bit of my tools for those of you who might also have fluffy bunnies, which I will share in my next post.

My life has changed a lot in the past two or three years.  A series of events led us to move and to put the ceramics studio on hold for a while.  I have returned to school to get an education license, and Jesse has found himself drawn into the world of sustainable urban gardening as Sweetwater Organics Director of Horticulture.

I am still involved in fiber arts – I am honored to serve as President to the Whitewater Fiber Guild and I do regularly get inspired to work on a knitting or crochet project.  I bring a small spindle made from a toy wheel to my classes in my backpack, and occasionally I spin my way through lecture.  I have also added weaving (basic rigid-heddle) to my list of interests.  And I do have a 4-harness Dorothy loom just waiting for me to work up the courage to use it.

My love of fiber arts lead me to explore natural dyeing a couple of years ago – and since I no longer live where scavenging for materials is the adventure it was in the countryside, I’ve grown into a gardener.   Although I started wanting to simply grow dyeplants,  I’ve really come to value and appreciate the time spent cultivating and nurturing plant life.  I grow herbs and dyeplants as well as flowers and hope to put in a good vegetable garden as well this summer.

My four bunny rabbits (two angoras, two jersey woolies) live just outside of my house in a small shed.  They’re getting older – Spike and the girls are around 8, and Gus is just about 7.   They love Jesse’s job as an urban gardener, since he often has lettuce and herbs for them when he comes home in the evening.  Since we don’t use any chemical herbicides, I’m able to harvest huge dandelion leaf salads for them as I weed my lawn and garden in the summer.   I do my best to keep up with their grooming, but I must admit I’ve stopped focusing as much on fiber production from them – I have more angora than I could ever use already!

I’ve been exploring polymer clay as an art form lately – but that’s a post in itself, and my philosophy readings are still unread.  I look forward to sharing my journey with the polymer clay process in a near future post.

I wanted to weave some samples with the yarn I had spun up, but I found out halfway through the warping of my 4″ Weave-it loom that I wasn’t going to have enough to make a complete square. Fortunately, I had just read this fun post on eLoomanator (the blog of Jana, of eLoomanation fame) on weaving rectangles on regular Weave-it looms.

I wove each sample into a small rectangle, then proceeded to wash them gently in warm soapy water and lay them onto a hand towel that I rolled up and squeezed gently to remove extra water. The next morning, when they were dry, I scanned them into my computer.

The final result?

From left to right, we have tog, combined tog and thel, and thel.  There is a lot more detail in the scan, click here to visit the original full-size scan on Flickr.

My conclusions?  I absolutely adore the way that the thel spun up.  It’s lacy with a substantial drape and it would be a perfect addition for my freeform shawl that I’m working on making out of naturally colored fibers.  The tog is also gorgeous, but in a more rustic way.  I’m thinking that it would lend a nice strength and body to a sock batt.

And I must admit I really liked the way that the woven samples turned out.  Maybe a project with Weave-it squares is in my future.

In conclusion, please feel free to visit my Links page to see a variety of resources that I found useful in this exploration.