Processing Services
BY APPOINTMENT ONLY!!!
Our current turn around time is 10-12 months, depending on the processes you require.
Spinderellas is a full service a custom fiber processing mill, offering a wide variety of services for your raw fibers.
We offer services to wash, card, and spin, your fibers including alpaca, wool, mohair, llama and many others.
We are committed to processing your natural fiber as if they were our own. Being a small family operation, your fibers are carefully handled and processed in an environmentally responsible manner. Each fleece is processed by themselves, but we will combine like fleeces to save on our minimum charges when possible.
We are taking orders on a limited basis so we can offer our high-quality services at a reasonable turn around time.
We will not take any fibers in house knowing they will be here for more than 8 months. We are simply too small to store fibers.
We also offer a variety of blending fibers including merino, bamboo, and silk. Other fibers available upon request.
Please fill out an ORDER FORM and place in the bags. If you have questions, please write to info@spinderellas.com.
We try to answer quickly. We also try to answer the phone, but often we cannot hear the phone in the mill. Email is the best way to hear back from us.
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Due to severe allergies- we do NOT process Rabbit or Suri Alpaca
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We DO NOT take alpaca 3rds- use them for mulch please
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Know that we are not able to spin Alpaca 2nds or coarse blankets into anything but rug yarn
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If you do not put an order form or a contact into in the bag we will not process the fiber at the time it is pulled to start processing and will be sent to the city compost - we cannot store fiber - we cannot store fiber or contact a medium to tell us who it belongs to - ( wink wink)
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If any of your fiber comes into the mill for processing with bugs- eggs or larva- it will be tossed IMMEDIATELY!! This is why it is best to process your fibers as soon as you shear- especially for alpaca- alpaca seems to attract moths more than wool.
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AGAIN: WE DO NOT GIVE MILL TOURS- we simply have no time with running the business and taking care of 2 handicapped "kiddos". Thank you for understanding.
Your fibers are rolled on a table where we remove tiny vegetable matter as well as skirt you fleece, if needed. It will then go to our tumbler to remove dust and VM.
We wash your fibers by hand, in a transformed washing machine using 180^ water and Dawn.
Your fleeces will undergo 3 full wash cycles, in which each cycle included a wash and 2 rinse cycles, with a separating of the fleece after each cycle.
If you are charged extra washing it is because we needed extra cycles to wash your fiber.
It then goes on the drying racks under a gentle fan to dry.
Your fibers are hand picked open both on the drying racks and also as we feed Ms Meriwether. We do not use a picker as we believe it damages fiber.
( we have owned 2 )
We weight your fibers on a scale and place it on our feeding table to be opened by our card. Each fleece is fed at the ratio we feel best to create the best in the finished product. Very often fleeces in the same order will not be carded at the same rate.
If your fiber is going into yarn, you fiber will be carded twice and often a 3rd time to make the best prepared roving to go onto the spinning frames.
Your roving for spinning, at Spinderellas Custom Mill, goes through many steps to create your yarn
Jim will continue to "draw out" or attenuate your roving , aligning the fibers and making them thinner. Again the fiber is weighed and measured to determine the ratios needed to make the correct single.
They are then taken to our 8 head spinning frame to be into the weight of single to make your yarn. After the bobbins are full, they are take to another spinning frame to be plied .
They are then skeined, steamed, which sets the twist and allows the fibers to go back to it's natural state, and bagged ready to be shipped home to you.