A Visit to Stonehedge Fiber Mill

Recently,  on a glorious Fall day while it was bright and sunny, we took a road trip.  Sister-in-law, brother-in-law, husband and myself.  

Our goal was to go and visit the Stonehedge Fiber Mill in East Jordan , MI and check out their yarn shop.  

As you can imagine, the guys weren't all that enthused about going to a yarn shop with us, but there were farm animals in the pen as we drove up and we told them to go have a look see while we shopped.  We made it just in time, too.  She had her whole little shop packed up to go the Ann Arbor Fiber Festival  this weekend.  

After we made our purchases....oh yes, there was some buying going on, we went out to check on the guys and they had just started a tour of the mill. 

That was so exciting to see the whole process of them getting the wool, cleaning it, combing it, and what all they do to it before it becomes roving or skeins.  Here are some pictures of what we saw.  

Here you see three layers of wool that has been washed and are drying at this point.  The top layer was all alpaca......oh my!  How soft!!

Here the wool gets combed to get rid of all the sticks and burrs that may be in the wool.

These colorful spools make up the Crazy Yarn that they are so well known for.  We were told that they can manage to make up about 100 skeins a day.  

Here is the roving.  

I believe this is where the yarn is plied.  

Here are some hanks getting ready to be twisted up into our skeins

Here's the little shop on the mill grounds

In the shop was a whole tubs worth of Crazy yarn. 

I purchased a sweaters worth of yarn along with some bases for a hat and mitten pattern.  

This is just some of my haul, but isn't it pretty?

All-in-all, it was a fun afternoon for both us gals and the guys.  Heck, when it comes to machinery, the guys are always interested.  

I would highly suggest visiting this mill and get yourself a tour of their workings 

 Stonehedge Fiber Mill