I have briefly mentioned the lovely batts and tops sold by Chary from Ixchel Angora Bunny & Funky Fibre Art. On top of their weekly blogs offering something new and fluffy they do a monthly club. There is usually 3 different clubs including a sock yarn club, Funky Bunny Batt Club and Fibre Club.
Each club runs for 3 months and has a quota for how many people can sign up. The Fibre club costs $72AUD + shipping with special hand dyed roving/tops. The Sock yarn is $78 and you get enough 3 or 4 ply yarn to make a pair of socks (or anything that requires that yardage). Finally, the Batt Club which I am describing today.
I signed up for the Batt club in December and just got my finally Batt so though it was a great time to introduce the goodies. As each month is a mystery until you get them I wanted to make sure I didn't spoil anything, especially for international buyers who would have still been waiting. These batts are not part of the weekly batts you can buy each week, so are special and only available as part of the club. Batts range from 140-180grams and contain luxury/unusual fibres such as camel, cashmere, bison, and rare sheep breeds.
This one is a little more expensive at $108AUD + postage, reflecting the more luxurious elements in the batts. They are also dyed in funky colours. So please welcome some photos and descriptions. Nothing has been spun yet, but I have spun Ixchel's tops before and found them easy and great to spin. I have kept these in their plastic wraps for photos as the Angelina tends to get EVERYWHERE, like my cats fur, but less fun to find in food.
I am trying to list all my Stash for my own log here on the Stash Page. Check it out to see something you might want to buy yourself as I have listed info and links where possible. I am slowly outfitting all the links above as I go!
Each club runs for 3 months and has a quota for how many people can sign up. The Fibre club costs $72AUD + shipping with special hand dyed roving/tops. The Sock yarn is $78 and you get enough 3 or 4 ply yarn to make a pair of socks (or anything that requires that yardage). Finally, the Batt Club which I am describing today.
I signed up for the Batt club in December and just got my finally Batt so though it was a great time to introduce the goodies. As each month is a mystery until you get them I wanted to make sure I didn't spoil anything, especially for international buyers who would have still been waiting. These batts are not part of the weekly batts you can buy each week, so are special and only available as part of the club. Batts range from 140-180grams and contain luxury/unusual fibres such as camel, cashmere, bison, and rare sheep breeds.
This one is a little more expensive at $108AUD + postage, reflecting the more luxurious elements in the batts. They are also dyed in funky colours. So please welcome some photos and descriptions. Nothing has been spun yet, but I have spun Ixchel's tops before and found them easy and great to spin. I have kept these in their plastic wraps for photos as the Angelina tends to get EVERYWHERE, like my cats fur, but less fun to find in food.
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| January-March Batt Club |
January Batt Club started with a tribute to the recently departed David Bowie, with the StarMan Batt. This consisted of Shetland, Angora, Cashmere and Angelina. In an amazing bright orange, purple and a bit of blue with silver Angelina. The Scottish based Shetland Sheep is the breed used in Fair Isle knitting due to coming in multiple natural colours and being a superfine fleece.
February continued with a tribute to Guardians of the Galaxy. This was made up of 17micron merino, Cashmere, Angora and Rainbow Glitz. This dye job contained a more mauve, green, aqua combo with a bit of black. This one is quite soft with the cashmere/angora mix. This one is the softest of all the batts, owing to the superfine Merino and Angora/Cashmere. Superfine Merino is the special fibre for this month and at 17 microns that is an amazing superfine merino!
Finally, a Starwars theme containing Leicester Longwool *Linen* and Angelina. This was a lovely blues, grey and silver Angelina. This one is a bit more coarse compared to the other to (must be the larger micron coat found in the Leicester Longwool. This wool is considered a critically rare breed, and included was a lovely information sheet on the sheep.
My thoughts?
I really enjoyed this round of batt club. It was focussed on interesting/rare breeds of sheep compared to other interesting fibre. I would have liked to see some other Fibre, so hopefully the next club's theme has some of that. I know some people are not always keen on colour schemes, but I can't think of any other combos that I would like any better. All three cover my favourite colours and combos so will sit quite nicely in my stash. So that is a yes on whether I would sign up again because I have!
Speaking of my stash I recently cleaned up my main crafting area.
A couple of wheels not pictured nor two of the looms. I love my storage racks! I found these at Lincraft (local craft store) and they are black metal mesh that clip together. So you can add and take away as required and build upright or keep going across. A couple I have made into floor baskets for bags of fleece and accessories. The top has all my random stuff. The left side has all my fiber sorted into 3 categories (1. Straight Unblended Fibre, 2. Blended Batts, 3. Random Assortment) The rest is my yarn! So yes right now I have reached SABLE (Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy)
