Sweater Shares

unique Sweater Quantity yarn
sold annually in the winter

I get this yarn made annually from wool that has deeply inspired me through my shearing adventures that year. The base of the yarns is always beautiful New Mexico Finewool. It is typically in the 21-23 micron range. Its soft, lofty and structured. To add color, and a little extra silkiness and drape I select wool and alpaca from the small flocks of the northwest to blend into unique batches of yarn. The yarn produced every year is completely unique to that year in both fiber content, color, and weight. I sell the yarn in 10 Skein units I call a ‘sweater share.’ I keep yarn that serves as my annual supply, the ranching family that produces the wool gets their annual supply and I offer the remaining shares to those inspired by tactile experience of connection that comes from thoughtfully produced, small-scale yarn.

Every year, I start my shearing season in New Mexico shearing finewool sheep adapted to the desert southwest. They are Merinos, Rambouillets, and New Mexico’s beloved Debouillet and mixes of each. We work in a six person crew traveling from ranch to ranch and shearing and classing wool that is sold at auction into the global wool market. This wool, carefully bred over generations, comes from sheep that have coevolved with the land, people, and markets. The wool is fine and comfortable to wear, it is long providing durability in processing, and it is bright white, lending itself to consistency of dying. The arid climate protects the easily felted wool and the sheep are rugged survivors- dodging coyotes and eating cholla cactus when food sources are minimal. The Roswell, NM region once boasted a thriving sheep economy and has been diminished over the years due to fluctuating wool prices, minimal feed in drought years, and intense predator pressure on small animals. Our shearing crew travels from ranch to ranch of the ones that are still in it. We shear the sheep that remain in the landscape that made them, and our hats go off to every sheep ranching family that is holding on.

I get to handle a lot of sheep by being on this shearing run. I get to see a lot of wool, and I get to see the nuance of finewool- the variations of crimp and body, the feel, the luster. There are some fleeces that stand out for their quality and have my admiration right away as I watch it pour off of the sheep. They’re just too special to go into the baler and onto the big auctions. I want to see them translated into stunning yarn and then into garments handmade and cherished. I squirrel them away out of the main hustle of the busy shearing days and bring them home to Washington to be processed into yarn by the expert hands at Olympic Wool Mills.

Once on my small flock run in the northwest, I keep my eye out for wool that compliments the white finewool of New Mexico. In the past I have used Finn, Finn BFL crosses, Alpaca, CVM crosses, and Romney Lambswool. We have done Worsted Weight, Aran Weight, and Fingering weight.

For 2026 I am planning some lighter weight yarns with even more color options than years past.