Merry Christmas to Me!

I have a wonderful friend who lives in Tennessee. We've been friends for years and met online, on a miniature dollmaking forum. We have only been able to visit a couple of times, but she and her husband are absolutely lovely people. She has seen me through a huge doll making spree and supported me through dozens of other projects. When I get frustrated I can rant at her and she tells me all the sensible things I need to hear and even reminds me to get on the ball when I start slacking off.
I know she is an enabler. Go to her house and you end up doing all sorts of neat crafty things.. However, I didn't know how much of an enabler, until I received this years Christmas Pressie..
I got a box in the mail yesterday. When she said I could open it early, I pulled out this bag of amazing fleece. It is soft, smells delicate, isn't greasy or sticky and this pictures doesn't show the lovely fawn colour properly. It has to be alpaca since there are no guard hairs( llama) and absolutely no lanolin ( sheep). I pulled out the bag to check for a card and instead, what did I find but this bag underneath the first one. Can you believe it is softer than the first? It feels like the cria fleece we got to spin last spring on an Alpaca to shawl demo, only it seems softer and it is the same gorgeous fawn colour. All I want to do is pull out the combs and play with it.
However, I need to find space in the sewing room for my son who is coming home for a week over the holidays. Plus I'm spinning up hat yarn from the leftovers of the fleece we got from the Royal Agriculture Fair Sheep to Shawl competition. Donna, from Wellington Fibres, cleaned and carded it, divided it up and gave it to the team members. It is gorgeous. They do a fantastic job of processing should anyone want a reference for a high quality fibre processor in Ontario.

Donna thought it was probably Romney wool. I've been practicing a modified long draw to make lofty, fatter than I normally spin yarn. It is very soft and far more lofty than the Shetland I've been spinning the past while. It is a dream to spin and makes me want to try a greater variety of fleeces varieties. This drafts so well, has no neps or noils which can be a huge problem with Shetland. It is soft enough to wear next to the skin. It won't be white for long though. It begs to be dyed! Only one or two skeins more and I can play with the new fawn fibre.