In Sheep's Clothing

How to care for and prep wool garments for their summer vacation.

Perspiration, preparation, and on and on and on.

SPRING. It’s not all daffodils and baby goats, folks. Spring is also just so much work.

The snow melts away and suddenly there’s dead plant detritus all over the beds that need clearing and then mulching and, later, weeding. The window screens need to be extracted from the barn, cleared of a winter’s worth of spiderwebs and bat guano (which, if you were a certain variety of kid in the 90s, you need to always say in an accent à la Pet Detective). You need to turn the water on for the hose again and pray it’s all ok and not busted. The seedlings need to be escorted in and out, so their tender little selves don’t freak tf out. You need to switch out the tires before you get pulled over for having your winter tires on!

It has been suggested, by someone close to me and well acquainted with that we do here, what there isn’t enough sartorial content on Treehouse. I’ll leave the real fashion commentary to the real fashion commentators, but I will go on and on about wool. Because one of the other big tasks of spring is bringing out the summer clothes and packing away the layers that keep us warm when it’s not.

Ohh, someday I’ll make this Anne Ventzel sweater.

You might be wondering: Wool?! Why?

I dress myself and my family (when they will let me) in wool all winter long. Even during the shoulder seasons, I like to wear a merino base layer as a t-shirt under a sweatshirt. Wool is…

• Breathable. Synthetics tend to make you sweat too much and then defeat their own purpose by making you sort of wet and gross, which will then make you cold.

• Naturally antimicrobial (Seriously! The NIH agrees!), which means you can hang it up, air it out, and wear it again. Less laundry! Less water usage! Less TO DO.

• Not *necessarily* the financial investment it seems like, especially because you don’t need quite so many individual garments to get through a week.

• Not made of plastic (😶).

There is, of course, one major downside: Wool needs to be hand washed. And if you wear a lot of wool, like this family does, April—and unfortunately, currently bleeding a little into May—involves a lot of time caring for and tucking away all these items to thank them for their service, but also to prevent moths from snacking on them all summer. As you can clearly already tell, I have spent a good amount of my own personal mental bandwidth thinking about (doting upon?) wool. I suppose you don’t run a magazine about fiber arts for 6 years without putting your time in wool-wise.

So! Here’s how I prep all the wool for its well earned summer of rest...

• Because we’re washing in bulk, I fill the bathtub with tepid water. Very hot or very cold water can make the fibers seize up and then felt. Which is cool if that’s what you’re trying to do. In this instance, we are not.

• Add your cleanser. If I had my way every single time (truly, the dream), I would use a wool wash that includes at least some lanolin. Lanolin is a wax produced by sheep’s skin, which keeps their fleece soft and moisturized. And it has that effect on wool clothing, as well. Additionally, because it’s a wax, it can help weatherize your thicker boiled wool pieces. Here’s one I have used, here’s one I have not, but which looks good. This year, because of time and interest constraints, I used the old classic, Woolite, which is also fine. The clothes just came out a little starchier, like when you line-dry linen.

• Gently swoosh around, then leave it to sit for 10-15 minutes. Wool tends to get too loose and lose its structure if you let it soak for longer than that.

• Drain and, again, gently and without a lot of herky-jerky stuff, wring out the clothes. Hang them to dry unless they’re hand-knit sweaters. Because for those you’re going to…

• Lay a towel on the ground, lay the sweater flat on top, then roll it up into a tube. Here comes the fun part (!!)—walk all over the rolled-up sweater + towel tube. Unfurl the tube and lay the sweater to dry FLAT on another, not wet towel.

• Let them dry, fold them up and positively festoon them with cedar. I like to make sure the odor is almost sort of suffocating. Moths stand back.

Progress, so far. You’ll notice there’s no folding advice to speak of here.

And then you’re done (lol)! You can do all the other things on the spring list and dream of winter.

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Listings

I had the great fortune to try Non Finito, a new soap made by my pal Jay. It’s almost ready for takeoff and I highly suggest you get ready to snag one yourself. (LINK)

Sort of a geodesic dome meets a yurt meets I want it? In Tustin, CA. (LINK)

An organ used for the Carolina Hurricanes’ hockey games! (LINK)

Poor buddy. (LINK)

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Notes

One zine under our collective belt, one zine out in the wide world. Feels good!

Paid subscribers! You were very patient! May is following closely behind, almost ready, in fact. Thank you for your patience and your support—you rule.