Rani Smith Designs

15/05/2026

All new season fleeces are listed in my shop.
If you are interested in any of the coloured merino fleeces, please make sure that you check the length before purchasing - we had to shear the coloured ones early this year, so they only have 10 1/2 months wool!

Pictured are fleeces #1063, 71 and 80

01/05/2026

New fleeces are coming soon!

Pictured are Fleeces #1362, #74 BT and #83 Junior.

The coloured fleeces are a bit shorter this year, on average around the 80mm. We had to shear them early, just over 10 1/2 months wool, as my usual shearer (my husband) can no longer shear them😢, so they were done at the end of our commercial shearing instead.

23/03/2026

I am working hard to get some new pretties made for my shop. I will list these in mid to late April along with the new season fleeces. There will be 12 new white fleeces and 9 coloured fleeces. I'm hoping that the really dry conditions that we have been experiencing since before christmas will mean that the fleeces will be really clean and hopefully all good and sound! Fingers crossed!

26/01/2026

My last make for 2025. A baby blanket/ throw for the newest addition to our family - a grandson!
Made from BWM cotton 4ply, so easy care. And just a basic granny square with a simple made-up scallop edge.

22/12/2025

Wishing all my friends, family and lovely customers the most wonderful Christmas season. I'm looking forward to another fun and woolly year ahead!
MERRY CHRISTMAS!

16/10/2025

I finished my Yagmur Sweater by Valentina Bogdanova a couple of months ago. It's all blocked and ready to go for next winter. It was a really lovely and fun knit.
I used Storms Boys last fleece (one of my original coloured sheep) in a sock weight and 3 ply construction yarn, spun on my EEW 6.0

11/10/2025

Everything in the world of wool is a slow process. I also love to garden - another slow but very rewarding process. And then nature does it's thing! Only yesterday I had counted over 50 flower spikes on this patch of hippeastrums in my front garden (first photo). And then we take a look at the bigger picture - and I move backwards and take another photo - just 20 years of tree growth done and dusted.

07/10/2025

The fleece listings are almost here!!!!!
I will be posting them over the next couple of days. Some of the white fleeces are already listed.
PLEASE make sure that you read ALL of the description for each fleece as this will contain any details about nutritional lines and skin flakes/dandruff in each fleece.

25/09/2025

Yes, you can see shorn sheep!!!
New fleeces are coming soon. I am working on the listings at the moment and will post them over the next couple of weeks.

I was a little disappointed with the fleeces this year and when you have to wait a whole 12 months it makes it even more so! We had such a good season, the grass seed went absolutely wild, so this has resulted in more seed in the fleeces than I would like and it has also meant that quite a few of the coloured sheep had very irritated skin from the extra grass seed. This means that there are patches of dandruff/skin flakes in quite a few of the coloured fleeces.
The great season also meant that most of the girls had twins this year - I got some amazing colours in the lambs and the wool style has also improved, but it means that quite a few of the girls fleeces do have nutritional lines in their fleece.

The little sheep in the photo are last years lambs - all those twins! I decided not to coat the lambs this year, so it will be another 12 months wait for these beauties and there is some pretty special fleeces in these!

21/08/2025

I have decided to temporarily suspend all shipping to the US due to the new tariffs which come into effect on the 29th August 2025.
At the moment there is not a lot of information available on how these will be implemented and collected. Once I know what is going on I will hopefully be able to start shipping again.

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