For Christmas my husband gave me a couple of bundles of cotton stems from a florist. How exciting! I've spun prepared cotton, but I've never had it in boll form before. I've heard that it can be spun straight from the boll and the seeds can be picked out along the way, so I gave it a try.
Here is one of the bundles of cotton stems with bolls, below the bundle is one boll, the seeds from the boll I spun, and the resultant two-ply from the one boll I spun up:
It wasn't really very tricky to spin straight from the boll. the seeds are actually quite large and fairly easy to pick out along the way as you spin. There were about six seeds in the boll that I spun. I got about one yard of two-ply from the one boll:
And here is a tiny swatch I knitted up with the bit I spun:
How fun! I can't wait to spin the rest up and dye it and make it into something! I also got four ounces of dyed Malabrigo roving for Christmas - wow! I love Malabrigo yarn, but I didn't know they also sold roving! Crazy wonderful! I've already spun it up and it's drying after soaking to set the twist. I got about 444 yards of two-ply fingering out of it, and of course the colors are gorgeous.
Happy Spinning!