Cathyʼs Creations explores the possibilities with products made from sheep
Cathy Wineman spinning yarn. Photo by Cheyenne Thomas
By Cheyenne Thomas, Tribune Record Gleaner
Forty-four years ago, Cathy Wineman began selling products made from sheep from her home in the countryside outside of Spencer. While these days, she lives closer to Stratford, her hobby of raising sheep and making products from those animals hasn’t changed, and she continues to sell both the meat and wool products that come from raising the animals at her little shop called Cathy’s Creations.
Wineman’s love of sheep dates back to her childhood, when she raised sheep for summer projects. As she got older and she moved away from home, she wasn’t able to raise sheep for a long time. When she got married and moved to Wisconsin, however, the opportunity came again, as she and her family had settled in rural Spencer, where they lived until 1991. It was around that time — when her family first moved to Wisconsin — she said, that she got the chance to learn how to spin wool into yarn through a class offered at a small store in Marshfield.
“I learned how to spin from a little shop in Marshfield, that was there for about a year,” she said. “It was in 1979, I took class on spinning and bought a wheel afterward. I got my first sheep a little while after that and started selling items and their meat shortly after.”
For many years, Wineman operated her small business from her house. People would hear about the products she made and she would invite them in to show them her creations. As it began to grow, however, she said it became a bit of a hassle to have a business but not have anywhere to display her wares to clients.
“Shortly after I got the sheep I began selling stuff from my house,” she said. “People would stop by, but there wasn’t a place that I had that I could display my items for them. I would have to haul a big box out of storage to show people. It wasn’t ideal.”
That all changed in 2009 when she had a little shop built on her current property at 209291 Galvin Avenue in Stratford. It is there where the items she creates are fully on display and allows customers to see the variety of things that can be created from sheep. From meat, to yarn, sheepskins and knitted and crocheted items, Wineman makes them all to sell. On occasion, she has also made yarn from the fur of other animals, such as pets who have passed away, which she knits into items for her customers. “I just have an idea of what I want to make and I just put it together,” she said. “If someone has an idea, I do those custom made products too. I knit slippers, hats, gloves, make yarn of different colors. Whatever a person wants. I even have sheepskins that a lot of people like to buy to use as biker seats. That’s popular.”
With 44 years of experience under her belt, Wineman said there has been a lot that has changed in creating products from sheep to sell. On the meat side of things, she said there are more regulations and licenses needed now than when she first began. And for the wool products? That’s where learning and experience comes into play.
“When I first started, I shaved all of my sheep by hand and did my carding by hand,” she said. “Then I bought a drum carder to go faster. But it is all very time consuming and you don’t get a lot done fast, so now I send my wool out to the carder. There are actually quite a few places around Wisconsin that do carding. The one I go to sends them back to me in half-pound balls that I can sell directly to the customer if they want wool that way.”
Even the type of sheep she raises for her products, and the amount of sheep in her herd, has changed.
“I have about 30 sheep right now, but I have had as much as 50 sheep in my herd,” said Wineman. “My original flock was a herd of Columbian Western sheep and I actually was a long-time member of the Columbia Breeders Association. These days, I have more of a mixed herd, with some Bluefaced Leicester sheep that I have bred into the herd.”
The differences in the breeds she has raised has an effect on the final product. Some sheep breeds, Wineman said, have either finer or coarser wool, with the sheep she raises falling a bit more on the coarser side since the animals can be raised for both meat and wool.
“It really has to do with the fineness of the fiber,” she said. “Columbians are about in the middle when it comes to the coarseness of their wool.”
While Wineman has been in the business for a very long time, and said she plans to continue to make whatever products a customer wants, she said there have been some recent shifts in the United States that have removed wool products from many people’s awareness. The Covid-19 pandemic drove some of that, and the demand for certain products hasn’t been the same for many flock owners like there have been in the past.
“Right now, there’s no real market for wool,” she said. “It’s going for five cents per pound, and way back when it used to be 90 cents per pound. You also don’t see a lot of wool products being sold in stores anymore.”
While the big stores don’t have many wool products, Cathy’s Creations has a variety of wool products to choose from. And whatever Wineman doesn’t have in stock or in a size that fits, she can create custom within a few weeks.
“It can take a couple weeks to spin and then knit or crochet an item, but whatever a person wants, I can create. I will do whatever anyone brings me to do.”
Cathy’s Creations is located at 209291 Galvin Avenue in Stratford. The shop is open on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12-5 pm. and on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Because she is sometimes out caring for her flock of sheep, Wineman said customers would benefit from calling or emailing ahead of time to make sure she is at the store to be able to provide them what they need. For more information, call 715-506-0096, email at sheephides@gmail.com or visit her website at cathys-creations.com.
