05 November 2013

Side Tracked

Today is senior day at the Co-op where we buy most of our food. When I returned and put the food away I was overcome by a compulsion to dye wool. Go figure! 
A few weeks ago I went to a craft fair and bought two cute felted handbags. A local teacher knit them and they were so cute. Now the long story. A friend told me about a friend of hers who had sheep and was learning to spin wool. She said this woman had a large amount and wanted to sell it cheap. I bought it sight unseen and this was the bag of wool.




At the top of the bag you can see the one skein I wound into a ball. Well, I thought knitting a bag with double strands on big needles might be a way of using up some of this wool. It really smells bad. So today the dyeing bug bit and this is what I did.



I picked out 2 skeins


Look like ramen doesn't it? I poured in vinegar water and blue dye on one side.


I mixed yellow and blue for green



I added that to the other side


Ask me why this is a dye only microwave? I ended up burning some silk while trying to dye it and the microwave instantly became my dye only microwave.


Now I see that I should have flipped the skein over for better color saturation so I made sure I did on the second skein.


This time I just mixed it in the pot


It is actually purple


As you can see here

4 comments:

  1. Wow! I have never tried dyeing wool because I thought it had to be boiled... now that I know it can be done like silk, I might just have to give it a try! I found a gal not too far away who raises llamas and sells her yarn... can't wait to see what you do with yours! BTW, did you have to use anything after to soften the yarn, or did it stay fairly soft?

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  2. Both beautiful! I am very intrigued by the blue and green skein. :)

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