With the biting cold of this Wisconsin winter, I've been doing some dye work this month. It is such fun to work with dye on colored wools, so I shot some pictures of the latest batch of experiments.
I soaked 100 grams of wool from various fleeces in my stash and put them in the dye pot to try out the effect of overdyeing the darker natural colored wools.
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| The mini trampoline drying rack - because I'm fancy like that. |
Clockwise from the top:
1. Corriedale, natural gray "Sierra" in Amethyst.
2. Cormo, white "Poppy" in Amethyst and then as a cleanup for Peacock Blue.
3. Corriedale, natural gray "Sierra" in Peacock Blue.
4. English Leicester Longwool steel gray "Theo" clean up batch in Peacock Blue.
5. English Leicester Longwool steel gray "Theo" in Peacock Blue.
Wool is a protein fiber, so I use acid dyes to color the wool fibers. Typically, vinegar is used for the acidification of the dye bath, but since I plan to sell these colors, I used citric acid instead since it has no odor and uses a much smaller quantity. I learned this when I started dying with the Nasty Romney fleece that started this journey.
Speaking of the Nasty Romney, I have had good news that I can finally share! I had submitted a proposal of the story of that fleece to Spin-Off Magazine quite a while ago, and I was selected for the Spring 2014 issue featuring color. I'm on page 70 of the magazine, with my article titled "Making Lemonade". Here is a link to the magazine: Spin-Off Spring 2014
I'll be putting some batts from both this dye batch and the Nasty Romney (now somewhat affectionately named Anastasia for obvious reasons) into my Etsy shop for your perusal and purchase.
Currently also hard at work on another delightful series of batts called the "Magic" series. All of these batts are full of sparkle and an interesting blend of fibers.
Here's a taste of the series for your pleasure.
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| Wings of Pegasus |
