Flaxen spinning

Though I must complete my Olds Level 5 final project, I have revised my plans. This flax was going to be dyed using fibre reactive dyes and used for a towel, but the woad in my garden had to be used and the flax ended being dyed with the woad that day.

I scoured 462 grams of spun flax to remove the waxes and set the twist in my singles using 1 T. laundry detergent,  2 T. washing soda and hot water in a large non reactive pot. I simmered the skeins in this solution for 45-60 minutes. Then rinsed in cool water.

462 grams flax spun into linen ready to be scoured.

The woad was harvested and prepared. The skeins were dipped 3 times and aired between dips. The result is a beautiful silvery blue colour.

Woad dyed linen singles. Oct. 2014.

Now back to the planning for my project.
This post has been revised.

Summer Almost GGGone???

Having had a night where my sleep ended at 2:30, I gave up & decided to use the time for dyeing some wool.

I didn't grow any woad this year, but I had a 5 gallon covered pail of a woad vat I made last year & didn't use. Everytime I left the house I had to pass by the pail which I looked at from the corner of my eye. Not one to waste much, I had too much time involved in it already.

Heck, just harvesting the leaves for that strong a dye probably took me 1.5 hrs. alone. Not to mention the time involved at the stove & stirring, etc.

So last night I went over my old dye notes and looked at some articles from some books on the subject and mentally prepared myself. I had in mind the wool (an assortment of my combed top, my carded batts, and homespun skeins) last night too.

I have loosely planned 3 rugs in variegated colours of coarse fibre I have been preparing over the past 3 yrs. I figure I will need 6 lbs wool for each rug. The rugs will have a dark warp and many shades of green, both from acid dyes & nature dyes.

Anyhow here are a few pics from today.

Woad over G. Marguerite & on white wool on botton.

All 5 skeins.

Batts & top

Skeins Drying

Batts & top

The Day's Work Summed Up

Post Christmas 2011

I do hope you all had a very nice, good, pleasant, wonderful Christmas!

As for me it turned out very good - I had visits with my kids & new grandchild, though way too short in duration. There was an issue with one of their cars, and the winter weather arrived so when I was looking forward to sitting with everyone, they were on the way out the door & going home.

I didn't get to hand out my knitting. Oh darn!!!

The food was plentiful & tasty.  I think everyone was satisfied in that department.
Having everyone together was wonderful. So until next year....

But really, if I had the opportunity to skip Christmas I just might take it. My stress levels sky rocket, but enough of that.
Here is some of the fibre things that have been done. There are things that don't make it to the blog, like the rugs I weave, socks & hats knitted and all the mittens that I felt.

I've had the opportunity with a few days off to also visit with some dear friends. And now since this is probably my last post of 2011, I want to say thanks for visiting and I hope everyone's coming New Year is better than the last & you have wonderful things coming your way.

And take some time for yourself to enjoy whatever it is that you enjoy doing with spare time you may find. All the best to you.

Felted mittens & hat. Woad dyed & handspun Suffolk.

Silk Hankies, dyed for mitts. Knitted without spinning.

Megan's Sock Monkey

Megan's hat & mitts

Finished 2 ply yarn w. dyed roving (Falkland).

Dyed roving & spool of one of the single ply from yarn in picture at left.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What Can Be Done In One Day OFF Work?

Well...quite a bit I think.

This is the first day's beginning. Since I rarely (almost never) buy store bought treats I always spend some of my time cooking. My hubby loves my poppyseed rolls which I prepare almost exclusively for him. This is what they look like.

2 Poppyseed Rolls

Then I felt like we should have some fresh bread. It looks like whole wheat, but for 6 c. of flour
, only 1 c. is whole wheat flour.

It's as good as it looks!

Then I thought bran muffins with dates would be good for breakfast:

Bran Date Muffins

Meanwhile by the time the bread had its first rising I was able to get the laundry finished washing & out on the line. How can you tell we live in a rural area? I like it that way!

When I was living the life, the sunflowers just kept growing & growing. I believe they are Russian Mammoth. They tower over my husband. We have groups of them planted all over the place.

Sunflowers 2011. The tallest one is 10' plus.

This is tansy, aka Bitter Buttons. It is another very tall plant with lacey leaves & small velvety flowers. I dyed some British Milk Sheep fleece with it to see the yellow I would get.

Br. Milk Sheep Fleece in Tansy vat.

Tansy

Tansy yellow on BMS fleece

Tansy yellow w. white fence for comparison

I had to fit in a little knitting too. These heavy work socks are now done. Started last winter, then ran out of Briggs & Little wool. Soon to be on their way through our mail system to Nova Scotia.

Briggs & Little boot sock. Heavy, oh ya!!

I kept the dye pot of tansy & added the woad leaves after I had removed the indigo from them & left it to simmer for an hour. Then I added alum mordanted Br. M. S. fleece and got an interesting result - it's on the right. The fleece on the left is a delicate aqua on Br. M. S. fleece. I made a mistake & added ammonia to the vat when I should have added the thiox. Oh well. This is all the woad from this year. I will have to try again next year.

Woad dye on left. Exhausted woad leaves in old tansy vat on right.

This is the indigo dye result (powdered indigo) used in last year's woad vat I kept. The green is over dyed with indigo on Golden Marguerite.

I have some acid dye, red, yellow, turquoise on the stove right now that are ready to come off. I'm using fleece from Ille de France sheep.

Ciba Acid Turquoise

Ciba Acid Yellow 

Ciba Acid Red (?)  Looks like orange.

There's more, but that's all I'm doing for now.

Another day or few

I'm working on a sweater for my hubby done up in Briggs & Little Regal 2 ply. The colour is a lively varied green. When you look closely you can see how the mill has blended a lighter & a darker green with red fibres. I love the colour. I'm using an online sweater calculator for the pattern which is a basic V neck.

 This project below is a mixture of fleece that was leftover from some workbook spinning. The fibres have a tiny bit of tussah silk, some mohair, a little shetland and the blue fleece was from a friend, but unfortunately I can't remember the sheep breed. It is a woad dye result. When I tried hand carding the fleece there were so many neps, noils and vegetable matter that I decided to use it all with the above leftovers and experiment with a long backward draw at my spinning wheel. It also gave my drum carder a workout. After many passes, I finally came up with 3 batts I could use.

Carded fleece, blended.

Visible neps, vm, carded batt.

Rolled into punis for woollen spinning.

Single.

Finished 2 ply woollen yarn. 85 yds.

For January 2011

I'm rather late in posting anything. I promise I have been very busy.

I managed to make it through the Christmas season of 2010 once more. I try to keep the stress low, but it doesn't really work. Next year I will go back to having made more gifts; time just slipped by and I didn't give much that I made to family. But I was busy.... and the turkey on Christmas day was delicious. We also had someone new join us for the day, Wendy, mother of my son's girlfriend. We enjoyed meeting Wendy & were happy to have her with us.

Spinning, knitting, and weaving.
I have so much fleece in my stash to use on the carder that my hubby is making me - it will soon be completed. I can't wait. For now I am going through a Mabel Ross tutorial video and trying some things out that she suggests using hand carders, flicker & dog comb. The video is really wonderful. Here is a pic of the Dorper X Dorset fleece I am using. It is lovely. Wish I had loads more!!

Dorper X Dorset

I did a rag rug using wool fabric strips in orange, brown & a lighter selection for a friend at work in exchange for her handmade moccasins. It turned out very nice! It's 32"x48". 2/2 twill.

Wool Rag Rug for Theresa 32"X48".  2/2 Twill.

Here is some fairly new spun wool:

Shetland above, natural colour. Blue is from last woad dye of the 2010 season, wool, but the variety is unknown.

The colour did not photograph very well, but it is the best woad result so far and is actually quite vibrant. The Shetland is being using for a saw tooth border on the 'Elizabeth Zimmerman Pi R Squared' shawl I have been working on for a couple of years. I ran out of wool for the shawl; set it aside; decided to add a border in a different shade from my own homespun Shetland. It's turning out very nice. Soon a picture will follow.

Spindle Spinning B & L Batt

I'm using a commercially prepared generic wool batt that I dyed in an earlier attempt to be spun up for some mittens & a hat I suppose.
The spindles are made by my hubby & spin beautifully. The dark one is a bottom whorl & the light one a top whorl. I like them both.
I plan to do the whole batt on the hand spindles.

Last Woad of the 2010 Season #6

Scoured Clun Forest Fleece, wet.

Alkaline frothed & aerated.

After 20 minute woad dip.

Changing colour 1.

Changing colour 2.

Changing colour 3.

Fleece the next day air drying.

Woad Experiments

With fall officially here now I had to get in my last woad dye day before we woke up with frost. Too little spare time on my hands and too many must do projects. I could not put this off. The weather surprised me by not getting the promised rain and storm, so I went ahead with the woad dye.

I harvested all of the first year woad leaves except the new leaves coming in the center of each plant. This will allow the plant to continue into its second year when it will produce the seeds in 2011.

I followed a somewhat different method of preparation as follows:
1. Gather all the leaves of the woad.
2. Drop leaves into very hot water in large pot on stovetop. Add a little lemon juice or vinegar to have it a bit acidic. Hi heat for 3 min., but keep below boiling point. Simmer for 15 minutes.
3. Drain off dye liquor. Leaves can be used to produce other colours from yellows to pinks to orangey colours with addition of alum and cream of tarter.
4. Now the baking soda is added to turn alkaline. Check with ph paper. It should be at 9 or 10. The temp must be kept at 130-140.
5. Using a stick blender aerate dye bath for 10-15 minutes until you see the indigotin is developing.
6. Add the reducing agent. Thiox or Rit colour remover. (hydrogen hydrosulfite). Dissolve it in some hot water, then add to vat.
7. Let sit 1 hour. It must be a yellow colour, even if it is very dark. Ready now for adding the soaked wool. Soak for 10 minutes, then aerate for 10 min. Repeat.

After addition of Thiox. Ready to dye.

8, Rinse the next day. If the colour is a bit greenish, 1 T. vinegar can be added to the last rinse.

Shetland 2 ply. Woad dye. Not rinsed.

Uncarded wool.