Moving right along.....

So, the holiday is over and it's back to whatever passes as work around here. I made this "new year" resolution to get on with the dyeing experiments, so that is one of the things I have done. I have dyed very little silk, and even less soy silk, so that is the plan....what I have done in the past has always tended to get very dishevelled in the process, so when I saw on another blog* someone using old tights legs to keep roving all neat and tidy when being painted, I thought that it might be worth trying that for immersion dyeing, too. I am aware of a couple of possible issues: needing a little extra dye because nylon takes acid dyes (I am working with natural dyes at present which is essentially the same thing) and that tights are themselves dyed and the brown colour might migrate. No information there right now - it will be passed on in due course!
So here is where we are at:



More than one thing for the money here: the flash, too, which I forgot to switch off - again. And the shadow of me taking the photo, which I really kind of like. My ghostly presence, if you will. But the real deal, is: silk, soy silk, in a dyebath of lac natural dye extract, alum as mordant.

An aside: I rarely use anything other than alum, and in fact could have used lac without any mordant at all. It is substantive, as is cochineal, courtesy, I think, of the carminic acid content. But I wanted the best take-up and fastness I could get, hence the alum - happy to be politely disabused of this - as silk seems sometimes a little shall we say fickle with natural dyes. I use mainly no mordant or just alum for mainly environmental reasons, and, let me be honest simplicity/laziness. I do play around with modifiers, use iron, and very occasionally copper. Though really, I might as well use chrome, as I have a lifetimes supply of it that actually using would be better than chucking! H'mm.

OK, what else. Finished the merino/cashmere. It is washed and abused, and now will be handed over to the DSM for knitting. Not a bad yarn, although I am very prone to looking at any yarn I have spun and seeing only the thick puffy bits......I have also begun spinning some rather luscious dyed batts that I bought at SOAR last year, in browns, rusty-pinky-reds and dark blue-purple (can't you just tell that I was spinning in the dimly lit sitting room last night, eh?) Very nice and silky-soft, but I don't really have any idea of what to do with it - I had originally intended a shawl, but now I'm not so sure. Whatever happened to all those resolutions about always spinning for a purpose??

Now then. This is the meadow over the river opposite our cottage. I do assure you that there are lambs in this image. Yes, there are - in the middle, between the trees, just below Rose Cottage. That is the closest that the little buggers have come so far!



As soon as I can, I'll get the so and sos on camera, they are not getting away with it for ever!

And while I was out there, I thought I might as well annoy Mrs Doolallyflip next door - it's a nice view up the lane, and if she thought I was photographing her peering through her nets at me, well...not my fault.



*The reason for the asterisk is that I know it would be good to add the link to the blog I was referring to, but my dicing with html only goes so far! I'll go and have a look at it - I like to build on my skills, but it's rather like my attitude to putting air in my tyres, I am just so certain sure that I am risking letting all the air out if I check them......

Oh, and finally. I can happily report that my mother loved her trip to the Thai restaurant, mainly, I think, because the couple running it are so polite and attentive, and very nice. They treated her like a queen, and she always responds well to that. But it was a very nice meal, and we shall go again. Yippee.

gw