Spinning and Logwood Dyeing!

Before getting extremely ill, in which I am much better after some antibiotics, I did some spinning and natural dyeing using logwood! So here are some of the results!

This is the original batt of Angora, Alpaca, Mohair, Merino, and Firestar! From: NorthStarAlpacas
Their description of the batt:
Alpaca from fawn Polaris, white Tom, and rosegray Vinnie in Gratiot County, Michigan
Angora from Saphirre who lives in Alma, Michigan 
Merino from Genopalette on Etsy 
Mohair from FroggyFibers -http://www.etsy.com/shop/froggyfibers 
Firestar from WildHare Studio -http://www.etsy.com/shop/wildhare

Here is the single from the two batts I had bought.

Sampler from HilltopCloud. I have some spindle spun from this but I will put them
together once I have everything plyed!

Early B-day present from my LBF!! Plus two more bobbins!

 Logwood Dyeing Experiments:

Logwood Dyeing Experiments:
Top Left: British Shropshire with Alum Mordant
Bottom Left: Pink Extra-fine Merino with Alum Mordant
Middle: 100% mystery Wool lace-weight yarn with Alum Mordant
Right: Red Extra-fine Merino with Vinegar and 2nd dye-bath

The pink in the centre and the red at the bottom are the merinos I used!

From the Red Merino to a Burgundy color

From the Pink Merino to a Lovely Rich Royal Purple!

From a beige yarn to a almost brown purple!

This is the Shropshire I have been using as of late!
About time I would say!

So from the off white to this lovely dark purple! 

So, what happens when alum doesn't bind with the fibre?
Well it would have been this blue spot color!
This is the only one I have found so far...

So that's it for now! I had a blast trying out Logwood dyeing and doing some more spinning!

WIP: Spinning Lessons --Skeins and Singles AND WIP: Tunisian Crochet Afghan

Excuse the long title but I needed to do one entire post for this one. Some people (who shall remain nameless) think that I do spinning on a small basis. A spinning wheel is just a toy for me to do my meager amount of spinning. I laughed, and they did not understand me. Let me show you what I have done since I got my new "toy."

You remember those red wool singles I gave up on?

Look who has plied them on her new spinning wheel!!

Probably, over filled the bobbin, but it did say it holds 100g... right?

Yeah so those were pretty right? Yeah ok confession time...

This is really what I have been doing:

Behold, my new skeins!

If you count that is 15 skeins (1 on the bobbin resting) and 2 singles.
I have a lace weight single on the wheel now.
Minus 1 of the orange skeins in the middle all these were plied on my wheel.
 All the ones in the middle where also spun on my wheel (minus 1 of course).
The two teal ones and the one on the bobbin are done using Navajo plying.

Is spinning all I have been doing? Of course not!!

Say hello to my way of getting rid... I mean using up my
acrylic yarn! This will end up being a throw/afghan using tunisian crochet!
It is a bit on the rolling up side so excuse the sea salt grinder in the picture.

Also, I have been working on a Plarn bag. Oh yes another one of those things... So to my lovely friend out there, yes my spinning wheel may be a toy but it is one that I love, so stop dissing on JULIE!

WIP and Done: Autumn Dreams

So I have been quiet lately. I have been rather busy with dating and trying to catch up on some sleep. We have construction going on in the stores below so that is not helping anything. However, I have been spinning at night and trolling the Ebay auctions during the day. I have missed out on 5 spinning wheels in the last 3 weeks and my parents were questioning me highly on what I wanted in a spinning wheel when I was at home. It made me want one more then ever! I came home and looked at my HUGE stash of fibre and my heart sank slightly. I have my Yak silvery blend and my bats from Rogue Adventures were staring at me. So I started spinning both but now that has all come to halt!

Why? Because my parents have generously donated me some money to buy my own spinning wheel!! What kind did I get? Well... I will let you know on Thursday when it arrives! I am not the type to giggle but I did, many many times when I got off the phone from the lovely lady at Handspinner.co.uk (Shiela Dixon). If you visit her site you will know I got some kind of Ashford, but that is all I am saying!

Ok so why is the post labelled as a WIP and Done: Autumn Dreams? Because, I have spun a lot of the October colorway from Rogue Adventures. I was trolling the internet, well youtube, looking up my new spinning wheel and there is a video on how to use a ball winder with your spinning wheel. Then using the center pull ball to ply on the spinning wheel. Well, wanted to give the technique a try I plied some of my spun yarn using this technique with my spindolyn. I did not do all of it, nor have spun all the roving.

That is the WIP:

This is the single I spun on the spindolyn! It will be plied on the wheel!
Weight: 23g

Now for the Done:

Nice reddish hue with yellow and brown accents!

Up close pictures of parts of the yarn.

My little skein. If it looks this good on from the Spindolyn who knows
how great it will look from the wheel!! Can't wait!
Weight: 15g
Length: I am getting in a niddy noddy as well so I will be able to tell you
sometime next week.

Done: Skein -- Red Velvet

The bottom skein is 2 ply, the top 3 are all singles which will stay that way. I am letting them rest before the become something very pretty indeed.

This should be really fun to work with in the future!

Done: Skein -- Rainbow love

So, remember that small skein I was making with pre-dyed roving? No... Well it is here. Anyways I let it sit on the toilet paper tube for about 3 weeks and then took it off and plyed it. After sitting that long I could have just kept it as a single because the twist had set by now. But, needing practice in plying I decided to go head and ply it pretty tightly with a lot of twist in it. I will set the twist soon and pray it works. Like most of my skeins I have no idea what I am going to do with it. (that will change very soon).

It is about fingering weight. When I get an WPI
thingy then I can say it a little bit better.

Done: Skein -- Teal wonders

I have two 2-ply skeins and 1 single skein. I have to set the twist but I still have more roving! Geesh. All hand-spun on a drop spindle and the plying was a nightmare!

I know it looks blue but it has more of a green tint then this!

To go over-the-fold or not to?

Over-the-fold is a drafting technique that is mainly for spinning on a wheel, but through a lovely group on ravelry I found a video that shows the drop-spindle version. There are two ways to do this technique, from the center (more for spinning wheels) or from the end of the fold (for drop spindle). Being the non-conventional me, well I use the center one. It goes soo much faster! Now this isn't for everyone and to be honest I thought I would of had to give it up. The roving was misbehaving and balling up in my hand, but I have got the hang of it now and it has cut my time by 75%.

From one night to the next on my ball winder. You can see the yarn is more consistent.

Well... now you know I draw as well. But I am proud of the thickness of the single.

Done: Skein -- Dark Hippy

I think the name is the only way to describe these colors. Really pleased.

WIP: Spinning Lessons -- Skeins

This is hank 6, if I can count correctly. (1. green skein, 2&3. Tea skeins, and 4&5. Rainbow skeins). I have no idea what color this will turn out to be. I have learned from this that I prefer to dye my fiber first. It allows me to make a thinner yarn overall as you will see with my rainbow dyed to singles yarn later on.

Very variable yarn type. Undyed for now.

Done: Skein Rainbow

Sometimes we all have to try out dyeing... I don't know what this will become, but it will be colorful...

WIP: Squares Scarf

So... This new project was inspired by Do you mind if I knit?'s pattern for her little square scarf. You make simple crocheted squares of all kinds of colors. Well I don't have that much yarn nor that many colors, so I am using the white yarn I used in the Scarf of Doom and Pink Owl. Well a white scarf of 240 squares is quite boring don't you think? Well... it is until you try and dye it!!! So I have made up 75 squares and placed them into different dye baths.

In there, the second square container from the top right, there is a fuzzy dyeing experiment. I fuzzed up one piece and left another alone. Then I will take them out of the dye and let them dry. Then I will fuzz up the unfuzzed piece and see the difference. Since I know that my orange crocheted piece had white lines where the stitches are I am hoping for the tips of the fuzz to be white.... AND in the big square container on the bottom right there is my hand spun skeins!! They are being dyed in three times brewed tea, to get most of the tannic acid out them and the caffeine. 

WIP: Spinning Lessons -- Skeins

Here is a new installment of my skeins of yarn! Undyed for now.

My two new skeins, one is small because it broke while trying to wrap it into a ball.

WIP: Spinning Lessons -- Dyeing

Using some food dyes these are my 1st few attempts at dyeing.

This was attempt #1. Lovely blues, greens, and yellows.

This was #2. It was dyed in shape so there are white lines (as you can see at the top) between the stitches.

Done: 2-ply hank

This is my first hank of yarn which I will be dying.

Rough I know but it was my first go at it!