Blog entry
Steady...
After all of the Thanksgiving visiting and joy, it's time to get back to normal.
The days have become soft and gentle again. I finished planting the daffodil bulbs!
I'm still working on emptying the silk fabric storage baskets. Since I'm so busy with dyeing all the time, they fill up fast.
Vintage block prints
I really love old Indian block printed textiles and keep my eyes open for them at yard sales, estate sales and second-hand shops. Sometimes it's hard for me to use these fabrics, just because they're so beautiful. Then I ask myself if I'm waiting until I'm 150 years old before I dare to use them?!!!?
I allowed, (forced), myself to use some of these wonderful fabrics and yesterday morning I took a few pictures of what I've made so far.
Walnuts
Every summer for many years, I've collected a supply of black walnuts for dyeing from a huge tree in the neighborhood.
The fruits of this tree usually ripen and fall to the ground around middle of August. This year each time I visited the tree I found barely any walnuts. The ones I did see were tiny. They gave very little color. I resigned myself to waiting another year for the beautiful browns and creams of walnut hull dye.
October
There's something about the light in October. that makes the world almost too beautiful. Even on a cloudy morning there's extra richness in the colors.
Flying saucer morning glories
Red nightshade berries and yellow Virginia creeper leaf
Silk dyed with indigo
Virginia creeper
Perennial sunflowers
Virginia creeper
Fresh Indigo
Basket of Japanese indigo leaves
One of the nicest things about growing indigo is dyeing with the fresh leaves. It's a quick summertime treat. The colors are different from vatted indigo. The shades are greener, like robin eggs, turquoise, or mossy water.
Strained dye
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Dyebath, rinse water, and leftover leaves
Little particles of indigo leaves in the rinse water
Silk embroidery threads
Organza silk before the final rinse
After washing and rinsing
Wool Pot holders
Undyed wool loops
Years ago, a dear friend shared a huge 5 pound bag of pure wool pot holder loops with me.. Little did I know at the time just how valuable and hard to find these would become. I dyed the loops with natural colors, and made potholders for gifts and for sale.
Hemp Yarn
Hemp is oine of my favorite fibers to spin and dye. Of course it doesn;t drink up color like silk or wool, but I love the gentle shades of natural dyes on the yarn.
Indigo on 2 ply hemp yarn
I don't work in a very scientific or mathematical manner, so every skein is different. Some are more firmly spun.
Some skeins are soft and loose.
Pansy dye progress
The results of the pansy dye experiment have been interseting and a little suprising. The purple and blue pansies gave beautiful shades of green to the silk organza.
Silk organza soaking in purple pansy brew
The silk looks a little bluer in the jar. Maybe it's the reflection of the blue and purple flowers in the water.
The silk fabric dyed with yellow and orange pansies is a greenish yellow.
Yellow and orange pansy dye
Green and yellow silks from pansy dye
I like these shades, but I'll keep experimenting.
Pansy Dye
Since May, I've been picking pansy flowers and saving them in the freezer. At first I kept individual colors in their own bags - purples and blues together, yellows and oranges in their own bags, etc..Lately, I've just been stuffing them all together so now I have to separate them.
A few fresh blue pansies for the brew
There are mostly purples and blues in this jar, but since I wasn't very careful. there are a few bits and pieces of pinks and yellow flowers
Yellows and oranges
June Inspiration
II've been dyeing silk threads in colors inspired by the velvety shades of petunias
Combinations of lac, logwood, madder and indigo
The milkweed flowers have begun to bloom. The air is filled with their heavy sweetmess. The tender, muted pinks seemed like the perfect color for some handspun wool yarn I've been saving.
Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca)
Handspun wool yarn soaked overnight in alum.
Elsewhere