All the reds

This weekend, we have some dyeing going on! Using those reds I was playing about with over the last week or so, we have a scarf blank called 'All the reds' especially commissioned for EJ. I would like to thank EJ for being so understanding this month with me being unwell which has delayed her receiving her especially commissioned yarn. But at long last, it is dyed, rewound into a skein and ready to go.

I really love these colours -very intense but still with the feel of Autumn. This blank is painted from light to dark in the middle back to light again at the other end. Very similar visually to the calm horizons in the giveaway last month.

I dyed a couple more skeins, one semi solid and one variegated, in cranberries, plums and purples but they are still drying so photos soon - well, depending whether it stops raining and I get some decent light!

On a shed note, the water has mostly dried out and doesn't seem to be flooding again even after a full day of rain. I think it must have been a flash flood after a month of dry weather hardening the ground so the water ran off the hill instead of soaking in. But, just to be on the safe side, the shed is getting a waterproofing inside. Haven't quite figured out quite how yet or just how expensive that will be but I think it is definitely necessary to stop everything getting ruined once I move in all my work stuff if it happens again.

Got a bit of startitis for a few new projects too so more this week as they progress.... Happy knitting!

Red door!

I couldn't wait till tomorrow to show you the red door:-) Flame red!! I've only painted one coat so far and will give it another coat tomorrow. I was going to paint the door surround red too but I think it may be better fading into the background a little. That means I'll have to get some more white gloss but I'll need it anyway to paint the windows and door on the inside.

Sigh! isn't it striking?! A little bit oranger than I thought but the reflective light is very bright and the paint is still wet. All I need now are some red planters attached to the windowsills;-)) Okay, maybe overkill! I do need to sort out the last bit of the outside though - the fascia. Problem is no-one delivers it and it's way to long to fit in a normal car. Still working on that one.....

It is a little bit darker red in real life, but not much! After painting, I turned round and saw my lovely bright red Dalias. The sun keeps bleaching out the depth of their colour as there are very subtle tonal variations going on.

I've been trying to capture those red tones today in my dyeing experimentation. With red being a primary colour, you can't mix it and have to use the bought tub of dye. Only problem is, that this red seems more vermillion and has an obviously orangey base. Adding magenta to take away the orange cast moves it very quickly into cranberry/plum tones. I'm wanting to run the strong red into deep crimsons but the red base just isn't going there. I know I have all the colours in the range of acid dyes but I really need a crimson red base.

Maybe its because I've painted the door:-) but these just don't seem very 'red' to me. We have orangey-reds, blue-reds, plum-reds, purpley-reds, browney-reds but not crimson red. Oh, they are all lovely in their own right and I'll probably use a lot of these soon but it's not what I'm looking for right now. I'll try again tomorrow or else look for another supplier of acid dyes........

Experimental Dyeing

A few weeks ago I started to experiment with dyeing yarn. I've done a lot of cold procion dyeing before but it's been ages since I've considered hot dyeing with acid dyes for wool - not since college and that's going back a bit now!!

So when I did the printing workshop last summer, and had to use acid and direct dyes, it reminded me how much I liked dyeing and layering colour. I began to look at how I could use this in my work - dyeing, yarn, fabric, embroidery threads, fleece.... Imagine spinning all those yummy colours! Too many plans, not enough time!

As I've been into hand knit recently, I thought more about dyeing yarn for me to knit with! I started with techniques I'm more familiar with so I dip dyed and space dyed several hanks of 100% merino DK with one hank of 2 ply silk (pink one above). The silk just loves the acid dyes but I was a bit disappointed with the lack of colour intensity in the wool - especially when the acid dye is meant to work especially well with it. I'm sure I used the right amount of dye and white vinegar but some have that white cast you get with cold dyes. I even remembered to prewash to get rid of any grease or remaining lanolin that would act as a barrier.... Am I just being picky? I've seen lots of hand painted skeins online that are much more intense in colour and that is what I am aiming for:-(

The next task is to hand paint rather than dip or space dye - microwave at the ready! Maybe I will get better colour retention? You can see in this grey/purple skein that I kind of overdyed it to saturation point, but I do like the subtle hues too. In fact I think this would look lovely as a Gretel Beret(another Ysolda pattern that I haven't managed to start yet!)


All I need to do now is make sure I do enough of one colour for the pattern! Well, back to the drawing board - I'll let you know how the hand painted hanks turn out.