A Small Breather

I have four batches of yarn to share but I don't have the pictures yet. I was out longer than planned today and ran out of the proper light to take the pictures. I will do my best to get them taken tomorrow but will be out most of the day then too. In the meantime, I thought people would enjoy a picture taken from the top of the bluff in Coupeville. This is where I get to go for the Whidbey Guild meeting. The scenery is worth the long drive for me. I thought I would also take a minute to add three more links. Two are in the Fiber Links and one is in the Personal Links. The first is WeaversHand. It is a wonderful website bursting with information for weavers done by my fellow guild member, Janis. She also has BraidersHand which goes into more detail on Japanese style braiding. Both are great sites to explore so please check out the links. The third link I am posting in the Personal Links is related to my commitment to empowering women. It is A Call to Power: The Grandmothers Speak. I highly recommend reading this book and checking out the link. It has enriched my life as a woman and weaver tremendously.
Please take time to check out the links. I love sharing them with everyone.
Joyfully yours, -Renee

Logwood Grey and Cutch

This was a strange combination. With the one on the right I should have got coffee bean brown. It is brown but more of a latte brown. The others are mainly grey with a brownish undertone. I ran out of Cutch and have had to use Cutch that was not from Earthues. I haven't had a chance to get more and I needed to go on. The Cutch I purchased doesn't look as nicely prepared and I don't know the concentration of it. From these examples, I am thinking I may need to add more Cutch!
Today was the Whidbey Weavers Guild meeting. It is the first of the guild meetings starting up after the summer break. I packed up my dog and went off to the meeting. It was a stunningly beautiful day today. It makes for a lovely drive but it turned out to be just too hot for the dog to stay in the car for long. It wasn't a very hot day, in the 70's I believe, but it doesn't take long for a car to heat up, even a SUV with the windows generously cracked. I didn't stay long at the meeting but did take advantage of being on the island and went to my favorite beach. I will have to post one of the pictures I took. The views were breathtaking.
I had brought the latest dye batch for show and tell but did not get to show them. I will show them here tomorrow! -Renee

Log Grey and Cochineal

This is a lovely greyed lavender dye combination. Logwood Grey and Cochineal both go a long way in the dyebath. Very small amounts are used to get rich colors. It is a good thing that a little Cochineal goes a long way as it is an expensive dye. Not surprising considering each tiny bug that must be harvested by hand and then processed. It takes a lot of bugs to make a little dye.
I am out of water again so I only got one dye session in today. I will have plenty to post as I push for the end. Stay tuned! -Renee

Madder and Cutch

Here is Madder and Cutch. They seem to appear more on the pink side than in the picture I took and certainly more pink than in real life. The colors are much richer but I think you can get the idea. Madder has yet to disappoint me. I have a few more dye batches to post but I will string them out a bit. Today I dyed with Madder and Cochineal. I really like this combination. It seems to bring out the best of both dyes. I am hoping the picture will do it justice.
That light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter. I should be through with all the Color Mix category this week and, if all goes well, I will get the Indigo category finished in a week. More skeins coming this way! -Renee

Fustic and Logwood

The skeins on the left were dyed with a Fustic and Logwood Grey combination. They look very green in real life but the colors didn't register well in the picture. I like the greens, they are olive greens to mossy greyed greens. It will be interesting to see how fugitive the colors are with the Logwood Grey being a component.
Dana left a question about the Quecitron on a previous post that I thought I would answer here. She asked about the proportions of the Quecitron. Quecitron is not listed in the dyebook like most of the others. I have been treating it much like Madder Root in preparation and proportion. I simmer the Quecitron saw dust, steep it overnight, and strain it out and add it to the dyepot. I use a percentage of the Weight of Goods to determine how much. In the case of Quecitron, I used 90% 50% and 25% WOG to determine the amount of sawdust. With the small amounts I am dyeing it doesn't amount to a lot. It would be interesting to do a dye sample using a range of percentages from 1 to 100 in increments of 5. That would give me 20 dye samples ranging from pale yellow to deep yellow. I would also be able to pin point the best percentage to get the color I want. There are times when I deviate from the dye book due to experience. I already know when the percentage listed will not give the rich DOS I am looking for. Most of the time I stick to the book. I have also found out the hard way that the book is right where I want to be most of the time. That is part of the learning experience. If I didn't venture from the tried and true path, I would never know. I keep notes and everything is meticulously labeled. This way I will be able to go back and either duplicate the color or decide it is not dark enough or light enough. I am really just scratching the surface here with this project. It will be a good jumping off spot, and totally fun of course!
I have Cutch and Log Grey, and Cutch and Cochineal and Log Grey drying on the line. I am about to go rinse the Cutch and Madder out and another batch is mordanting. Two more mordant baths to go! -Renee