Cloths part 1

Well, part 3 really. Since I already showed off some cloths from last year and blabbed about the new project in another post.

So, I made notes. I did not number those notes and match them with my buckets however…. lahdeedahh. Some I remember from description, but…

I was going to leave them all there FOREVER, but in less than a week some had taken on A LOT of colour in the fabric itself, the print part I couldn’t see of course. What to do? Open or leave them?! ARGH!

Ok, so I opened ONE. Seven days in. Hot weather (finally). And did recognize it after opening, so the registration is back on track.

This cloth had previously been soaked in red wine with a horse shoe on top. Then bundled with tansy, daylilies, something sunflower like and sage. Cold water bucket. I also poured in some exhaust from the tansy test halfway through, I think that’s what’s giving the olive green with the iron and also being the outer layers of the package. There goes my theory about tansy not reacting with iron!

I learned that you don’t get clear plant prints when submerging the cloth in fluid. So next thing would be add flowers to damp cloth and then not to use more water. I should probably go read my book….

In the mean time I’ve been cooking the rest of my cottons in tannins and aluminium acetate. So they should be ready for further experimentation. Next up if I come across old bedsheets etc. will be seawater and milk, and I’ve got some dried sumac bark from last year. I’ve also aquired some texts on dyeing with clay and rust among other things, can’t wait to dive into them. Bring on winter, see if I care! (Yeah, I said that last year too and spent the entire winter being sick = no crafting, but I’m not planning on a repeat). Silk fabrics, cellulose fiber yarns – lots to try! As well as trying out the procedure on wools for comparison with ordinary mordants. There’s no end to the experiments, somebody find me a huge grant?! 😀

Funny how boiled oak leaves left to steep for a few days, look and smell JUST like black tea. So I wonder if that’s the smell of tannic acid? I didn’t have a sip though 😉

 

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Plantefarvning på stof

Kort fortalt, jeg tester alle mulige måder at få plantefarve til at hæfte på bomuld. Garvesyre fra rødvin, egeblade, bark, aluminiumsulfat, havvand, mælk, jernopløsning. Første test var 4 forskellige spande med blomster og salvie rullet ind i lagner og puttet i spande i drivhuset.

Efter en uge hev jeg første bundt op og har bl.a. lært at man ikke fÃ¥r tydelige print af blomsterne ved at have stoffet liggende i væske, der skal man nok sarte med fugtigt stof og sÃ¥ snøre blomsterne ind og lade være. Jeg kunne ogsÃ¥ studere lidt først, men det er typisk mig at bare prøve noget. Jeg burde nok tage og fÃ¥ læst min bog om emnet! Jeg har ogsÃ¥ fÃ¥et fat i nogen e-bøger om at farve med ler, rust og andet sjovt. Vinteren kan bare komme an og gerne med en del mindre sygdom end den sidste, hvor jeg sagde det samme og sÃ¥ blev det bare til nul spinding! 🙁

Jeg skal ogsÃ¥ have spundet nogen forskellige plantefibre og teste med dem, mÃ¥ske silkestof? Nogen som vil donere noget kedeligt hvidt bomuldsgarn? 😉

Kogte egeblade som har trukket et par dage lugter fuldstændig som og ligner sort the. Gad vide om det simpelthen er garvesyre der lugter sÃ¥dan? Jeg smagte dog ikke pÃ¥ det….

Jeg lader stoffet tørre mellem hver behandling, jeg håber det sætter sig og ikke bliver vasket ud i næste omgang, men de kloge påstår jo at det kan lade sig gøre på den måde.

Teensy tansy tests

1400 g Tanacetum vulgare. Boil, leave for 3 days due to stupor.

First, simmer one mordanted skein for 20 minutes. VERY sunny. More so than the photo below shows (1st skein on the left).

Then enter 2 more skeins + some unmordanted fleece. Take out yarns after half an hour, put one in ammonia soak.

Enter two mystery skeins, previously dyed a dull grey-yellow last year. Leave in fleece. Simmer an hour, then cool in the pot.

Quick iron dip seemed to do nothing much (unlike the Dyer’s chamomile for instance, which just needs a quick dip to turn the yarn olive green) so that’s the skein that had an alkaline modifier. You could leave the ammonia in the yarn for an even deeper bronze, but it’s not good for the wool, so I didn’t, and most of it rinsed out.

CORRECTION AUGUST 21st: After unwrapping one of my cloth experiments, I can say that tansy does react with iron giving a strong olive. In this case however the iron was in the cloth first, i.e. as a mordant, then tansy cold dye poured on as an afterthought. Noteworthy I think!

The mystery skeins were slightly altered, quite greenish. Despite the large amount of dyestuff to yarn, I felt the pot was exhausted, seems like the first skein sucked up all the good stuff. One could use this for a series of yarns from dark to pale by entering one skein at a time and/or leaving in for different amounts of time. I can’t help thinking that a 1:1 dye ratio would give a rather dull shade…

mystery skeins before

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Rejnfan

En lille hurtig test med stor plantemængde i forhold til garn – i alt 5 nøgler á 35 g + en hÃ¥ndfuld uld. Suffolk tror jeg. 1400 g blomster, kogt en time, derefter trukket 3-4 dage.

Først kom jeg 1 bejset bundt i og simrede ca. 20 minutter, hvorefter det var meget mørkt og solgult (mere end på billedet).

Så puttede jeg to mere i, samt en håndfuld vasket men ubejset uld. De fik nok en halv time, det ene dyppede jeg i jern uden at der skete noget, så i stedet kom det i ammoniakbad, hvilket gav en dyb bronze farve. Når man skyller mister man lidt af gløden, men det er jo ikke så godt for uld at være basisk, så det må jeg leve med. Men muligheden foreligger hvis man ønsker.

RETTELSE: efter at have pakket en af mine stofpakker op, kan jeg se at hvis man bruger jern FØRST, som bejse, så giver rejfan faktisk en kraftig oliven/jægergrøn farve!

Ulden lod jeg ligge og puttede så to kedelige brungule fed i, som jeg ikke kan huske hvad de er farvet med. De blev noget grønlige af den tur, absolut forbedrede, og sjovt nok mere ens end da de kom i. De fik en time + afkøling.

Og så syntes jeg farvebadet så lidt svagt ud, det første fed må virkelig have suget til sig af farvestofferne. Det kan man jo udnytte netop til at skabe en gradueret skala af gul fra kraftig til bleg. Hvor gult det bliver når man bruger 1:1 plante og garn fik jeg ikke afprøvet, men jeg tror måske jeg vil holde mig til den kraftige suppe hvis der skal være lidt pang.

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Sunday swatch

The coming week I think I feel like spinning, although I still have sleeve syndrome. So be it. I hope I get the time in between all my appointments!

This is just one of project palettes that I’m contemplating. Plant dyed silk in the middle, merino for the rest.

Ugens spindeprojekt

Hvis ellers jeg har tid og ork mellem alle mine aftaler. Så må vi se, om jeg får gjort noget ved mine ærmer eller ej.

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Garden tour through the seasons

Just a few snapshots from around the place through the 10 years we’ve been here.

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UFO begone

Sat myself down for some prescribed quiet time and attacked my UFO pile in between reading. It’s sooo great to be able to cross out things on a to do list! And good to not run around trying to do ALL the things, just attack one at a time, never mind the others for the time being. I really, really must practise slow living since I probably won’t be able to master slow thinking…..

Didn’t manage to get done yet, even though I have several knitting projects just waiting, tempting…

So what do you do about sleeve syndrome?! As soon as I get there, I just lose all my steam. Knit summer tops you say? But I’m such an icicle, I need my heavy sweaters… I could do the sleeves first, but I tend to have length issues when I do. I need to set up some sort of reward system perhaps? I feel really silly working on one project, while my mind is all buzzing about another one that I’d rather be doing. Not very zen. I wanna be zen! So what do you do when one sleeve turns out too thin, the other too wide (not on the same garment thank goodness) and the body has stretched in width (on the garment that has too thin sleeve – but will the sleeve grow too?). You get REALLY bored!

This is just the very short immediate list. Oh boy, you should see the other one!

  • Sleeves on orange sweater
  • Sleeves on blue featherweight cardigan
  • Blue reverse sweater
  • Felted bag
  • New soft collar for ugly scratchy sweater

I felted the sweater, which I didn’t remember had no sleeves. I’d meant to use those sleeves for the shoulder strap. It also shrank A LOT. Well, that’s what felting does, stupid… So, now I have to knit some kind of strap, then felt THAT, before I have my bag. Which incidentally won’t be big enough for its intended use I think… Anyway, not the quick and dirty project I had in mind! For some reason, second hand stores here don’t have any wool sweaters, it’s all bleeping acrylics. I guess it’s a good thing though, I don’t need any storage space for felted items-to-be-turned-into-cool-stuff. I may just cut off the buttons and save those, you know. I know a cat or 3 who would love a new sweater.

I need a magic wand to finish these UFOs. And not one of those with a knob and a number on the end.

And now to go frog the too wide sleeve. In laceweight on 3 mm needles…. Wax on, wax off….. Yes, I did read that book up top. All looks so simple on paper, yes? Actually, maybe I’ll just keep knitting and accept what I get.

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Projektbunke-projekt

Så blev det lige tid til lidt stilletid, læs og strik, få has på nogen af de halvfærdige ting (så jeg kan starte 10 nye, ikke?). Jeg prøver at øve mig i at gøre få ting og gøre dem færdige frem for at rende mellem 25 forskellige projekter og få stress som jeg plejer. Jeg kan tilsyneladende ikke tænke langsomt, men måske jeg kan lære at opføre mig langsomt.

Det er ikke helt lykkedes mig at blive færdig endnu, selvom jeg har adskillige strikkeopgaver som ligger og frister! Jeg ved ikke helt hvad der sker, men så snart jeg når til ærmerne, længes jeg bare efter nye projekter. Hvilket er skørt, for ærmer tager jo ingen tid i forhold til kroppen, få dem dog overstået! Og hvad sker der så? Jo, selvfølgelig bliver det ene ærme for smalt og det andet for bredt (dog ikke på samme trøje), i min iver for at blive færdig. Og så tager ærmer pludselig meget lang tid, især med mønsterstrik som man er blevet rigtig, rigtig træt af. Nogen som har en tryllestav til låns? (ikke en af dem med numre på) Ja, og selvfølgelig er kroppen på det smalle ærme vokset i bredde helt af sig selv, men kan man forvente at ærmet også gør det?!

  • Ærmer til orange sweater
  • Ærmer til blÃ¥ cardigan
  • BlÃ¥ omvendt sweater
  • Filtet taske af sweater
  • Strikke ny blød halskant til kradsende, grim, men varm trøje

Dette er den meget korte liste – I skulle bare se den lange… Mht. at filte en taske, ja, jeg havde overset at der ingen ærmer var pÃ¥ trøjen, de skulle have været brugt til skulderstroppen. SÃ¥ nu skal jeg pludselig til at lave en skulderstrop af noget andet, det tager lige mere tid end beregnet. Eller ogsÃ¥ klipper jeg bare knapperne af og gemmer til noget andet og giver trøjen til kattene.

NÃ¥, det blev sÃ¥ til en rapport om, hvordan man IKKE bliver færdig med sine UFOer… I gang med at trevle ærme – i lacegarn pÃ¥ pind 3. Zen, tænk zen…. wax on, wax off.

Hm. Måske få projekter slet ikke giver mindre stress end mange?

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