I haven’t done any dyeing in months, so it was great to drag the dye bottles and fiber out of the closet and start playing again. I was a little nervous about making a mess in Jag’s kitchen; it actually worked out very well, with no permanent staining of walls, floors or countertops (at least that I’ve noticed so far). I pre-soaked the wool in the very hard well water, but I used filtered water to mix the dye solutions, and the colors took just fine.

I dyed up 4oz of 70% Alpaca/30% Cormo blend that I bought recently from AMIA (Alpaca Made in America). I mixed up some teal, bright green, and spruce, and let them bleed together and make a some lovely shades of aqua blue/green.

I had a bag of about 6oz of Bluefaced Leicester leftovers sitting in the closet, so I used the whole clump and chose my favorite color combo of teal, purple, brown and green. I tried to leave some undyed or very light fiber, since I’ve come to realize that a little white usually blends in nicely instead of showing up as a big blaring pale spot. I used to be obsessive about coloring every last inch of wool, but there’s really no need.

Here they are, drying on the porch! It was really nice to mess around with fiber without thinking in the back of my mind that I might end up selling it, which makes me wonder if I really want to re-open the Etsy store or not.

I’ve also been spinning up some fiber that was previously for sale in my Etsy store, was purchased, and then was returned for being “too green”. After adding a disclaimer about computer monitors and colors to my shop verbiage, I decided to keep it for myself. It’s going to be my first 3-ply, and I’m actually almost done with the second bobbin now. Plying is my favorite part of spinning, so I can’t wait to see how this turns out later this week!

I’ll add the 3-ply to a collection of small amounts of worsted weight green yarns (some handspun, some commercially spun, some new, some leftovers) that I want to combine into a single project…a shawl, a sweater, a weaving project, I can’t decide what. I’m poking through my knitting books and on Ravelry for inspiration.