First Dye Job Reveal

In the last post I had dyed my first pot of merino fibers and I was patiently waiting for them to cool. Needless to say that was a couple days ago and I have definitely washed dried them since then. I have been painting my apartment with my best friend for the last three days so I have had no energy to post. But it is all done now so on with the spinning.

So this is what the roving looked like when it is all washed out and dried. There is quite a bit of white still but that is okay. I have learnt a few things with this first experiment.

The first is to look under the roving to see if the dye saturated all the way down. This is why there is still so much white. So note to self: make a bit more dye solution and check underneath.

The second thing I learnt is that when the roving is packaged they fold is in half lenghtwise. I was wondering why the middle was taking so long to dry. When I tried to spread it out I noticed that is was folded. So next time I dye fiber I will open it up and see if it changes anything.

That is it for this post. In the next one I will show off how this roving spun. I am also in the process of ordering more fiber with The Black Lamb so I will have more blank canvases to play with.

First Dye Job

Today I finally took the plunge into dyeing. Below is what I came up with. It is still cooling as we speak and I am trying to be patient and not touch it.

As with anything I decide that I will learn, I read everything on the subject that I could get my hands on. I read articles, books from the library and manufacture directions.

After reading about the many techniques on how to dye wool, I decided that I would follow more or less the instructions in the Knitty article Dye Fingerprint. I first made 2% dye stocks of the colours I wanted and then mixed them with half vinegar and half water solution. So basically I would have 3 parts water and 1 part vinegar in my dye solution to pour over pre-soaked roving. With the lid on I heated the fiber in the oven at 250 F for 30mins. I'm going to let it cool until I come home from work later. So hopefully this way all the dye will be absorbed.

I'm very excited about it. The next post will show the finished roving all ready to start spinning. Yay!