Welcome Fall

Completed Maedwe

Two Shibori scarves using rusty nails and dyed with yellow onion skins.

Using rubber bands I wrapped rusty nails in this infinity scarf and the placed it in a pot of steaming onion skins. 

Another shot of this scarf.  This is a habotai silk infinity scarf blank from Dharma Trading. 

This scarf is larger and is silk charmeuse.  Again, I used rusty nails and other random rusty pieces of metal and folded the scarf around two  ceramic tiles, bound it with string and steamed it in the same onion skin dye solution.  Both scarves were mordanted with alum and cream of tartar. I really love these and will definitely play more with rusty bits.

Fall is definitely here, I feel a chill in the air. 

We returned from a family vacation to the Outer Banks and is was a shock to see leaves falling and the bright colors of turning leaves begin to appear.

All the things...

Sometimes I believe I have a specific kind of ADHD...crafters ADHD.  I want to do all the things.  This weekend was a perfect example.

Friday night, the activities were:

• Finished the hand sewing on five knitting project bags
• Started a shawl with my handspun, Nurmilintu
• Spinning on the wool/flax blend.

Saturday, the line up was:

• Organizing the craft room
• trip to Ikea for hubby's kite room and a fold up drying rack
• washed, dried (on the new rack) and steam pressed 12 eco-dyed scarves
• Knit on Nurmilintu
• Scoured and mordanted six silk infinity scarves for future dyeing.
• Scoured and mordanted 224 grams of Shetland roving

Sunday activities included:

• Blocking three spa clothes and a cowl
• Gathering 660 grams of Queen's Anne's Lace along a roadside near our home
• Gathering 30 grams of Russian Sage blossoms from the front yard
• Trip to Wally, Big Lots and TJ Maxx for new dye pots
• The usual laundry, cooking and going to gas up  the car.
• Straightening my office, shredding files from 2011, 2012 and 2013.
• Spinning for an hour or so on the wool/flax blend.
• Bundling and steaming 4 bundles of eco-dyed scarves, this involved gathering hibiscus, rose and eucalyptus from my dye garden.
• Steaming the Queen Anne's lace and Russian Sage to dye the roving.
• Completed July travel report.

 

Fiber Camp - Day Five and Six

If you have never taken a week off and stayed home, I highly recommend it.  It has been a pleasure to have no schedule and just play.  The Jacob fleece purchased at MDSW is all clean.  I have a lot of  flicking in my future.

 

 

You can see it is separated into white, dark, mixed and deep blue.

 

 

 

 

These are five more eco-dyed scarves.  The brown and bright pinkish purple are from spent day lilies.

 

 



 

This a 100% cotton T-shirt eco-dyed in a bundle with irises, marigolds and onion skins.

 

 

Lastly, banana puddin'.  Made old fashion style from the recipe on the Nilla Wafers box.  Susan this is real banana pudding!

 

Sallie's Pomegranate Scarves

My friend Sallie brought me a bag of pomegranate flowers to dye a scarf for her.

 

 

 Pom flowers laid out on a silk scarf.

 

Close up of the pomegranate flowers and some of Sallie's marigolds.

 

 

The bundles ready to be simmered.
 

 

 

 

The scarves are a golden color, the pomegranate flowers are star shaped.



Hatteras Scarves

 

 

While we were in the Outer Banks last weekend, I collected seaweed, driftwood, small shells, leaves and random bits while walking on the beach.  I knew I wanted to push my eco-dyeing beyond flowers.

 

 

 

Seaweed, straw and even the  exo-skeleton from a small crab laid out on a silk scarf.

 

 

Close up of the random bits.

 

 

The bundles ready to go into the pot.  I wanted these scarves to visually represent the beauty of this special place.  I added some Greener Shades dye in the color Coral Reef.  This dye would be considered organic except there is some copper in this turquoise color.

 

 

Hatteras Scarf 1

 

 

Hatteras Scarf 2

 

 

Hatteras Scarf 3



Crafty Memorial Day Weekend

Flying high at Fred Liske park in Cabarrus county.

 

Spinning on my Little Gem II

More eco-dyeing.

I enhanced the blues and purples by adding iron to the dye pot.

Bits of yellow from some "weeds" gathered along Fort Dobbs road. 

Rose leaf prints



Red from bits of madder root and gold from onion skins, pennies and copper pipe added to the dye pot

Deep purple from iris blooms

Blowing in the breeze. 

 

Busy Saturday

 

Reed and I drove to Sanford to visit with Ryan, Emily and Riley.  We went to Big Bloomers Flower Farm.  This is an awesome place for perennials, annuals, herbs, hostas and more!

After Big Bloomers we had lunch together and then headed our separate ways.  Reed and I went to a nearby roadway and deadheaded a hatful of poppies.

Next up, a stop at Lake Crabtree to fly kites.  The recent rain brought the lake level up considerably.  Very little field left for playing.

 

When we got home, I prepared four more bundles for eco-dyeing.

 

These bundles with the iris blooms are being wrapped around driftwood and will be placed in water with iron added to it to hopefully enhance the purple.

This pot had the poppy bundles, I used the mordanting water and added pennies and additional pieces of copper pipe.