The Meditative Dyeing of Cellulose Fibers

When I was in college I dyed wool all the time. Wool yarn, wool roving, wool fleece, wool fabric... I used it for weavings and knitting, and I even sold it on ebay for a while. I had access to the dye lab at the university I was attending and it was a gorgeous facility complete with stoves and ventilation. My college roommate can attest to this, as she was very irritated by the drying skeins of yarn in my closet and the overall permeating wet-sheep-smell. Bwahaha.

Wool was the first fiber I dyed, apart from the tedious cotton/rayon dye swatches I did with my dye class. Because it was my fiber of choice even before joining the textiles program, and because I'm a stubborn ox, I clung to it religiously and learned all I could about dying wool with acid dyes as well as a few natural dyes. Basically dye+acid+heat=colored wool... Aren't protein fibers cool?

So years later I decided to play with cellulose fibers (after graduating and without access to a dye lab) and discovered the process was far more time intensive than dyeing wool. Each time a cellulose fiber (made from plants such as cotton, linen, hemp, etc) is dyed, it must first be prepared using a mordant or fixative. Then after this chemical is applied it is ready to be exposed to the dye molecules. It's like prepping a petri dish, almost. You have to create the perfect environment for the dye molecules to saturate and fix to the fibers. I totally understood it, but I found the process tedious and the results uninspiring.

This spring, however, I began to notice other bloggers discussing natural dyeing, using various plants from their yards... The idea of using natural dyes wasn't new for me, but the idea of using weeds and invasive plants to create color on fabric was instantly inspiring.

The thing with dyeing cellulose fibers with natural dyes is that each natural dye source is different. Some plants that are high in tannin, such as oak galls, sumac and walnut hulls, will fix to a cellulose fiber easily and fast. Others, such as certain leaves producing golds and greens dye well on cellulose that has been treated with a mordant, or fixative (usually alum, but sometimes iron or other metals). Still other dyes, such as berry juices and many flower-based solutions, must be applied to a cellulose fiber that has been tannin-treated as well as mordanted... and some dyers even swear by treating with tannin a second time after the mordant.

When I was younger and in college I found myself tantalized by the quick and vibrant colors of acid dyes on wool, but now that I am older I am able to see the beauty in the lengthy process and ecological soundness of dyeing naturally.

This morning, I found myself in an almost meditative calm while preparing the cloth for the tannin bath that I'd made out of sumac leaves. The cloth has to be soaked in water to allow for even tannin uptake before it is immersed. The pot of sumac leaves was boiled for two hours and then allowed to sit for three days simply because I didn't have time to fuss with it. I feel like dyeing protein fibers with synthetic dyes is akin to baking - you have a very specific set of directions and as long as you are careful you can produce quick and even results that remain predictable.

With natural dyeing you are bound not by "directions", but by concepts... You should never expect a specific result; you simply hope and observe.

Something as simple as an increase of iron in your tap water can change the colors, and something as complex as the sun exposure that a plant had access to over the span of an entire growing season can affect the colors as well as the light-fastness.

You are at the disposal of the elements - a sort of terroir within fiber and cloth. As with all things inevitable, it's best to just relax and go with the flow, embracing the results with wonder and awe, and know that what you see in your finished cloth is a complex compound of so many incomprehensible factors that it is truly a glimpse of chaos. Float, as a leaf, down the river.

(photos coming soon... having some technical difficulties...)

Fiber Giveaway Winner!

Update: We have a winner! Our winner is #6 - Kelly H, who said "I'm a knitter, and wannabe spinner, so I'd be using your lovely wool to learn how. I'd also use some to needle-felt fix a small hole in my favouritest sweater that a moth found last year. We're going to be educating ourselves on sheep farming this winter, with big dreams in mind. What made you decide on Icelandics?"

Congratulations! Be sure to check back for additional giveaways this winter. I've got at least three, maybe four lined up and they're all going to be awesome! (I may do a few more fiber giveaways as I destash some of the bags of fuzz I have amassing in my house!)

 

In the meantime, here's a photo of our latest visitor here at Tanglewood. His name is Ollie and he is a pure bred grey moorit Icelandic from Queso Cabeza in Olivet. He is a lamb ram who gets to make his breeding debut here with our three lovely ladies... 

that is if he can ever catch them!
 LOL!

Enjoying the warmer weather...

The weather this past week was like a dream. It provided a much-needed respite from daily trudging through the snow, and I was able to get several things done in the yard and barn. I mucked the entire sheep stall and toted all of the manure and straw/hay bits down to the edge of what is going to be the newest and biggest vegetable bed this spring. We have no tractor, so everything was done by hand with yard carts. It was tons of work, but in the 50º sunshine it was quickly done and I loved every moment of it. I also mucked and toted the duck manure, and started prep-work on the new bed. I'll have to post more about the bed prep later. I'm trying a new technique of my own ridiculous devising and I have photos of a lot of it perfect for a pre-spring gardening post.

I also got to spend some time boiling the first of the maple sap. I set up a fantastic little nest to huddle in while waiting and watching and (not-always-so-) patiently tending the task at hand. When the wind picked up later I was constantly trying to keep pine needles from blowing into the sap. It was intense! I was constantly skimming them from the sap's surface or flicking them mid-air before they landed. How tedious! We were going to finish the first batch today, but the wet weather and the ice/storm on the horizon kept me from starting the fire since we'd only get a couple of hours before our primitive setup would drive us indoors anyway. I was defeated as soon as I saw the forecast. Boo.

Finally, yesterday, Jeremy and I headed off to the spinner's flock Fleece Fair in Chelsea, MI. The middle school gymnasium was packed with people and fiber, and I had to walk at least three times past everything to feel like I was seeing everything. When we left, I had four balls of fluff with me and a grin on my face. I've started spinning the top right ball already and aside from an occasional second cut it's very nicely processed and easy to spin. I'll have to post photos of the finished yarn asap...

A new start for an old horse, sheep in the sun, and a wooly craft

This weekend was absolutely frigid! Jeremy had a comic book event to attend in East Lansing, so I went with him and used this opportunity to visit my friends at Roheryn Farms mere minutes from there. I currently have three horses boarded at Roheryn, on sort of a horsey-vacation for the winter since my lesson program shrinks so drastically during the winter. Two of the horses were active lesson horses, the third, Esme, has basically been stored at Roheryn for the last year. Esme is a very intense horse who, a little over a year ago, was rearing under saddle despite having good teeth and a sound back. I tried several training tactics with her and finally made the decision to sell her. Unfortunately in Michigan the horse market is floundering so terribly that in the end I couldn't even find a home for her for the asking price of $200. I had a few offers, but never from anyone I trusted, and a few from people I outwardly don't trust. I decided to just give it a rest, and I let her sit in a field and get fat for a few months. This weekend I decided it was time to give her a shot again. She is fat, out of shape and her feet are pretty long, but I figured if it went badly I'd know it was time to send her to a horse rescue as I can't afford to keep a non-working horse much longer. Lo and behold, Esme was perfect! We worked for nearly 45 minutes in walk and trot, and she was completely soft, balanced and very receptive to correction which was a huge problem before. I've decided it may be time to bring her back down to Plymouth to see if I can get her working under saddle again. If I can, she'll go back into advanced lessons very very lightly.

Minya says "OMG that's the spot!" while being brushed by Heather. You can't quite see the beauty of her conformation here, especially because she is shoving her back at Heather to be scratched, and she's butt-high, but trust me- she's stunning.

While I was at Roheryn, I visited with Lauren and Heather Shelley's adorable foal who is nearing yearling status. Roheryn's Minya is an adorable bay Arabian filly who has been an incredible improvement on both her Sire and her Dam. It's so much fun to watch her grow, and while she has inherited some of her mother's stubborn personality (that danged mare once bolted after refusing to walk past a puddle and dragged me, running for dear life, for more than 100 yards) she is learning her boundaries and being exposed to lots of things to desensitize her.

Yesterday it was sunny and chilly: Not much warmer than Saturday, and the sheep nestled into their hay and straw, tucked up like little fuzzballs in the low southerly sunshine.

I love to watch them bed down midday in the sun. I always worry when I don't see them right away when I pass their field. Everyone I've spoken to has told me that Icelandics are fantastic at getting out of fences, so naturally I take a second gander if I don't immediately see everybody. They're nearly always sun bathing though, and they always seem irritated when I spoil their afternoon naps. I wonder if I'll ever get comfortable enough to stop checking on them multiple times a day... If I do, that will no doubt be the day they escape... :)

These cold days have been the perfect excuse for me to stay inside and knit. I've been meaning to pick up knitting again but it always seems like there is something else to do. Instead of garden planning however, this weekend I began a pair of simple wool socks. I have yet to finish a pair of socks. I have a few singles, but never a pair. This morning I am determined to finish this pair. (Please disregard the fuzzies all over our couch cushions, haha.)

I'm excited to be able to make my own socks. I like socks to have a tight foot, and I'm not using a pattern, so I can modify my socks however I like.

The yarn I'm using is a wonderful blended wool from The Shearer's Yarn in New Hampshire. I picked it up from a store in Keene while visiting my parents earlier this year. It has more lanolin than most processed yarns and I love to knit with slightly greasy yarn so this was what drew me to it. High lanolin content also makes for good boot socks. My next project will be another pair of socks, this one in a wool/alpaca blend I picked up from a great little yarn shop in Holland, MI called Friends of Wool. Then, after this, I plan to make a thrummed hat out of some handspun wool that I spun a few years ago from roving I picked up in Maine while passing a road-side stand. It was talking to the owner of this stand that drove me to get my own mini flock. She managed her small plot of stony, rocky land and was able to keep several tens of sheep on great pasture through very careful rotation. I was able to learn a lot just by chatting with her, and she really made the possibility of getting my own sheep "real" for me.

Right, this house is cold! I've got to tend to the wood stove, and then back to knitting!

Tucked in, nice and cozy

Jeremy and I bundled up and trundled into town to the Saturday farmer's market yesterday. Our mission was simple enough: to get a small Christmas tree. We found one quickly enough, after falling in love with it's odd Victorianesque shape. I had hoped to find a few other things while we were there, but aside from buying another calendula lip balm from a wonderful local bee farmer, we didn't pick up much. We came home and decorated the tree while listening to some of Arvo Pärt's Berliner Messe. After hanging our assorted ornaments I realized that for the most part our tree has either native bird ornaments, or star wars ornaments. Hahaha. I guess that seems about right.

Our tree has the most adorable homely shape to it.

I also began warping my table loom in a simple white wool. It's been a long time since I've woven, and I'll admit it would be easier if I could find my sley hook instead of trying to fumble the various plies of the yarn through the metal heddles. I didn't get as far as tensing the loom, but that's fine by me. Once I get it dressed and tensioned, I'm sure the actual weaving will fly by quickly - it always does. My goal was to finish dressing it today, but after the snow storm slowed everything down I didn't really get much of anything done...

The table loom has been a great loom for the house we're in now, but I miss my floor loom which is still in storage - and dressed - at a friend's house.

This morning brought a four inches of wintery surprise for all of us. The weather forecast had been correct, for once, and the old North wind had dumped a blanket of white over us during the night. When I awoke, the snow was still falling fast and I managed to stay in bed an extra hour or so before the lady-ducks' cries finally drove me to get out into the cold crisp air.

This is a shot from the window that is level with our bed. I roll over and peer out over the barnyard every morning.

My first chore was to hay the sheep. They seemed more polite today than usual. I think they're developing a distinct pecking order and there is a lot less shuffling and headbutting in the morning when I feed them. It's fun to watch their excited faces as they root around in the hay pile to find the bits of alfalfa that I mix into their grass hay. Spoiled much?


After the sheep, I trudged over to the duck coop amidst quite a racket. If the sheep have become more polite, the ducks have become less so. I swear each morning, Fleur and Tonks get louder and louder. Poor Fleur has the squeakiest voice, too. She had an upper respiratory infection earlier this year and, while she seems to be over it, she still has a squeak when she quacks. Poor dear sounds like cleaning an oboe reed!

The ducks are finally acclimating to the snow. They are Khaki Campbells, and, well, they're pretty wimpy when it comes to bad weather. I know some people who have ducks that revel in the snow. I have to put their food across their pen so that they get out into the snow a bit, or else
they'd never leave the coop!

The ducks despise the snow, and would rather stay inside than venture out.

The blanket of snow has coated everything now. It was peaceful and quiet in the gardens, and I was grateful for the thick frosting because for once I was able to focus on the accomplishments of the last year, rather than the unfinished jobs and projects now masked by the snow.

In 2010 I managed to:

• put in, and adjusted the soil of, a bed of eight blueberry bushes
• plan, prepare and plant a raspberry patch of 34 plants, and prepare the bed for 2011 expansion
• build two large raised strawberry beds, one small wild strawberry bed
  
• build four raised beds by the front fence: two for vegetables and two for strawberry propagation
• build my fantastic garden bench and raised veggie bed
• install three concrete cinder block gardens, using lasagna soil methods
• prep plant and harvest a new veggie bed, and then double it in size for next year
  
• Etc, etc, etc

It's amazing to look at what I've accomplished. I often feel like I'm behind in what I'd like to be doing around the garden, but this morning I was able to finally feel like I've caught up. The season of planning is truly upon us, though I am still trying reeeeeally hard to keep from planning veggie varieties until January 1st. It's healthier that way, I think...

Here, I close with a few additional photographs.

The blueberry bushes are tucked in for the winter...

The Raspberries are cozy and sleeping, though the deer fence has collapsed under the first snow- not a good sign...

The orchard is thickly frosted and only the occasional skittery steps of the voles and field mice show that life exists beneath the snow.

Basil loves the snow and drives us all crazy with her frantic yapping and bouncing and nipping and... you get the picture.