Multi Coloured Locks

Realised how short I am of dyed locks and dyed Wensleydale batts.  The pots are busy with dye and I am slowly getting my stocks up again.  It is not that I have been neglecting the dyeing I just seem to have been busy with other wool types.
These are lovely mad colors just randomly dyed in the pot with a small amount of water

Madder and Logwood Natural Dye

Happy days, literally as the process does take more than a day.  The logwood color is closer to the top photo,  that is the purple one.  This is Clun Forest fleece which I prepared with Alum.   I then had some powdered logwool and powdered madder.  The books say you should never use powdered madder,  well never mind I did.  I left the powders soaking over night in the saucepans and then added the fleece.  I kept the saucepan containing the madder just below boiling as it explained in my books but I had no fancy thermometer so it was just guess work.  the logwood I boiled.  Then left them over night to cool and rinsed them this morning using soapy water to start with.
So many people say that dyeing is too difficult,  all those measurements they say.  Well I am a hit and miss person and I reckon using natural dyes is an inexact science so just relax and enjoy.  The mordant needs to fairly accurate but again I was definitely light on the Alum as that was all I had.  The plant material,  this is always different as no 2 lots of plant matter are going to be the same.  Weather and time of the year being an influence on the color you will get.   So I suggest give it a try.  You will need some mordant, alum is the safest, and a few large stainless steel saucepans.  At this time of the year Ivy leaves give a good color and they are easy to get.  Make sure you use pure wool and if it is merino it is super wash otherwise it will felt. Go for it my friends 

Felting Fiber. Clun Forest and Wensleydale Locks

Washed Clun Forest fleece  from sheep reared in Carlow.  These sheep have had no dips, vaccinations,  worm doses or anything like that so the fleece in almost Organic.  Clun Forest is sought after for spinning and felting as it is a fine soft fleece.  I have washed it using the fermentation method so it has had no detergents or hot water to ruin the fleece.

The locks are from my Wensleydale sheep and are really long and have  lovely curls.  A great color,   dyed with Landscape Ice.  I am selling the locks as they are or separated,  you can choose.  I think that they are so nice that i do not want to ruin them pulling them apart but there should be no waste either way

Finished Items

Now that all my spinning equipment is at the Fairgreen Gallery,  Skreen  I spend my evenings knitting. The shawl or evening wrap is made from less than 200 grams of yarn.  It has a lovely drape and is knitted from Wensleydale wool with a hint of Angelina.  more of this yarn available at the  Fairgreen or my Etsy shop.

The felted bag is the largest I have made.  Now I have the extra table space at the Fairgreen  I have room to make some different items.  This is bag has a plain grey exterior with red Wensleydale locks and the interior is bright green.  The button closure is made from Irish Sea polished ceramics. The wool came from my neighbors sheep that get shorn in my farm yard.

Felting Projects

A busy day felting at the Fairgreen Gallery.   A bag, lined with bright orange.  Rather pleased with myself as this is a first for me and it worked really well. Large front of a cushion cover and some Alpaca wrist warmers.  All hanging on my clothes line to dry in the lovely September weather we are all enjoying at the moment.   I have more ideas just need the time and energy.  Hard work this felting,  great way to keep warm.
I got some spinning done yesterday as well so a productive day

Lock Spinning Wensleydale

Both these color ways have been spun using the same method. A slight variation on my usual method.  The main yarn is lock spun using long locks from a shearling fleece that I have fluffed up at the butt end of.  These are spun at a very slow ratio using my Spin O Lution wheel which will take any thickness of yarn.  I then plied this onto a Wensleydale cross single. As I plied I flicked out the tips of the locks making the yarn have a more tail spun effect. This makes a very stable yarn and improves the yardage to weight ratio.   I then kettle dyed the finished yarn as part of setting the spin. 

Hackle and Combs removing Hay Seeds

A friend appeared with two huge bags of Zwartble fleece.   Very smelly and as you can see from the top photo full of hay seeds and straw.  The fleece on the left of the top photo is washed but full of seeds and it is beside the finished yarn.  I tried carding it but it made no difference and then decided  to try using the hackle and combs.  I combed it twice and that almost got all the veggie matter out as shown in the photo of the combed tops and then spun it and plied it.  Almost totally clean.  While combing it I had to stop very often to clean up the hay seeds.  This would have been a fleece that would have to gone in the bin if I had not got the hackle and comb

More felt

Getting ready for the summer markets and festivals.  a small selection of my new felted items, cushion cover, kindle cosy,bags and a clothes peg holder.   Adding a bit of variety to what I normally sell.

Gradient Colored Yarn

This is a yarn that gradually changes color from violet to bright red created by mixing 2 dye lots of fiber in different proportions and so getting a gradual change of color.
To start dye the two base colors,  enough of make all the yarn that you want in the finished item.  I then blended them in different proportions on my drum carder. Each batt will need to go through at least 4 times  Starting with the middle color which was 50/50 violet and red.  I made 60 gram batts, so for this there was 30 grams of each color, then I made 40 grams red and 20 grams violet, 40 grams violet and 20 grams red,  50 grams and 10 grams for the next.   The last one is totally red or violet.
Spinning, I spun a single gradually working from the violet to the red and back again.  At this stage you need to be thinking what you are expecting to make out of the yarn as the smaller the garment the less of each color you need in each block.  I did this with an adult sweater in mind.
Plying needs to Navajo,  this is 3 ply but it means that the colors stay in blocks rather than getting mixed as they would with normal 2 ply

Drying Weather

Three sets of wool drying in the sun.
 Busy, busy the last few days getting as much washed and dyed as I could.  Yesterday afternoon very busy as the weather is to break tomorrow so both my saucepans were on the go and my sink filled with wool for washing.  Out on my drying table this morning,    I have washed fleece from Zwantble sheep.  This is a really good quality fleece but sadly it has got badly mixed up in hay and straw so I have to comb it to get rid of as much veggie matter as possible.  Look what a wonderful colour it is,  as black as any fleece could be with just the very tips sun bleached.  The combing works but it is slow and wasteful  if this fleece was clean there would be next to no waste.
The green is pure Wensleydale,  always the slowest to dry.
 The pale purple Wensleydale cross,  really long staple which I will use for felting although it is so soft it could be used for spinning.  I will comb this and sell the combed tops as felting wool and in my felting kits.  the left over bits I will put through the drum carder and use myself for felting

Felting / Spinning Fibers

These a bags of mixed colors for felting or spinning.  I use this fiber for both wet felting and needle felting.  A little coarser than marina wool which makes then useful for some needle felting projects and for making items that need to be hard wearing.  Each bag contains 50 grams of fiber and I have made them up in different color ranges,  blues,  reds/pinks, greens, browns and naturals and they are in my Etsy shop https://www.etsy.com/ie/shop/MarkreeWoolCraft and a larger range in Inion Veigh Gallery,  Sligo.  Shades in the bags will vary but each bag will contain at least 4 different shades

The First of the 2015 Lambs, Enjoying the Sun

today is the first really nice day since we started lambing and I took a few photos of the ewes and lambs at their evening feed.   Plenty of lambs this year and we have a rather complicated method of identification.  Firstly all the ewes are sprayed with a number and the lambs with the same number.  Single lambs get a blue number, twins red and triplets blue and red.  This means we can see who belongs to who at a glance.   These numbers do not last very long and the ewes loose it  fairly quickly but it is very helpful in the first few weeks.
The pedigree sheep have to be carefully tagged and recorded so that we can tell later in the summer exactly which lamb belongs to which ewe to register them.  So the lambs get a numbered tag in their ear at about 1 day old and this number is recorded and the ewe's number as well.  Towards the end of the summer their details are then sent to the Wensleydale Association and a pedigree tag is issued for each lamb with its individual number,  my flock number and the year it was born and this is put into the lamb's ear.

 Most of the lambs are not pedigree as I only need a few for replacement each year

Combed Wool Tops dyed with Lichen

My latest dabble with natural dying.  I had hoped for a pinker color which I got the last time I used  Evernia prunasti and this time the wool picked up the dye in different shades.  This will add character to the yarn.  These little nests are 'combed tops'  the very best method of preparing fiber  for worsted spinning.  I have prepared them using a hackle and comb and then pulled the fiber off the hackle through a dis.  This gets rid of almost all the dirt and veggie matter and all the short fibers giving a continuous 'top' of fiber all much the same lenght staple.  There is a fair amount of waste fiber which I will pass through my drum carder and maybe I will spin this using the woolen method giving two yarns of the same color but different texture.
Dying with lichen is lovely as the wool needs no mordant which can do damage to the fibers,  making them soft, sticky or brittle depending on what is used.
This lichen is plentiful here at Markree enjoying the Temperate Rain Forest climate and clean atmosphere.  It grows on trees enjoying a fair amount of natural light and so is found on the top of the trees.  I gather it off the ground after storms, which we have had plenty of this winter

Crottle Dyed Yarn

An ancient and traditional way to dye wool using crottle. A lichen found on rocks, particularly on stone walls.   It takes time as the lichen needs to be fermented in ammonia for several months and then dried before using.  It gives a reliable colour and dyes a lot of wool for a small amount.    No need for mordants and I just put the dried crottle in a old pair of tights and boil it with the wool.   A method used to dye wool for centuries. As with all natural dye stuff the colour is  soft hue that can not be obtained from artificial dye

Hand Felted Cushion Cover

Something new.  Wet felted square,   backed with Magee Tweed designed and loomed in Donegal Town.  this cushion cover is suitable for a pad 12" X 12"  or 30 cm X 30 cm.  a small cushion but it is as large as I can make in my kitchen,  starting off measuring  over 16 inches square.  The buttons are hand made from Irish Sea polished ceramic.  These buttons just add the finishing touch to the cushion.  With that lovely tweed and felted wool a special button is needed.  no plastic for me!!  I have put it up on my Etsy and will also bring it to Betra Country Market on Saturday.   Full details can be seen at   https://www.etsy.com/ie/listing/222966258/hand-made-felt-and-donegal-tweed-cushion?ref=shop_home_active_1