Today I posted a book review on Deb Menz "Color in Spinning".
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art30371.asp
I'd love a dialog with others who have read this book and/or tried any of the techniques she writes about. I've been a handspinner since 1978 and frankly have not explored color nearly as much as I should have. Perhaps because I love the natural colors and perhaps because I just didn't know enough to want to get involved to this depth. Now my eyes have been opened <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Hello Peg,
Enjoyed your book review. Like you I have been spinning since the seventies, but never really did much with colour. I still love spinning in the grease so to speak and sometimes I think dspinning commercial predyed wool tops is so close to buying the finished fibre - why bother? sometimes I do though. I have just purchased Yarns for Dye for. Only bought it this morning and am quite excited. Our group often have dying days which are really good fun and we paint our hanks, steam them or let them sit in the sun for a couple of days. I haven't reached a technical stage yet, but am about to work on it. We could certainly all do with a bit of colour in our lives. And people generally do dress very dark.
.. Sara

Sara, have you ever dyed the unspun Icelandic stuff that comes in flat wheels? I have some pale gray that I want to dye and wonder how to go about it. I am afraid of making donuts if I dye these big wheels.

Laura

Hi Sara,
I have that book, Yarns to Dye For, on my desk right now. It's the next in line for a review. I'm excited about reading and learning from that one too. I so love the natural colors, and raising both French Angora rabbits and Border Leicester sheep, I have lots of natural colors to choose from. But I'm excited about doing more with acid dyes too. I found it interesting that Deb says the most common mistake people make is to think that white enhances colors. *eek!* I think I've made that mistake a few times!
Pegg

Hi Laura,
I have to admit I have no idea what you are actually referring to, but I am intrigued. Can you describe it more? I have never seen Iclandic fleece in the round.

regards, Sara

Hi Peg,
Yes, Personally I always like dyed natural shaded fibre, they are not harsh or as 'artificial' as dyed white fibre. We are having a workshop soon from a dyeing specialist who only uses three or four colours and mixes the bottles of dye and obtains the whole colour wheel. This is a workshop for everbody, felters, weavers and spinners. Anything exciting comes of it and I shall post it.
regards, Sara.

I spent a good part of this afternoon carding wool while my tomatoes cooked down for canning. Talk about multi-tasking!

I had dyed this a few weeks ago and picked it all together, so it was ready to just stand and card. I use Jacquard dyes and had 2 batches of mixed britch wool. This is the stuff I skirt out and remove from my sale fleeces, but I keep for it myself to use. It's a little coarser, a little dirtier and uneven in length. It's mixed white and natural colored. I dyed 1 batch sapphire and the other batch spruce. Then I had a generous pound of leftover natural black lamb's wool from a crossbred that I added in as is. So my colors are the deep blue, deep teal and natural black. I'm only running it through the carder once, so it's not too blended.

My thinking is to spin a thick single, so that the character of the yarn will be more pronounced. (Something I learned from the book Color in Spinning!) However, I've never done much with singles and spinning thick is NOT my best work. So we'll see. I have in mind a knitted winter coat. I think when it's all said and done I should have around 4.5 - 5 pounds of carded batts.

Peg, your thick single sounds magnificent - but I would probably ply with a really fine silk or other thread. have never actually knitted a garment with a single. There is obviously a lot I haven't experimented with. I think time is often so precious we concentrate on what we know too much. Re dyeing - have you seen Sara Lamb's site at www.saralamb.com . If you look back in archives to February 03, 2005 there are great ideas for dyeing - knitting on a machine, ripping it and reknitting combined with other colours. It is beautiful!
.. Sara

Sara, this Icelandic is from Schoolhouse Press. Meg Swansen imports it from Iceland, it comes in a big log, and the log comes apart in flat plates of thin roving. You can knit right from the plate or wheel of roving, using two plies if you want, one from the inside and one from the outside. You can also use three or four plies for very bulky knitting, this is how my sweaters are made that I bought in Iceland back in the 80's. This probably doesn't make sense, but the roving is wound somehow into a disc shape, and then the disks are all put together into the great big log. I think maybe they call the log a bundle. Anyhow, I had 4 big bundles all in the light gray to black spectrum. It's been fun using it all but now I wish I had brown instead, it's a better color for me!

I suppose I could spin this stuff, then ply and dye, but I really don't want to do that. I will probably just use it as it is.

Peggy, I think your singles would be great for garter stitch. I have been thinking of making myself a Tomten style jacket, I have some of EZ's patterns and like the one with either a hood or roll collar.

That yarn sounds really beautiful! Will you post pictures when you have it? Or bring it with you next weekend?