Mordanting cotton
Topic: Natural Dyeing

Mordanting Cotton First we’ll deal with mordanting cotton because the options are limited. Usually cotton is mordanted with alum. Sometimes iron is used to create darker, sadder colors. Care has to be taken with iron since too much can cause the fiber to deteriorate.  Most dyers feel both alum and iron are safe mordants—but like any powder to do with dyeing you do not want to inhale it, injest it,  or get it on your skin. Painting stores have relatively cheap air filter masks used by house painters. Sometimes I just use a medical dust mask, but I really like the air filter one better. 

 

There are two methods for mordanting cotton: (1)the alum acetate method and (2)the alum sulfate (normal dyers alum) and tannic acid method. Alum acetate is a more expensive alum that is only available from speciality suppliers. I prefer it to the alum tannic acid method which is cheaper but multiple step and takes significantly longer. For alum acetate, use 5% WOG or 4 Tablespoons for 1 pound. Use 1/3 cup for 1.5 pound. Dissolve alum acetate in boiling water. Hold at 100 degrees for at least one hour and longer will not hurt it. Drain water (do not rinse). Either keep goods in plastic if going to dye right away or dry and use it later. If dry, soak in water before dyeing.

 

Only a portion of the alum will be soaked up by the goods. If you want to mordant more goods, just put in ½ as much mordant. After 2-3 uses, go back to the full amount of mordant and start again but you can continue to use the same water.

 

Another option is a 3 step mordanting process using potassium alum sulfate (common dyers alum) and tannic acid. To do this mix ½ cup alum sulfate in 4 gallons of hot water in a plastic bucket. Make a tannic acid solution by dissolving 2 tablespoons in 4 gallons of hot water and put in a separate bucket. Put scoured wet cotton fabric or yarn in the alum sulfate mixture for 12-24 hours, then rinse. Then put fabric in tannic acid solution for 12-24 hours. Rinse again. Put back in alum solution for 12-24 hours. You can reuse these alum and tannic acid mixtures several times. Sumac is a source of tannic acid.

 

I've had lots of fun teaching quilters to natural dye. Quilting is something I wish I had the time for but that yarn and fleece calls me too much.  The fabric above or some like it, is headed to a patchwork lining on my natural colored circular sampler bag.  Now if I can just figure out what sort of interfacing to apply and how to make a bag lining, I'll be set.  I sure wish I'd paid more attention when Mom tried to teach me to sew.  Linda

 

Mordanting--premordant or mordant in the pot
Mood:  rushed
Topic: Natural Dyeing

Mordanting is probably the most intimidating part of natural dyeing and also the most controversial. Mordanting is necessary for most local plants to provide vibrant colors and more importantly to keep the colors from fading.  There are two methods of mordanting—premordanting and dyeing while mordanting. The one I use almost exclusively is to premordant the goods. You can mordant weeks in advance and then dye when the dyestuffs are available. Natural dyeing is quite a long process as is and adding mordanting the same day is generally a bad idea. You can also add the mordant directly to the dye bath, but since I dye many times in the same dyebath it is very hard to control the amount of mordant that way.  I don't premordanting fiber for black walnut, cutch and some other woods because of the tannins.  I also don't premordant for indigo, but most of my indigo dyeing is overdyeing so I have mordanted the yarn.  I finished winding most of the skeins last night so now I have to check my supply list to make sure I have enough natural dyes for my upcoming class in Helena.  Dyeing to get into the dyepot, but I'm sticking with business.  Linda

Scouring fiber before dyeing
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Natural Dyeing

Natural dyeing is a three step process:  scouring, mordanting, and dyeing. Scouring of yarn or fabric prior to dyeing is very important stage.  I wash my wool yarns and silk, fleece, and fabric just as I normally wood any wool item—hot water, Dawn detergent or Synthrapol, using no agitation.

 

Cellulose fibers such as cotton and linen yarn and fabric takes more preparation and in general are a little harder to get as vibrant as color. I have had great luck dyeing cotton fabric. Cellulose goods require more intense scouring. To scour cotton, weigh your goods (WOG). I scour 1.5 pounds (4 yards of fabric) in my canning kettle. Then add enough warm water to enamel or stainless steel dye kettle to cover goods well. Add 2 tablespoons Synthrapol per pound of fabric (3tablespoons for 1.5 pound).  Dissolve 2% WOG of soda ash in boiling water and add to bath (4 teaspoons for 1.5 pounds). The soda ash improves the washing ability on cotton and is not a mordant. Slowly heat up the water to simmer for 60 minutes stirring pot slowly every few minutes. Longer is better than shorter. After scouring the goods, I either dry it or more likely go directly on to mordanting because it needs to be wet before putting into the mordant bath. 

Crab apple blossoms and twigs
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Natural Dyeing

I love to dye with the fruit wood, leaves, and twigs.  Most of these don't need mordant because the tannins in the bark serve as a mordant.  These yarns were dyed in June 2006 from leaves, twigs, and immature fruit.  I had one of those small plastic grocery bags full and got some wonderful colors.  This was quite a lot of color from this amount of plant material.  I have about 16 ounces here.  The most reddish ones were the first dye bath and were on unmordanted fiber. This probably was because the amount of dye in the water was the most.     I want to experiment some more this year with this dye although I have gotten quite lovely colors last year from plum leaves and twigs.   What I need is a nearby friend with a big crab apple tree in their yard.  My crab apple tree is just a baby so I can't just pull off a lot of leaves and bark there yet.--

I'm making some progress in winding skeins in the evening for my upcoming classes.  I'll be really, really glad when I'm done so I can do something more fun.  All's well in beautiful Montana.  Linda

Dyeing with Milkweed
Topic: Natural Dyeing

Milkweed pictured in my last post is a persistent weed around here.  It is easy to see because it is taller than everything else in the field.  Almost any vacant lot in my town has some and along irrigation ditches it flourishes.  To use it, I pick the whole plant wearing gardening gloves.  I have heard it may cause a contact dermatitis in some people so have played it safe.  I have dyed with a lot of it and like the clear yellows it gives.  The sample on the left is alum and the right tin.  As well as using it as yellow, I over dye with light concentrations of indigo or cochineal and get lovely greens or oranges.  Keep in mind that in all dyeing (even chemical dyeing) yellow is a very wimpy color easily overrun by any other color.  When I took the class with Trudy Van Stralen (a once in a lifetime opportunity) she suggested dyeing with your yellows first for at least 1/2 hour and then dyeing with the  light concentration of dyestuff.  So that is my procedure. 

I put enough milkweed leaves and flowers to fill up my big kettle and simmer it for at least one hour usually more.  I remove the plant material and then add my yarn about 4 ounces at a time.  I keep dyeing one four ounce skein, then another until the yellow seems to be getting too pale.  Then if I want orange I add a tiny bit of cochineal and put some of the skeins back in getting very nice oranges and peach and keep dyeing until I'm low on fiber.  If I still have enough color in the water to warrant it, I put the leftover dye into a milkjug and later add other leftovers to beef it up.  In terms of weeds, milkweed is my favorite.  I get the best colors in June when the plant is about to bloom, but very good color until fall.  If the milkweed has gone to see I cut off the fluffy heads to keep it out of my yarn.  Linda--whose garden looks a lot  more respectable than it did yesterday.

Gardening/Natural Dyeing
Topic: Natural Dyeing
I finally went to the doctor 2 days ago because I knew I was really sick when I went to my favorite gardening store and could barely walk around picking out plants.  Usually I'm a gardening nutso this time of year.  Our weather which has been cool held me back for a while.  But it was knock down gorgeous.  So I have bronchitis which makes me very sleepy.  But I still bought lots of garden plants yesterday and am going to hit the beds in a few minutes.  My daughter is coming over.  Right now I just have a big mess on my front porch.  One of my favorite things about gardening is natural dyeing.  Usually I go through a massive natural dyeing phase in June when milk weed starts to bloom.  It is one of my favorite local dye plants.  I have to get gardening so I can get dyeing.  Linda

Is Carded or Combed fiber better? (Is steak or roast better?)
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Spinning

Buying a lot of fiber in the last few weeks has brought me back to a common question in my spinning classes and a topic of discussion right now at the board of my spinning group Prairie Handspinners as we discuss next year's programs.  So which is better carded fiber or combed fiber--of course you know the answer--It depends.  So here are some ideas I have.

Are you going to spin in on a wheel or a spindle?  If spindle, carded Are you going to blend two different fibers for example mohair and wool?  Carded.

If you are going to blend fibers of two different lengths, you have to card it.  Combing by its nature pulls all of the longest fibers first and the short get left behind the combs or at the end of the piece.

 

Which is easier?  Usually Combed for wheel spinning. For most people particularly beginners, it is easier to spin a smooth yarn with combed fibers because the fibers are all parallel and smooth and are slippier.  Sometimes people feel it is too slick, but they can spin from the fold.  However, a well carded fiber particularly for Corriedale and coarser wool is very easy to spin. 

 

Which has more waste?  Combing  Combing leaves all the short bits behind the combs. 

 

Which is better for getting debris (such as cheat grass or hay) Combing.

 

Is your fleece very fine?  Usually combing.  Unless it is very short stapled, fine fleeces usually respond better to combing because the relatively coarse cloth on hand or drum carders will nub up.  If you want to card a fine fiber, you must either use cotton cards or have a fine cloth on your drum carder.  Because there are not that many well carded fine wools (without neps), it is usually easier

 

I don’t have either cards or combs-- which is cheaper? The cheapest tool is a dog brush and you can get a pretty good combed product with a flicker or dog brush.  Next up in price are hand cards.  Next up are single pitch combs such as Viking combs.  Then comb the English combs and last up the price is the drum carder.  The drum carder is the fastest.  The guild has both English combs and a drum carder available to check out.

 Is it important to keep track of butt end and tip end of the fleece?  Usually not that much?

Although spinners often talk about the importance of this, Peter Teal explained that in all commercial combed top, the fleece is put in either way.  The fiber is then carded and then it is combed.  So you might get a slightly superior preparation by keeping butt and tip in order, it won’t be much.

 

What is the key to successful carding or combing?  Time.  Start with clean fiber, do not over fill cards or combs and take time to do a good job

 

I want to dye a prepared fiber.  I have had best luck with carded medium wools to avoid compacting.

 

You cannot have good spinning, if you have bad fiber preparation.   Linda who is going back to winding hundreds of skeins for my natural dyeing class at MAWS

 

Bamboo Clover Scarf
Topic: Knitting

Okay I admit it.  My learning curve on posting photos is long.  Sometimes I make them tiny like the purple clover scarf and sometimes giant.  Haven't really figured out how it works and just poke and hope.  Linda 

Clover--why clover?
Topic: Knitting
Why did I name this scarf/shawl pattern clover?  Well, it is based on a pattern from Barbara Walker's book called Grand Trefoil.  I looked up what that means and apparently it is an old name for a type of alfalfa/clover.  I live in alfalfa county and just couldn't name a purple scarf clover.  I also wasn't sure if the Grand Trefoil type of alfalfa they were talking about in Europe was the same kind we grow here in Montana.  So I named it Clover which seemed okay.  My names aren't all that great.  I just try to keep them short so I can remember them.  The only name  I felt a bit inventive on is my pattern called Slip and I--more on this later.  This bamboo version of this scarf is in a pretty yarn called Royal Bamboo.  It has a lovely sheen and my husband gave it to me at Xmas.  I had sticker shock with this yarn and knew it would be hard to match this yarn in my own dyeing so I put it on my wish list at my lys.  Because this yarn is dk/worsted I used a simpler cast picot cast on and cast off.  Linda

Clover scarf--new pattern
Mood:  happy
Topic: Knitting
I'm finally posting some pictures of recent finished objects.  This scarf is a knitted lace pattern of only 5 stitches and 3 rows.  This makes it reversible, so it should be dead simple.  Not exactly.  It is a pattern every row (no reassuring purl or knit across). I didn't make many mistakes knitting it which was good because I had a little trouble seeing how to go back.  I'd put in an occasional life line when I do it again.  Didn't really need it until I put one in before I put the edging on but somehow I knocked the needles out and lots of other silly stuff and that life line came in handy.  I knit this in Alpaca with a Twist Fino.  I really like this yarn and bought some more recently when it was on sale at my lys.  I have another version of this scarf too, I'll post.  I'm teaching a class on this scarf in August at Wild Purls.    Linda