Monday, November 7, 2011

Lose a crock pot - gain a dye pot

When the lid to my 7 quart crock pot bit the dust, I couldn't just throw the whole crock pot away. "Crock pot" doesn't sell replacement lids, and the way the handle broke off would mean super glue could potentially melt into our food if I tried to glue it back on.

This crock pot has been relegated to the basement as a dye pot and I'm having so much fun using it like this.

6oz total of merino/targhee x, finn/dorst/targhee x, and some cormo thrown in for good measure.
I pre-soaked the merino/targhee separately because that was the only fleece of this combination that wasn't coated and was full of VM (vegetable matter).
I used Country Classics dye in the Bluebonnet colorway.
I dyed it in two batches. I wouldn't want to try to dye more than 4oz at a time in this pot. Then I dried it on the sweater rack...
and when it was barely dry, spun up a tiny sample skein and plied it with some natural white finn/dorset/targhee x. I love this little yarn and have decided that I need to dye more of this color and ply it with more natural white because, this dye job has been slated for plying with more of Fiber Fancy's Weekend Enjoyment. Hopefully it will be a scarf that looks like just the light blue end of this one.
We both like the light blue end of this scarf better and now I have enough of the light blue to make a whole scarf like that.

By the way, if you've never tried dyeing your own fiber, it's very addictive.
This is more finn/dorset/targhee x in pine green. I have merino/targhee x in raven cooling down right now so I can dye the mohair that's been soaking over night to become what ever color strikes my fancy this morning.

eta: This is VERY addicting and if it keeps up, I'm going to have an excuse a reason for buying more fleece.