Unravelry

Remember those sweaters I found last week? Well, they're no longer sweaters. Meet my new piles of sproingy yarn.

Both ended up being laceweight yarn, which is much finer than I'd hoped for. I think I know what to look for now when I'm combing through the racks of sweaters, but I doubt I'm going to find many in this climate that use heavier yarn. I think a drop spindle may be in my future (for plying thicker yarns out of the finer ones I find.) The next step for these yarns is to be washed and hung to dry with weights at the bottom, to straighten them out. I'm hoping to wind them into nice hanks to sell.

I used my handy-dandy new lap swift to wind the yarn onto as I unraveled the sweaters. It's an advanced piece of machinery. Prepare yourself for the mechanical genius behind it. Ready?

Yes, that's a 2x4, and those are 2" nails. It works great! I'm actually very pleased with it. I'd eventually like to get an umbrella swift, since it will be easier to unwind hanks onto a ball winder (which I'd also like to get) off of a rotating swift, but for now this will do just fine.

I still don't like that salmony-pink color, so I grabbed one of the smaller hanks of it and set it in a vinegar soak for an hour. It's now been zapped a few times in the microwave with a pouch of Blastin' Berry Cherry Kool Aid and a pouch of Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade. It's a darkish color again, but we'll see how it dries and reskeins. I'd like to do another hank of it in orange, just to see how it takes it.

The Miracle of Reskeining

When I got up this morning, I immediately twisted my newly-dyed and now dry yarn into hanks, and I wasn't pleased with the colors at all. I had two of these, which to me looked a washed out, pukey-burgundy and light electric blue:


However, I've read over and over that reskeining (rewinding the yarn into a new hank) works wonders, so I did my best to withhold judgment. I sat down with my new lap swift (a 2"x4" with nails exactly 36" apart) and began winding. Sure enough, after thirty minutes, I had this:

Now, that's more like it! The colors are pretty close to the photo - maybe only slightly less washed-out in person. I'm actually happy with this. Not thrilled, mind you, but definitely happy for my first attempt. I will be dyeing more yarn in the future - count on it!

Post-Dyeing Drying

We left the yarn cooking on low for about 2 hours. One hour probably would have been enough, but I was uncertain whether or not the milky-white water indicated that the yarn had soaked up all the dye. When, after another hour, it was still milky, I decided it was probably fine. I unplugged the crock pot, took off the cover, and we went to the mall.

About four hours later, we came home, and the yarn was cool enough to handle. I dumped it into the colander in the sink and rinsed my new, colorful yarn in water the same temperature before putting it through another spin cycle in the washer. Behold, hand-dyed yarn! The colors are pretty close to the photo, although the red is a little more burgundy (not so pinkish) in real life.

And here it is, hanging up to dry in the boys' bathroom. Tomorrow I'll reskein it on the simple swift I made this afternoon.


Jason's first question was, "What are you going to make with it?" Good question, actually. It's 100% feltable wool, so maybe my first felted bag? We shall see!

Adventures in Dyeing

Note the spelling - that's dyeing, not dying. Although the latter is a definite adventure, it's not one I'd like to try for many more decades.

Anyway, I picked up a couple of skeins of Kashmira (100% Wool at Joann's) on clearance for this express purpose. It's a blueish grey, not a fun color at all. I've also been picking up a few packets of Kool Aid each time I hit the grocery store, so I'm all set.

Last week, I rewound the skeins around the legs of an upturned dining room chair. No pictures, sorry. For this, I'd much rather have a niddy-noddy. Must talk to Jason about getting one of those put together, I think.

Last night, I set the skeins in a soak of water with a couple of glugs of vinegar. Very exciting stuff, let me tell you.


I also chose my Kool Aid colors:

This morning, I drained the yarn and ran it through the spin cycle in the washer to get the excess moisture out. I held both skeins together and wound them into a spiraly lump in my large crock pot.

I used four glasses to mix my colors:

• Glass 1 - 1.5 cups water, three packets Cherry, one packet Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade
• Glass 2 - 1.5 cups water, three packets Watermelon Cherry
• Glass 3 - 1 cup water, one packet Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade
• Glass 4 - 1 cup water, one packet Berry Blue

We poured the blues in first, one on each end of the pot, followed by the Cherry in the center, and the Watermelon Cherry along the long edges. As we poured each color in, I squished the yarn gently to make sure it was soaking through. (I should have taken pictures of my red-dyed fingers before scrubbing them with baking soda!) I topped it off with a couple of cups of clear water - just enough to make sure the yarn was covered.

Afterwards, we set the crock pot to low, and we'll leave it until the dye exhausts (when the water is clear). Stay tuned for updates.

Yarn-to-be

After the last couple of heavy-duty posts, I thought I'd lighten things up a bit around here. Look at the yummy yarn I bought today at Goodwill!


What? You don't see yarn? I do! These sweaters have been officially dubbed yarn-to-be. I have read and re-read several tutorials on reclaiming yarn, and I want to give it a go. I spent about twenty minutes this morning combing the racks at Goodwill and actually found four or five sweaters that would have worked. My budget's limited, however, even at $4 per sweater, so I narrowed it down to these two. The green is a beautiful 100% Italian Merino Wool, and the salmon is an intriguing blend. Here, I'll let the label speak for itself.

I'm not a huge fan of the salmon color, but I figure this is a great opportunity to practice my yet-to-be-developed dyeing skills. Since it's 65% animal fiber, it should hold some Kool Aid dye. If nothing else, an over-dye may have an interesting mottled effect. I plan to do a little color calculating first, though...I don't want to end up with mud.

If I learn the yarn-reclaiming process well and think it's something I can do well, I may consider selling it in my new etsy shop. I'm not set up yet...I need to get some purses and bags made before I jump in. (What's a shop without inventory, after all?) I do, however, have a name for it now: R3 bags. (The 3 should be superscript - anyone know how I can do that on blogger?) The three R's are [tentatively] Reuse, Reclaim, Repurpose. While I predict that most of what's up there will be bags, I'm not closing my mind to the idea of offering reclaimed yarns, and maybe even plarn. I've found that a lot of people do one plarn bag, then never touch the stuff again, simply because of the labor involved in cutting the plarn. Obviously, this is still all in the very beginning stages, but in a week or two I'll be able to devote more time to it. I also need to get Photoshop Elements installed on my new computer, because not having a logo finalized is driving me nuts.

Anyway, I did manage to find a little already-in-the-yarn-stage yarn today, too. It was $2.22 a skein. I'm not familiar with Plymouth Encore, so I hope that was a good price. Maybe I don't want to know...