It's time for me to embrace my true nature!

For this first post, I've decided to explain my personnal process.

In natural dyeing, the colors we get from plants and insects depend on a number of factors. Temperature, sunlight, time of day, stage of growth (early or midsummer?), nature of the soil. Fresh or dried? And the type of water (very hard?) Its pH? I'll stop here, but you see what I mean. It's very difficult to know exactly what color you'll get, and just as difficult to reproduce it. That's why it's a good idea to always buy the amount of wool you'll need for your project in one go (one dye lot!). Most dyers offer a range of colors, but you may have noticed that some colors are OOAK (one of a kind). These are happy accidents, or dyebaths that at the time didn't give the desired result, but then the dyer had fun experimenting with unusual over-dyes, modifiers, sky is the limit!

Well, you'll find that I only offer OOAK colors (but I dye at least 6 skeins at a time, enough for most sweater patterns). I've always found taking detailed notes extremely tedious - it spoils my fun! I don't have the discipline it takes to reproduce a color over and over again. I think I've got mad witch syndrome. When I'm in front of my pot, I start by preparing a first bath of color and then I modify it by adding a gulp of this, a pinch of that, dipping in lots of little strands of wool until I'm giggling with joy at the result. That's when I put my prepared skeins into the bath. To sum it up in a nutshell...I play! Here's an example...

Undyed yarn

Fresh out of the first dye bath

A little soak in exhaust baths with a pinch of perlimpinpin powder

Aubergine!!!

No dream is too small