Dye Garden Begins!

This is the view of the garden looking west. This year, it will be about half veggies and half stuff for dyeing purposes. I have 4 sets of "M-Braces" (www.artofthegarden.net). They make raised beds a snap and I love them!!!

This is the view looking north east. I wish I could have the garden open without any fencing but our beloved chickens are free rangers and, for now, that's just how it has to be.
This area is where the flowers will be planted. On the docket are: Blackeyed Susans, Orange and Yellow Cosmos, Dyer's Coreopsis, Purple Basil, Japanese Indigo, Dark Red Hollyhocks, Pokeberry, Bronze Fennel, Marjoram, Sunflowers, and Marigolds.

Vegetable seedlings are already started as are a few flowers but this weekend is the time for scouring the local nursery for the rest of the seeds. Some may be a bit challenging to find so we may need to order off the Internet.

Have to include a picture of my beloved Suzetta. I never knew I could love a chicken so much. She is cuddly, kind, and curious. She comes into the dye studio with me. Comes into the kitchen when the door is left open. Follows me around the yard. Calls me when she is lonely. Watches over the other chickens and makes gigantic eggs.

Next posting- when the stuff is in and growing.

Thanks for looking!

P.S. Do any of you know how to keep the font the same throughout the whole posting? This is SO annoying. Makes me furious as I go to extreme lengths to make sure each paragraph is the same and them when it posts it's anyone's guess what comes out....gurrrrrrrrrrrr.

Watch me dye 45 yards of raw silk!

A customer asks me if I can color match this swatch of raw silk. "Sure", I say..and I do. I match it perfectly on my own raw silk.

Next question- "Can you dye 50 yards of it for me?" "Sure", I say.

Next question- "Can you dye it on my silk which is upholstery weight raw silk and wider than yours?" "Ummmm...sure", I say,"... but it has to fit these parameters..." which are then spelled out and all I can do is try.

The silk arrives and it is wider, heavier and worst of all- BLEACHED white. Not a part of the parameters. All I can do is try. I do. I get it but not without dumping unprecedented amounts of dye and soda ash onto the mix.

Next question- "Can you dye it in 9 yard panels?" Staggering a bit...I reply, "All I can do is try." And I do.

First step-Cut the fabric into one 9 yard, 15 inch panel to test it before committing. This stuff is going to shrink like crazy. And it did. And it worked. Okay. Price is going to double as the time and dye quadruped in order to get the depth of color on the bleached silk.
Here is 2/3 of the amount of dye I will need to use to dye this order.

Here are all but 2 of the boxes of ash that I will need to dye this order.
The messes I make are colossal. One yard, or 45, the outcome is always the same- huge pile of mess and this project was no different from any of the others.

Here is one 9 yard panel pre-soaking in warm water while I mix the 8 cups (yes) of dry dye powder and 8 cups (yes) of dry soda ash.
Just a part of what the dye sinks looked like while I was working.
Midway though one of the dye sessions I came up for air and had a chat with my dear husband. Never once did he mention my dyed face. Not one time. I happen to take a bathroom break and noticed (it was shocking) how I looked. When questioning him on why he failed to mention my dyed face, he said, "You always look like that." Not true. Anyway...my hair is blue in the front. This is still on my face. It will have to wear off with time.
Of course it would start raining about the time I was ready to pull panels out of the machine. What you do not see are the new laundry lines I installed in the dye studio that run the entire length of the work space. I have to be more prepared for crappy weather. Anyway- I hung the full 45 yards inside in the dye studio and then the sun came out, of course, but anyway- no birds were able to poop on this stuff which certainly has happened in the past.

Here it is ironed and folded. 45 yards. When the final price was quoted the customer decided 45 would work rather than 50, so okay.
Here it is boxed up and ready to ship to Mexico City. Hopefully when everything is said and done I will post a photograph of the silk as the finished project- a couch.

I am going to take this thing to UPS now...wish me luck. It weighs 38 pounds. Steve is going to help me.

This project was stimulating and challenging and a stretch in many ways but in other ways I have to smile-this might have killed me 20 years ago but when you have as many miles clocked in as I do, you learn some things...like what happens when one tries to dye bleached things. Like what happens when upholstery weight comes into play rather than dress weight. Like how to laugh it off when the dye has soaked into your nails and skin and you have an appointment with a hand therapist the next day. Like how much to account for when you know a fabric will shrink but you do not know HOW much it will shrink. It's all good.

It's true that something special kicks in when you have 10,000 hours logged in regarding a craft or an art or a specialty or whatever. Something else kicks in when you have logged 100,000 hours. I don't know how to describe it but it goes something like this-you just know that you know that you know you can do it and...you do.

Okay. What's next?

Ombre Dyed Curtains and Mess with the Dress!

I wanted to show you my current commission to dye and then construct two sets of ombre dyed, dupion silk curtains. This first set was one of those "I -think -I -am -going- to -lose- my- mind -and- maybe- should- retire- from- this- business" kind of projects. I dyed 6 yards of dupion silk a tea stain color which came out way too yellow. I mean WAAAAAAaaaay too yellow! What the heck?? I know this recipe backwards and forwards...I thought..... but it went yellow on me. So how about if I overdye the silk with some more blue and red? That went well but wasn't dark enough and some mysterious blue streaks showed up at the lighter section on the top. Overdye again with darker brew. Okay! I hung the curtains on a ladder to use the benefits of gravity and at some point in the process they fell off of the ladder and developed black spots all over the silk from the decomposing leaves on the patio. CRAP. Time to just start over again.

Cut new silk. Decided to splat on a new dye recipe (what was I thinking???) that I hadn't tested first. Delirious. It turned, while I wasn't looking, from brown to deep....deep.....red on the lowest sections and stayed tan on the top most section. I screamed when I rinsed the silk. SCREAMED. OUT LOUD. Okay...deep breath. Do it again with adjusted recipe. Rinse time.....deeper RED. SCREAMED OBSCENITIES THIS TIME.

Called customer to come look at the results as the silk is absolutely magnificent. Not the right color on the bottom but completely exquisite. I so totally know better than to do things like this. I have dyed fabric for over 40 years and I know that focus and concentration is vitally important when handling silk of any kind.

Guess what happened? Customer flipped out with joy. She says, "Bring it to my house and let's see how it looks." It looked completely amazing. Like.... chillingly perfect. I even impressed myself which is very hard to do.

Sewed the first set and here they are. Cannot get a good pic of this as the color is too complex but suffice it to say that this is a stroke of blessing that made me look like a complete and utter genius.

On to the next set which should be another very difficult custom color but I'll show you and tell you about the adventure next week. Or the week (month) after because I am such a terrible blogger.

And then we have this....this is a full length organza layered monster dress with an organza shawl in a hideous lilac color. It is my entry for the "Mess with the Dress" show coming up next month. Here is my artist's statement:

Title: “Mother of the Bride (She Was Always Such a Natural Beauty)”.

Although I am not yet a Mother of the Bride, I do know what goes into such a production. While we strive to look as if age and time has had no effect on us, behind the scenes there is a tremendous amount of work, money, product, and effort given to make it all look so very natural. The dress is only secondary. The gym, the makeup, the creams, the vitamins, the diet, the tanning…that’s the mess that is put into the dress.

Fun to do.

Thanks for looking. What are you working on these days??

New Web Site coming soon!

My brain and everything that goes with it is consumed with the formation of a brand new web site that will allow me the luxury of adding and subtracting my own products. My current site was built in 1999 and is flat out-archaic. Fossilic if that is a word which "spell check" says it is not. Having to learn how to do all this is mind boggling. I am learning a foreign language. My head hurts. I will let you know when it is ready to look at and when you can order stuff. Until then, the old site stays put.

Merry Christmas. The new year will be a welcome relief. I'm done with this one.

My Dyer's Garden gets blogged!

As you know from the posting below- I am plotting out a dyer's garden for the spring. The lumber and "M Brace" at each corner was donated by one of my best friends who invented the marvelous gizmo. Here is her blog-

http://artofthegarden.net/project-blog

Fabulous product, fabulous friend, fabulous fun. Can't wait to start. I will blog (I promise) about the garden's progress and end results.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Zinnias as natural dyes on wool

I have to tell you about a wonderful thing that makes me think more highly of humanity. I forgot to plant zinnias in my garden this year. Zinnias are one of my all time favorite flowers because they are easy to grow, are awesome colors, make nice cut flowers that last a long time and did I mention they are easy to grow? So I forgot to plant them and then sometime around late spring I remembered, as I had wanted to try dyeing with them. I mentioned this to my pal Laurie the "Biker Babe" and she said- did you read in the paper where Farmer So and So planted tons of them and they are free to the public? What?! She then gave me directions to get there and my daughter and I took a drive. There they were! Not just a few, but acres of them. There is one photo of me in the middle of the mass of flowers on my Facebook page somewhere. I can't find the photo now. Anyway- we chatted with Farmer So and So and he said he just did it for the fun of it and for the public to enjoy. Amazing. We did enjoy it and we told him we were going to use them to dye wool and he was only mildly interested. Go figure! I think it is the most fascinating thing ever but I digress.....
Here the heads of the flowers are simmering away extracting what looks like a tea colored base. These flowers were red and orange only so we were fairly disappointed.
Add the yarn to one pot full- no mordant added.
Add roving to another pot- also no mordant. We did use vinegar after everything was said and done.
As happens so often with natural dyes, the end results are tea stain colored. Oh well. It certainly would have been easier to flip some Lipton's in the water rather than get shoes muddy and spend the time snipping and then picking off the heads BUT the experience was a good one and another to chalk up to experience. For a truly outrageous color- see below where we used Pokeberries. Now that color rocks and rolls.

Thanks for looking!

Acupuncture, Shearing and Spinning, Pokeberries, and my Dyer's Garden

Lots has happened in the month plus since I blogged last so I will make up for it with lots of pictures, okay?

The first thing to say is that for the last 7 months I have been in considerable pain from some mysterious thing happening to both my wrists and at times my thumbs. No, it is not carpel tunnel. No, I have not gone to a "real" doctor. Some may think this is foolish. I think it is wise at this point in time. I have my beloved Jerra who is way smarter than any "doctor". She is my compounding pharmacist. She has concocted a salve that only partially helps. I have concocted the other stuff that is just now starting to kick in to help a lot. It's herbal. It has an awful name that sounds like I am up to some sort of witchcraft- Cat's Claw or Una de Gato. It works. So for now, I do what I know to do which is herbs plus this, pictured above... and slow down on tennis and things that make my wrist and thumbs hurt.

Notice all the people flat out on their backs? This was a free clinic I went to to get in an extra session. I need to go and get into a routine until the inflammation and pain are completely gone. Needles are not just put into my wrists- they go in the tops of my feet, in the sides of my calves, and in both ears. It actually feels fabulous. No really. Try it sometime.

Okay- moving on.

Earlier this month was the annual "Hoes Down" celebration at Full Belly Farms in Esparto. The Yolo Wool Mill www.yolowoolmill.com had a tent set up for teaching purposes and to show off their beautiful wool products. Here is my daughter on the right teaching an interested young woman how to spin.
At the beginning of the teaching loop, there was a shearing demonstration which I always love watching. The sheep think the shearers are predators so they go totally limp which is a good thing, eh?
Here are the results of about a minute or a minute and a half's shearing.

The kids or adults then take handfuls of the wool to the washing station where they get to do the first step in taking the wool from "Sheep to Shawl". After washing, they get to card the wool. Then from the carding station, they bring it to the spinning station where they are invited to try a drop spindle or the wheel.
I had to include a picture of this goat. I kept coming back to it to marvel at how bizarre this is! This is, to me, God's act of hilarity. It is The Triune Goat. Three in One. Holy, holy, holy! Brown, spotted, black. Different sections. Different functions. Different and yet all still goat. Glory to God.
Next, I want to show you the highlight of the magnificent new adventure I am on surrounding the glorious fun involving natural dyes. In our yard, a mysterious plant sprung up two seasons ago. At first we were horrified. It was something we had never seen before but that's not surprising really. It grew and grew and grew and soon made bright red berries that the mockingbirds devoured and then pooped out everywhere. My botanist brother did not know what it was and took a sample back to UC Berkeley where he teaches. I never heard back from him about "the mystery bush" as we named it.

The bush died back that winter only to reappear the next spring...along with about 20 friends. Yikes. It was getting totally out of control.

This spring after we did almost everything except set it on fire, it came back as did 100 of its pals.

One day, Marcail came running to me with her newest natural dye book- mystery solved! It's called POKEBERRY! Not only was the mystery solved, but we saw that it makes the most luscious berry colored dye EVER! Not brown, not beige, not yellow- RED! Where on earth did it come from and how can we get it to not be pissed off at us for the abuse we threw its way? Why did it chose OUR yard and how blessed we are to have it land here!

Now to the problem of apologizing to the bush and seeing how we can encourage it to get back to the enormous height and width it once was. Sorry pokeberry.

Here is what the berries looks like.Dyeing with the berries is tricky. Almost daunting actually but we decided to try it. The wool needs to be pre-mordanted which we did using vinegar and heat. Then the berries were squished up with our hands. It's okay to do that. It washes off skin. The book says its okay to do this but in the future I may use gloves just because.

Pokeberry has a very interesting history. The early Americans and colonists ate the "spring greens" but after some time the leaves become poisonous. The leaves actually could be bought canned in stores until the 50's when it fell out of fashion. Don't know about the berries. Don't want to try.
The last step was to fire up the BBQ and to heat the wool to the magical temperature of about 115 F. Lower than the usual simmer. This apparently is critical as the color can be temperamental with heat.
Here are the glorious results. We unfortunately did not have the requisite 25 to 1 ratio of berries to fiber. Next year we will. The color is lovely, don't you agree? There is enough left over for another run or two. Will post more results as they come in.
The last thing I want to show you is my backyard garden. This spring we rototilled up all the Bermuda grass and planted veggies. Huge success. One section pictured above is now being prepared for a Dyer's Garden.

My dear friend, Jill Plumb has invented a fantastic product called an "M Brace". You can see more of this on her web site: www.artofthegarden.net. She has graciously given me sets to play with in my yard along with the lumber in exchange for photos of my progress.
Here is how it looks today with the plots in place waiting for the compost and dirt. Fabulous.

To be planted in the boxes will be Japanese indigo, yellow cosmos, dyer's coreopsis, purple basil, black eyed Susan, marjoram, orange cosmos, bronze fennel.

Outside of the boxes will be sunflowers, and hollyhocks.

I'm dreaming of spring already and it's not even fall yet!

Wish me blessings. I do for you.

Thanks for looking.