sweetgeorgia

Dyeing Polworth

Acid for acid exhaust dyes! Who would have thought… In a previous attempt at dyeing, I forgot to add vinegar and the result was murky, slightly felted roving. Ugh. So this time, I soaked the Polworth roving in cold water plus a big glug of vinegar. The result? Juicy colours. Yummy.

I used a slightly different process this time too. Just before the trip, I bought an 18 qt. Turkey Roaster for cheap at Walmart. I didn’t like how the dyes would sink to the bottom of the Crockpot and make a big muddy mess of the roving, so I used the cold-pour/saran wrap method as shown in the Twisted Sisters book. This gives so much more control over where colours go (and stay!).

I broke off 7 lengths of roving, each 30g, and “painted” stripes using the 0.5% dye stocks I had already made up. Wrapped them in saran wrap lengthwise and then coiled them up. Placed them all in the roaster and steamed them for about an hour — I know 20 minutes is enough, but I put them in a cold roaster and heated the whole thing up so that I wouldn’t have to transport potentially leaking coils from the dining table to the kitchen counter…

In the Twisted Sisters book they have a photo where the roving packets are “all puffed up” so that you know they are done. In my case, the crappy saran wrap I used melted onto the rovings. Woo hoo. But it was no problem. Plastic and wool don’t mix so I just ripped the melted saran wrap off and the roving was still safe and intact. Just in case, I bought some thicker, heavier-duty saran wrap for next time!

Here are the lovely colours I got:

After a day of drying, I pre-drafted the whole lot. Just gently attenuating the rovings until fluffy. See pre-pre-drafted and pre-drafted shots here:

And here’s the whole 210-220g lot of dyed Polworth roving! Happily, none of it’s felted and it’s still soft. So pretty just like that, I’ll have to decide how to spin it up!

Next time, I think I should pull back a little and try some more “subtle” colourways! These colours are gorgeous…but blinding, non?

Y.A.S.P.

Yet Another Sock Project.

A couple of my friends are starting socks for the first time and are, like I was, apprehensive about the heel turning section. So we’re all starting with the top down sock and going to have a “heel-turning afternoon” soon. Here’s the start of my sock:

It’s in that “ONLine Supersocke 100 Sierra-Effekt” that I picked up a few months ago. I thought it would be predominantly pink but so far, it’s mostly black and white! I’m going to extend the leg of the sock more this time so that I can use up more yarn (previous socks only took 30g of the 50g available). The pattern hasn’t even started to repeat yet. Hmm…

Japanese People, Machines and Bathtubs

In lieu of the dyeing photos that I forgot at home today, I have more photos from Japan. So much is visually and graphically expressed in Japan that the oft-mentioned contradictions and contrasts are made even more apparent. In Kyoto, we bumped into a Maiko getting her photos taken by an American pro photographer…and then at Harajuku station in Tokyo, we found pockets of people all dressed up for the weekend in their costumes:

And here some of the girls that were sitting outside the GAP in Ometosando. Too shy to take a photo with these girls, I took a photo of other tourists getting their photo taken.

We spent quite a bit of time at the Robot Station at the Expo too…watching little Japanese kids play with the “child care robot”. This robot, called PaPeRo, actually responds to pats on the head and verbal instructions — it blushes and “plays” with the kids!

The yellow robot is Mitsubishi’s Wakamaru robot — a hospitality robot that speaks and understands four different languages. It can recognize faces and, in the shot below, was actually looking at me — creepy but very cool. Many of the robots on display at the Expo were actually in use onsite!

And finally, we spent on night at an onsen in Osaka called “Fushioukaku”. So relaxing. It was a perfect way to spend a day between train rides and luggage hauling. I mean, you take as many baths as you like in their hot springs…next to a waterfall…under cherry blossoms! The only thing you have to think about is when you’re going to have your next bath!

See the lovely stone bathtub on the hotel balcony outside our suite? I want one. We’re renovating our bathroom this summer and it’s starting too look like a real challenge. Our house is old old old to start with and the bathroom is tiny. I’ve measured the old bathtub and it’s 57″ x 27″. WHAT?!? All “standard” bathtubs are 60″ x 30″ (or 32″) nowadays! How will we find a new tub to fit our silly little bathroom? I was thinking of installing a tiny Japanese-style soaker tub instead!

Plummy Fall Yarn

Here’s the finished yarn spun from the roving that I dyed in the crockpot a few weeks ago. Barber pole effect? Yeah, I got it, but I’m interested to see how it will knit up now. This yarn goes from being mainly yellow to yellow/purple to plum/purple, mostly two-ply with the last bit of purple stuff navajo-plied to itself. The colours are more muted since the roving was brown-grey to start with.

I think I’ll be doing some more dyeing this weekend — there’s a pound of Polworth that I bought just before our trip and 200g of fine merino that I picked up in Japan — all plain creamy white right now. I did also buy myself a HUGE 18 qt. turkey roaster to steam the rovings in this time…all because I think I managed to felt some of the last rovings I worked with. Hopefully the steam (vs. simmering) will prevent felting… we’ll see…

Kyoto, Nagoya and Backyard Leaves

While sightseeing with my grandmother at Narita-san, she exclaimed “agh, all you do is take pictures of food!” — ah, not so. I also take pictures of food menus! See what I saw at the Japan World Expo 2005 in Nagoya…in the food court:

Too bad we didn’t try any but we were pretty much eating non-stop. I can’t believe how tiny people are in Japan considering that there are food stalls and restaurants everywhere. Entire floors of department stores and malls are packed with cakes and confections… They are, however, light on take-out coffee shops.

Oh, and in Kyoto, here’s what I found:

These were just two of the food stalls set up in Kyoto in preparation of the cherry blossom viewings… The day we were in Kyoto, the cherry blossoms weren’t fully in bloom yet but there were a few people camped out in the park waiting for it. Hundreds of food stalls ensure that you won’t be hungry during your wait. There was even a stall selling PlayStation 2s.

Also, in Kyoto, we passed the Kyoto Arts & Crafts Museum/Gallery and they had these natural dye samples on display:

And finally, I couldn’t show up at my grandmother’s house empty-handed, so I finished off the Backyard Leaves scarf during the initial part of our trip (knitting on the bullet train, so comfy!) and blocked it at our friend’s house on his bath towel: