Fresh from the wheel

A few weeks ago I tried out kettle dying (the scraggy lengths in the pictures below).  The blue merino fiber has been turned into this 2 ply handspun.  I love the color of this yarn- like peacock feathers. I love how it goes with Sea Fret handspun. This was spun on the Westbury wheel and plied on the Louet.

I have also spun a huge (well to me it seemed huge) skein of a mix of pink and grey merino and silk, total yardage is 456! this is the most that I have ever spun of one yarn. Here are the batts waiting to be spun.

The finished yarn - with some very pretty violets from the garden.

Spun and plied on the Louet. 

Kettle dyeing

Last weekend I tried some kettle dyeing for the first time.  (All my previous dyeing exploits have been hand painting fibre and setting the colors using a steamer).
I was very pleased with the results, the colors were far stronger than those I have managed to achieve when I have hand painted fibre, and the process was surprisingly straight forward as well.   I will be trying it again.

Exhausting the dye bath

Skeins hanging to dry -they look a bit scraggy here and are much better dry!

Some carding was also needed at the weekend -  so out came the Minty Carder to create some batts based on the 'Sea Fret' yarn I spun up earlier this year.  

Last month I also finished spinning up some Polworth fiber that I had dyed up earlier in the year.  I spun this up on the Westbury wheel and plied it on the Louet S10.  The ratios on the Westbury allow me to spin so much finer than on the Louet, I like the Louet but it is very 'grabby'  (I think anyone who has used one will know what I mean by this).  My little Westbury is much more gentle in its take up, but this makes it far  slower. 

I loved the Polworth, it is so soft and was lovely to spin.  I got 330 yards of two ply, just over 3oz. 

I will be getting some more Polworth - maybe to combine with more kettle dyeing.