Fine Stoles in natural dyes

Sunday 15th
When I was at the Real Colour Show at Llanidloes in mid Wales a local shop l'Amoire, bought all my fine stoles of which I had three, a fine felt collar and a fine felt scarf.,This means I have now sold all I have made which is enormously satisfying. So now I am starting to make some more! These are being made using 17.5 micron Merino that one of my students at Lincoln Summer School told me about-and which I got from Adelaide Walker in Yorkshire. Thanks to Bettina of Woolly Bits I have also bought a kilo of 16 micron merino from Germany. These are all Merino's from South Africa and so not from sheep which have been muled. Yesterday I dyed my first 100g of this -worried that being so fine it might felt-but it seems to be okay. Today however I am going to make a stole in terracotta using cashmere and silk as the first layer and 17.5 micron merino on the top. I dyed the cashmere and silk yesterday using madder, cutch, osage orange, and cochineal extracts of natural dyes. This is now hanging from a chair in front of a wood burner drying out. It is a still a little damp.The 17.5 micron merino I dyed some while ago as I have a commission to make a stole in terracotta. The 16 micron will have to wait-it is drying and I don't want to hurry it and perhaps felt it!
Thursday 19th
The fine merino stole is still sitting wet and damp on my table waiting to be further felted. It won't come to harm like this but I had to put it on hold as I had a commission to dye fine merino and silks. A welcome bit on money in a quiet month. Yesterday I decided to try spinning again with Abergele Guild of Weavers Spinners and Dyers which meets at a lovely village in Llanfair TH on a wednesday afternoon. However we have had a lot of rain and as I drove and saw the flooded fields Ihad mny doubts about my wisdom in going. If you click on the link you will see what met my eyes as I came down the long hill into the village.
This is the 16micron dyed and ready to be felted

Woolfest. Panic! What Panic ! EeeeK!

I am totally freaked out by another blog author saying she was ready for Woolfest bar a few bits and pieces. While DH decorates the sitting room following the installation of the wood burner & solar panels, clears a place in the garden for the new summer house, and plants our new Dye Trees ( Birch Betula Pendula....Wig or smoke tree Cotinus Coggrgria. .... Choisya Ternata Mexican Orange blossom .........I potter around with a furrowed brow trying to fit lots of different events together. For the Woolfest I have two major new products. One is my new book "The Colours of the Rainbow, Painting Fibre and Fabric with Extract Dyes." I have been trying to write this for two years and then decided that the only way to do it was to get up early and write every morning. It is not very early only 7.30am but DH is a dormouse in the morning and if he is not working he snoozes peacefully till 9 am. If he is working he does not get home till 10am so one way and another I have managed to write it. As I wrote it I kept identifying gaps in my samples so off I buzzed to the studio to do some dyeing. Mostly what I needed was what I call batch dyeing -dyeing lots of multicoloured fibre and fabrics in one go in a large pan. Well of course this is not only an opportunity to do some nice samples but I need to make more samples for summer school at Lincoln for the National Association for Weavers Spinners and Dyers where I am teaching ( along side extract dyeing) making a fine felt stole from 18.5micron merino So I took the opportunity to dye myself some multicoloured merino and also of course for Woolfest. Into my batch dyeing went fabrics- muslins,. chiffons and organzas-This is because I am involved in a very exciting event next October "The Real Colour Show" . (More soon)
Into my panic stricken brain zips the reminder of my other new product. These are my new Fabric Paints. I had these for the first time at my Open Day on May 30th I did not make many- just five pots of each colours but they all sold and of course I need to make a whole new lot for the WoolFest -phew! This means to make up the paints ,print off the labels and fill and label on the pots. Are you feeling tired reading this! On top of that is making more inks as they are generally selling well and although they did not sell well at the Woolfest last year they might this year. A college wants me to send details of my new course-you guess it-as a matter of urgency please. Someone asks me for a course next year-very gratifying as it means I am now booked up till next June- but they want a variant on my written workshops so I need to write a blurb and work out pack costs.
Why I am writing this blog! I don't know except it clarifies my mind to write it all down.
Back to the book. It needs to be edited,printed and given to DH who will go through it with a fine tooth comb and pick out anything I missed. As he is doing an OU degree in Law it means fitting this in with with what he is doing . Then I need to hand paint the covers, finish the design for labels, print them off and print the book and put together. I am very behind with my accounts Oh woe!
And get ready for the Woolfest
Ready ! You must be joking!

Photos are results of batch dyeing. They are in oranges greens and pinks and lilac and are a homage to Michelle Obama who wore a skirt in these colours while visiting Westminster Abbey. (and two cardigans as it was rather cold! I so admire her style)!