Spinning and knitting hand-dyed silk and wool/Handgefärbte Seide und Wolle spinnen und stricken

I have a new passion.
I've put all other projects aside for spinning the hand-dyed silk & wool rovings from Dornröschen.



I found the link to Christine/Dornröschen and her hand-dyed rovings and yarns on Jana's wonderful blog - 'Anaj's kreatives Tagebuch'. Jana is a most talented master spinner, dyer and felter, and her beautiful artyarns seduced me to trying out this hand-dyed silk wool as well.

Feeling the soft silk running through my fingers while spinning, plying and knitting makes me happy. The colours come out so rich in the spun yarn, shining warm and precious when hit by the light.

I've started knitting two shoulder shawls, one in green and purple, which remind me of crocus, lilacs, hyacinths, asparagus, bulbs and sprouts ...



... the other one in oriental reds, resembling herbs and spices in an exotic bazaar - or maybe the red, ripe fruits and berries in the midst of the summer heat:



The classic feather & fan pattern which I've used looks intricate but is yet quite simple, one row changing between 6 times k2tog and 6 yok1, one row knitted, one row purled inbetween. You can find the complete pattern in "Beautiful Knits" by Alison Dupernex, which holds several easy patterns.



Though this yarn was a new purchase - which I just couldn't resist - I've promised myself not to start another project without incorporating recycling or stash material. Even for this 'precious' silk I was glad to use the - almost antique! - rayon silk thread bobbins for plying, which I found in my mother's cellar about a year ago.

And I'm sure my stash will provide some beads and maybe some of that Indian recycled Sari silk for the finishing as well ...

Speaking about other projects - look what I received from Elizabeth at Landanna last week: driftwood!



This lucky girl lives on an island in Denmark with the beach nearby, thus being able to collect wonderful driftwood on her daily walk ... At the moment, she is taking us on a virtual walk with her in her blog.

And this is what Carolyn is doing with her beach finds - so beautiful! - another lucky girl, living close to the sea ...

Quite busy spinning, crocheting, embroidering .../Textiles Allerlei

I've been carding some bamboo, fine wool and silk fibers together for a very soft and delicate yarn. As I didn't find any bamboo fibers in green, I decided to dye some and mingle them with the white roving - funny, but in my opinion it looks more 'bambooish' that way.

Slower treadling, just to the point of holding the fibers together, made this yarn as soft and delicate as I wanted it to be - then plied with a very thin cotton thread.

I still have some problems with the new slide yarn guides, though - they just don't seem to stay where I want them, but keep sliding towards the bobbin ... Anyone else who's got the same problem, or am I doing something wrong?



I've been playing around, doing some necklaces too - using cotton yarn and glass, bone and wooden beads from my stash. Thought it could be a nice thing to wear now to the summer clothing.



This is how the embroideries proceed for 'My Neighbour's Garden':



and for 'The Vineyards':



Sara is coming on Saturday - maybe we'll do some acid dyeing this time ... :-) By the way, if you want to read about really archaic natural dying, go visit Manya Maratous' wonderful Greek 'Mythcolour'-blog!

(German summary: Bambus-, Woll- und Seidenfasern - und laaangsames Treten - machen diese Wolle sehr weich und geschmeidig. Allerdings wollen die neuen gleitenden Fadenhalterungen immer wieder von selber Richtung Spule gleiten - ärgerlich. Mache ich etwas falsch oder hat noch jemand die gleichen Probleme damit?

Und dann gibt's noch ein paar Bilder von Halskettenspielereien mit buntem Baumwollgarn und verschiedenen Perlen, für's Sommergewand - und davon, wie die beiden gestickten und gepunchten Bilder voranschreiten - fleißig diesmal, gell?)

Fibre sisters fabric brooch/Die Stoffschwesternbrosche

Yesterday I finished the small fabric brooch which I began to stitch at Sara's just before returning home.

It shows us two fibre sisters - and makes me smile and remember this nice week we spent together!



I found a piece of white cloth with one of Sara's b/w pencil drawings in her waste fabric scrap basket, showing two caterpillars, and I asked her if I could use it.

Eager to try out the handdyed threads, I started stitching and embellishing on it - and voilá! The fibre sisters turned up!

Proudly wearing my new brooch, I'm now working on two other fabric recycling and punching projects, of course including a lot of free embroidery, so I can use the threads :-)!



(German summary: Ich habe die Stoffbrosche fertiggemacht, die ich bei Sara begonnen habe: Grundlage war eine s/w Federzeichung von ihr, mit zwei Raupen, die ich aus der Schnipselbox gefischt habe - jetzt ist sie mit Stickereien recht verändert, und zeigt stattdessen passenderweise zwei Stoffschwestern! Und zuletzt noch eine kleine Vorschau auf das, was ich jetzt gerade mache ... auch Stoffrecyclingprojekte!)