Setting Sun

More lovely long Wensleydale locks.  The 6 inch ruler can just be seen in the top photo.
 These are dyed using food colouring.  Dyed and then rinsed well in soapy water.  These locks have had no harsh or dangerous chemicals used in the washing or dyeing process.  They are from the first shearing of my year old lambs and so have really nice tapered ends

Dying with Stinging Nettles

These are the colours I got using Nettles to dye my yarn.   I used copper and allum as mordants and the brown is copper and the green allum.   Nettles are a very traditional dye plant and give good results which are pretty dye fast for natural dyes.  It took me nearly 2 hours to prepare the nettles and I used both tops and roots and only got stung  a few times!   The end product is 200 grams of both colours.  I am pleased with the colours as I had looked on line and it seemed that other people had got very weak colours and I was worried as it is a little early in the year and we have had so little sun.

Purple Headed Mountain

This yarn is named after a line in the well known hymn   'All Things Bright and Beautiful'   which was written at Markree Castle.    I was getting withdrawal symptoms as I had no fiber ready to spin and so had a dig around in my fiber stash and came out with these colours.    The fibers are a mixture of long and short staple pure Wensleydale and a little Wensleydale X Suffolk.   I carded them individually first and then mixed them once on my drum carder and this just mixed the colours rather than blending them.     The yarn has a lot of texture,    thick and thin bits,  slubs and curls  giving it lots of character.  I ended up with 4 hanks all weighing around 100 grams which I then listed on Etsy
https://www.etsy.com/listing/151592229/purple-headed-mountain-hand-dyed-and?ref=shop_home_active

Fleece to Yarn Workshop May 18th and 19th

Pretty well all organised  for the workshop.  Plenty of fleece washed and ready for everybody to  card and spin   Yarn mordanted,  ready to dye with nettles.  The nettles are growing fast and there should be more than enough to dye the yarn.   It will be exciting to see what colours we get.   Pots of commercial dyes and food dye for you all to have a go and of course raw fleece to wash. There are still some places available to book contact  info@markreecastle.ie or telephone 0719167800