The busy day of Friday.

Friday is my day off. I therefore try to cram as much as i can in. It was too hot to go to the gym so i decided to dye up some more yarn and sunbath.

Here are the willow leaves & twigs cooking up along side dinner :). A combination of spaghetti, meatballs and willow that smells like lemon when cooking is a very odd combination.









I am dyeing up some wool mix for someone on Ravelry and this is my process -


I presoaked in citric acid and mixed up Cerulean blue with some lemon yellow.
I microwaved for 5 mins and left it to cool.
When I rinsed it out it was very green so i though i would put it in for a second blast.
I rinsed it through again and its a nicer blue/green but a bit patchy.
Hopefully when its balled up it will look nicer.

A pot of Willow

Im am boiling a pot of Willow leaves and twigs today. I cut these from my tree that is far too big for my liking and chopped them with my secutures and filled the tub with water. I planned to wizz them in my blender like i had read but it just jammed the machine up.

I have put them all in my pot and brought it up to boil. This has been by far my most pleasent smelling dye to date, smelling of a strange lemon zest, but i have only got fermenting bean & smokey tea to campare.
I am going to use wool this time and follow all the correct procedures and NOT in an excited frenzy think that it is ok to not wait for it to cool or keep touching the wool so it felts.

On the way home today i spied a eucalyptus tree with the long thin leaves, now i have to just pluck up the courage to ask if i can have some leaves. In the mean time the guy from work reckons hes has a eucalyptus at his farm and i should have some by monday!

I rinsed out my tea soaked cotton today as you can see above. I will post a dry picture tomorrow.