Dyeing Day

My friend, Mary, came over today to do some fun dyeing. The pink and white is some of the raw merino fleece squirted with dye and heated in the microwave. The top left which doesn't show up but came out beautiful was my first experience with crockpot dyeing. I soaked the alpaca roving in vinegar and water, spun it out in my washing machine, then layered it into my crockpot. On each layer I would sprinkle dry, dye powder using plum, marine, and raspberry. I simmered it about 2 hours and am very pleased with the results. Will definitely do this again.

The pale colors in the left pictures are a light fawn alpaca (Beau) rainbow dyed and processed in the microwave.

The center picture of Mary shows her adding dyes to her sheep roving which we microwaved for about 5 minutes. Mary is a fellow spinner and excited for this roving to dry to see how it spins out. (She will probably kill me for putting her picture in here.)