DYEING THE THREADS

 The threads were first soaked in a soda/salt solution for about an hour. Skeins can be laid out in a litter tray. The plastic bottles need to be filled with water to weight them down in the plastic bowl. Pack as many bottles into the bowl as possible as this will reduce the amount of soda solution you need to fill the container. Make sure that the threads are fully immersed.

 

I mix my dyes up in jam jars and then pour out small amounts into plastic pots. The dye in these pots will become contaminated with soda salt solution as I dip my paint brush in and out so that any dye left over will not be able to be reused. The dye in the jam jars however can be stored somewhere cool, such as a garage, and will keep for use at a later date.

 

1/4 inch and 1/2 inch brushes are ideal for painting the dye onto the threads. The colours can be painted on in stripes or completely randomly. Garden gravel trays are great for standing your dyes and threads in. (helps contain any spillages)  

 

Skeins can be laid flat in the bottom of these trays and several threads painted together.

 

I use thin plastic bags to cover each painted thread bottle and cut long pieces of plastic from rubbish sacks to wrap the skeins, several at a time.

 

These are then rolled up and put into a container

 

All the threads are left over night before I rinse them well using first cold water and then warm water with a few drops of synthrapol rinsing detergent (if you don't have any, use washing up detergent instead). Finally they are rinsed until no more dye is being lost. The threads on the bottles remain on the bottles for the whole process which will stop some of those terrible tangles.

 

 

Finally the threads can be hung up to dry. These garden tags are really useful for attaching the bottles and hangers to the washing line. Not sure what the neighbours think about our strange washing! 

 

For this batch of threads, which were mostly different weights of silks, I used emerald green, lime green, forest green, bright yellow and a medium blue.

 

These were the thicker threads which I will store on the hanger for now.

 

These are a very fine mulberry silk which I can use for hand stitching or machine stitching so I like to wind some onto cotton reels to use straight on the sewing machine.

 

These are slightly thicker mulberry silk - great for hand stitching but can also be used in the spool on the sewing machine.

 

 

These are some threads I dyed a couple of weeks ago, using up various odds and ends of dye which I had stored for some time, so a complete mixture of colours.

 

 

Preparing Threads for Dyeing

Had a good day dyeing threads at the inspire group the other week and decided it was time to dye some more. I have used a lot in stitching lately and I am low on some colours.
The preparation is time consuming but it is worth it to prevent the threads tangling during the dyeing process.

 

If the threads are reasonably thick, I wind them into skeins, tie the loose ends together and then tie a different thread around the skein in at least 3 places (not too tight though as this may prevent the die penetrating and leave a white mark).

If the skein has more than about 20 wraps, tie them with a figure of 8 to help keep the threads apart and allow the dye to penetrate. The skeins can then be soda soaked in litter trays ready for dying.

If I am dyeing fine thread which is likely to tangle during dyeing process (to the point where you just want to throw it in the bin!), I use empty 2 pint plastic milk bottles. The thread can be tied to the handle to secure the ends and can remain on the bottles right through the dyeing, rinsing and drying processes. It is then easy to wind the thread off onto a spool/ cardboard tube etc. This process works well with natural fibres such as silk and wool as when wet, they will shrink onto the bottle and stay put. However, if you are using rayon or viscose, this tends to get heavier when wet and slides off the bottle. Best to use the skein method with these threads and dye in smaller amounts.

Just a few more bottles to go and then they will be ready for soaking.

An embroidered story book

 

 

 

 

Finally managed to finish my latest embroidered book, The Elephant's Child, based on a favourite story from my childhood - written by Rudyard Kipling. I wanted to enter it into the West Midlands Embroiderers' Guild Regional Day competition - "A Story in Stitch". It was finished with just hours to spare! Managed to use up quite a lot of my dyed fabric and thread.

 

It tells of a time when elephants had only short, stubby noses. One small elephant, The Elephant's Child, was full of "satiable curtiosity" (he asked ever so many questions).

 

All the animals were tired of his questions and spanked him for his curiosity.

Then one day he asked "What does the Crocodile have for dinner?"

He was sent by Kolakola bird to the banks of the Limpopo River to find out.

There he met the Bi-coloured Python Rock Snake and finally, the Crocodile, who decided to try Elephant's Child for his dinner and grabbed the elephant's nose and pulled and pulled  until it became a long trunk. Fortunately the Elephant's Child escaped, but his nose remained a long trunk. He soon discovered that it could be quite useful!

And that is how the elephant got his long trunk.