Mother of Batman!

I'm continuing to do straight samples and simple mixes of the dyes I have. Holy Mother of Batman, are they intense! I figure I can comb some white into them, or even add it at the wheel. Good thing neon is back in fashion. I'm using roving I got a while back, from a sweater factory that went out of business. It's decent, but seems very processed. I'm not complaining, it was cheap and I have a humongous bag! By the time I get through it, I may get some some sophisticated colour going on.

              Look, I'm being so organized and putting little samples into a binder.

I think these were my last batch. Yellow, black, turquoise/navy mix and navy. (Ciba dyes)

 Then I got all fancy and did fushia with one part black, two parts black, three parts, four.

 I have a great book, that I think might help. It's for printing and gives percentages of mixes, all with cyan, magenta, yellow and black. (as apposed to red, yellow and blue) To do the samples I'm putting a chunk of roving into a cup with the dye stocks, then transferring them into baggies and then using a vegetable steamer. They're coming out uneven, just the way I hoped. More interesting for spinning with the variation I think.

 These greens and blues were the very first attempts. I didn't steam these, just a post on the stove. (immersion) When I saw the colour, that's when I decided to do smaller samples! Ha. At least I was smart enough to use the bad roving I bought, back when I didn't know what good roving looked like. I figured if I screwed it up too badly I wouldn't be as upset. Of course I felted it, cause I let the pot boil!

To save it, I've been combing little bits here and there, creating some new shades by mixing them on the hackle and combing them out. I've been stashing them in my plate rack and I'm loving the burst of colour there. I can't wait to spin some of this up.

Thanks for visiting. If you have any questions, I'm more than happy to share.
Happy spinning!