It's 1320 yards of fingering weight yarn, and it ended up being half a pack of orange Kool-Aid a hank, overdyed with ten bags of tea per hank. I have another skein of the same yarn, but in a different colour, sort of a "Fireworks" colourway, a friend likes to call it, so I'm going to use that for a contrast, somehow. I'm thinking sweater, but who knows.
I also just rewatched the movie version of MOA. I've seen it before, when it first aired, and I still like it. I was just really annoyed at the beginning when Igraine was using a spinning wheel! Unless someone went to China or India to get one for her, there's no way she was using a spinning wheel in England the 5th or 6th century. Was it too hard to get the actresses to use spindles? My boyfriend told me no one else probably noticed this, and I know spinning wheels look entirely more theatrical and dramatic, and yes, it's just a movie, but, it annoyed me.
On another note, is there any music any of you MOA veterans recommend for getting in the mood of designing and knitting a related garment?
6 comments:
No music suggestions, really, but that yarn is gorgeous! What an eye you have to take a pack of Kool-Ade and make that happen! How very impressive.
Can't wait to see how beautifully it knits up....
When I knit, and I don't happen to be watching a movie or something, I love to listen to my celtic cd's. Misty Celtic Morning, etc. Anything that has harps & flutes with background nature sounds. I also love listening to Loreena Mckennit, Enya, so on and so forth.
Oh, I almost forgot. That's a beautiful color. Itsn't kool aid dyeing fun? I've never heard of using tea for yarn though. What does that entail?
your wool is amazing...well done, so impressive what you have created. I agree with Ami, off the top of my head I would think that any of the Celtic mysticism collections would be great mood music...Enya, Loreena, Niamh Parsons, anything with that kinda feel. I have to say that I am a sucker for knitting while listening to podcasts so maybe a celtic history or another kind of historically related podcast would get you in the mood.
Tea dyeing is fairly easy, people have been doing it for ages on all manner of whites.
All you need is a pot big enough for whatever you want to dye, and a lot of tea. More tea than you think you'll need, because it always ends up being lighter in the end. I just put the teabags in at the beginning, bring it to a boil, take them out, put whatever I'm dyeing in, and let it boil for about ten minutes. Then I turn off the heat and squish it down with a potato masher, and leave it for another few minutes. Take it out, rinse with lukewarm water, not cold because we don't want the yarn to even THINK about starting the felting process, and hang it up somewhere. It works better in the summer when you can hang it outside.
Some people put vinegar in it too, as you would dyeing other things, but I've read tea has natural acids in it that holds the dye. I waited a day inbetween the Kool-Aid dyeing, and the tea overdyeing.
It smells a lot better than the Kool-Aid/vinegar dyeing too!
That's beautiful! Excellent job!
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