I’m Back

I’m back. Maybe. Maybe not. I’ll see how it goes. I have to re-learn how to post particularly the pictures which, if I remember correctly, is what led me to abandoning this blog the last time. Is it strictly necessary that I have to re-learn everything all the time? Can’t something just stick in my head for a while?

 

Dandelions

Dandelions.  I love them.

They have received very bad press and I don’t know why.  They are really quite pretty, the way the petals arrange themselves.  Only their obvious and blatant success at reproducing  has earned them their bad name.  If they were difficult to grow we would  rush to garden centers to buy them and we would join societies with monthly meetings  dedicated to propogating them.  Having said all that, I picked about 150 of  the flowers and stems and made a dye out of them.

The wool on the left  was dyed with the dandelions and turned out  pale yellow.  The wool on the right is  a sample of the wool before dying.  It is handspun and mordanted in alum and cream of tartar. I think, had the dye bath been stronger, I would have got a stronger colour.

 

Trying For Orange

I may not  know a lot but I think  I can recognize the colour orange when I see it.  I can demonstrate:

These pumpkins and gourds are orange:

Theses leaves  are orange.

So, I when I read that marigolds, when used as a dye, will invariably give a stunning shade of orange I eagerly planted a couple of rows.  Into the dye pot they went where they simmered until all the colour left them.  I put in some pre-mordanted wool and got a colour that was definitely not orange.

I don’t know what you would call this colour but I think it is reminiscent of  1970′s carpeting.   Thinking that I had made some odd and isolated mistake I tried again using flowers from the same plants but a different dye pot.  I got the exact same colour.   I have no idea what went wrong.    Variations in colour is one of the interesting things about natural dyes – you just never know what you are going to get- but I understood that marigolds were one of the more predictable dyes.  Oh well, more research is required.

 

Something Completely Different

When it comes to dyeing wool I am usually quite content to  work with natural dyes.  There are enough plants and colour variations to keep a person entertained for a lifetime.  However, every once in a while it’s a good idea to shake things up a bit so I gathered together some roving, beads and a package a raspberry  Kool-Aid:

I used the microwave and the spinning wheel and made this:

Certainly a deviation from my normal spinning and dyeing techniques.  I don’t know when blue became the official colour for raspberry flavour but it does make a nice dye.  I mixed the Kool-Aid with water and put it and the wet wool in a microwave safe dish.  I cooked it for two minutes on high, waited two minutes then cooked it for another two minutes, rinsed the wool and let it dry.  I then spun two singles.  I threaded the beads, about three hundred of them, on some sewing thread and  spun the thread with one of the singles spacing the beads randomly along the length of wool.  Finally I plied the single with the beads with the single without the beads and declared the project complete.  Approximately 100 meters of worsted weight wool with beads spun into it.  I don’t know what I will make with this.   Maybe a hat?

 

Camping

We recently went on a little camping trip which I think is the best way  to ride out a  heat wave.  When the temperatures got too hot the lake was refreshing and we cooked our meals over a campfire.   Unfortunately due to a problem with the pump for their well  the drinking water  was declared unfit for human consumption.  This was a bit inconvenient since I  didn’t plan for that particular glitch.

The thing I like about this park is their reverence for the Black Rat Snake which results in these signs scattered around the park:

Not a sign you see very often.  It reminded me of another sign I saw recently which is also rare but really shouldn’t be:

 

Growing Tomatoes – Maybe

I don’t think things are going well in the tomato test garden.  I have plenty of blossoms:

Lots and lots and lots of blossoms in fact  but very little fruit:

The  few tomatoes that have condescended to grow are very small.  Am I being impatient?  How long does it take for a tomato plant to go from blossom to ripe fruit anyway? It is already mid- July and I think these plants  had better get motivated if they are going to produce anything by the first frost in September.    They have plenty of sun, lots of water and about two months to come up with something edible.

 

Onion Skin Dye

Last week I continued experimenting with natural dyes, this time using onion skins.

I used regular yellow onion skins that I had collected over time.  The natural coloured  wool was pre-mordanted, as usual, in cream of tartar and alum.  I was surprised by the colour.   I expected something  more yellow rather than this brown/gold colour.    These onions came from my uncle’s garden.  Somewhere along the line, without ever discussing it,  my uncle and I  have reached an agreement where he provides me with his onions, which are particularly sweet, and I provide him with maple syrup.   It works for us.

I think the next dye experiment will be with wild grape leaves  because the vines are growing like crazy  and interfering with the clothes line.  Not that the clothes line is much use right now with all the rain. Oh well.

 

Canada Day 2009

Yesterday we went for a bike ride to a small pioneer cemetary that is about two or three kilometers from where we live:

 

It seemed fitting to stop off at this cemetary on Canada Day.  Two families came from Scotland and settled here in the 1830′s. There are only about a dozen graves, the oldest is from the late 1800′s and the most recent dates in the 1960′s.  At the risk of sounding morbid, and I don’t think I am, I find old cemetaries fascinating.   First of all, there are trends in tombstones.  There was a period when all the tombstones seemed to have weeping willows on them, then that  trend died out ( of course the pun was intended) and  the weeping willow was replaced by another motif.   You just never see weeping willows on tombstones anymore.  References to lambs have always been popular on the graves of children.  I have seen many tombstones that say ‘the wife of so and so’ but have yet to see one that says ‘the husband of so and so’. Since families didn’t seem to move around very much,  several generations of  a family are often  buried in the same graveyard.  Lots of time can be spent speculating on whether this person was the son of that person,  etc.    Occasionally, by looking at the dates of death,  you can find  hints of other things that were going on.  Sometimes you will  find a tombstone saying several people from the same family died in the same year.   An illness?  A fire?  So really , hours of entertainment can be found at an old cemetary.  I’ve noticed plenty of pioneer cemetary signs on the  backroads around here and I think I might stop and take a look at some of them.  Anyway, enough about that.  After paying our respects to the pioneers we went into town, had a picnic and stared at the brilliant blue sky:

Eventually night came,  as is it’s habit,  and the sparklers came out:

No eyes were injured.

And, finally, the fireworks:

Happy Canada Day

 

Tomatoes

I now have blossoms on my tomatoes.  I have no idea if  they are early or late for the season but I do know they are good:

It is very gratifying to watch the plants gradually develop.  Only a few months ago this plant was just a seed that I put in some soil and now it is beginning to form fruit.  It just doesn’t seem possible but the proof is right there in the garden.  Of course , it’s still early and  a lot can go wrong.  Some animals got into the garden and ate the tops off three of the plants but I don’t think any permanent damage was done.  I have since built a fence. Incidentally, I read the other day that tomato plants make a good  natural dye so I have that to look forward to.

 

Test Garden

This year the experiment garden is all about tomatoes.

 I  have never had much luck growing tomatoes which I blame on the fact that they do not thrive on neglect.  However, this year I planted six tomato plants in my special little plot and will devote to them the attention they deserve.  Or so I say now.  The purpose of this experiment is to find out how much fruit, measured by weight, these plants will produce.   All six plants are heritage tomatoes that I started from seed.  There are three Livingston Perfection, one Moscow, one Urbanite and one Howard German.  They got off to a late start due to the cold, wet spring but I think they will come ahead just fine.  The first task is to build a fence to keep  unwlecome animals out.