Tuesday, March 27, 2007

One of those days....

 
You know the kind...

The kind of day when you spend ages creating a post - uploading pictures, finding links, writing out recipes/patterns, that kind of thing.

Then Blogger eats the post

It's the kind of day when you go to make some toast - and you burn it

The sort of day that finds you heading to the bread bin - and realising that you just burnt the last of the bread....

Oh well, back to the drawing board. The Last Post has gone - goodbye, farewell, I may try to resurrect your glory on the future.

Meanwhile, I've been saving up lots of this

And doing some of this......

...to get this

Looks pretty gross, right? And it was actually, MR India said he would divorce me if I ever did it again would I please not boil up coffee grounds when he is in the house.

So, what I have actually been doing is trying to dye yarn with coffess grounds. Apparently coffee contains a natural mordant, so 'all' you need to do is boil the saved up grounds for a couple of hours, strain the liquid off and then boil your fibre in it for an hour or so.

The big challenge now will be to rinse the coffee out without felting the fibre. To this end, I am letting the fibre cool completely so it won't get the kind of nasty shock that makes all of the scales cling to each other in fright.

Another problem is going to be those little coffee grounds that escaped when I was filtering. But then, these little hiccups are 'part of the irregularities that add to the charm of a handcrafted product.'
Right?

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7 Comments:

Blogger yvette said...

That looks, em, interesting India!

8:17 am  
Blogger Twelfthknit said...

HI Yvette, looks very unimpressive, doesn't it? Now that it's drying it looks quite nice - sort of the same colour as Tussah silk - honeyish, but without the sheen.
India

9:07 am  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It doesn't look spectacular, but you might get an interesting effect if you overdye it with black walnut hulls (do you have those there?) or something yellow. What do you think?

5:34 pm  
Blogger Twelfthknit said...

I think I might actually have black walnut hulls - if I can find the package, I think I'll give it a go.
India

6:15 pm  
Blogger Kathleen said...

I love your adventuring spirit, India. x K

6:32 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks India for all your help! My problems have been solved in the most easy and satisfying way. I can help with one of yours too - you left a lovely but lonely trekking sock in the shop today :-)
Would you like me to post it to you, or hand it over to L when I see her?

XX

8:17 pm  
Blogger Flavaknits said...

I'm thinking mud pies and those bits of sheeps fleece that always got caught in the barbed wire.
I like the idea of coffee smelling yarn (especially since I knit in a cafe) this could catch on! Can't wait to see the progress.

8:35 pm  

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