I know I’ve talked about Spin-Off before, but Winter 2008 is a particularly appealing issue. You don’t have to be a spinner to appreciate the fiber information, excellent patterns and inspirational articles. This issue focuses on color. The article on managing color as you spin was particularly dangerous! The basic concept is how to work with two colors of roving, as you spin, to design wonderfully dynamic yarn.

I read the article on Wednesday and spent the entire evening dyeing four colors of roving. I knew all the roving, that’s been sitting in a bin in my closet, would have a good purpose. If you are interested in dyeing roving, here is a fantastic tutorial.

I used only one color for each group of my roving. I started by laying out the dry roving on the living room floor. I kept rearranging it until I had 8 equal lengths. I folded up each group of two strands and wrapped it up into a white cotton kitchen towel. The kind I use when I’m baking bread. I put the four towel sausages into a warm bath of water to soak for an hour. The towel wrapping was necessary to keep my four sections seperate. And, they allowed me to spin the four bundles in the washing machine to get rid of excess water.

After that, I followed the tutorial instructions except only using one color. I used Jacquard Dyes in Teal, Chartreuse, Gold Ochre and Emerald. I still plan on working with only two bits of roving colors at a time but I’m going to mix up all four colors into combinations. I won’t get started until January. It will be nice to have such a colorful, stimulating project to begin in the New Year.

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