Welcome! I hope today finds you all happy, healthy and staying warm. We only got about 6" of snow from Sunday night's storm. Some areas not far from me got as much as 20". Now that's a lot of snow. I really don't feel bad that they got more than I did. . . 😁
As if I have not been busy enough putting away the Christmas decorations and re-decorating the house with the "normal" stuff, I decided to dye some wool. This formula was supposed to dye 1/2 yard of wool.
Well . . . I put the first half yard of wool in the dye pot and it soaked up dye so quickly I almost immediately took it out and put it in a basin with fresh water and vinegar. I then reduced the dye strength . . . a total of three more times. What was supposed to dye 1/2 yard of wool dyed 2 1/2 yards. The colors in the photo are not a good depiction of the true colors, but it gives you an idea of the differences depending on the dilution of the dye. Thankfully they are all useful reds. I went to the local wool shop and talked with the owner who has been hooking and dyeing for decades. She said a rule of thumb with dark color dyes is that a recipe should have a total of 1 teaspoon of dye give or take a little. She said the formula was incorrect. Live and learn.
So I did start hooking on my Granny rug and also am hooking more hearts. I keep giving them away so need to hook two for the auction to benefit the pugs. Thankfully they hook up quickly but the backs take about the same amount of time as the hooking. The house is about 98% put back together. I am not sure why it took me so long this year.
So tonight I wanted to make stuffed shells for dinner. I went to two grocery stores and neither had any boxes of large shells or manicotti. I bought lasagna noodles instead. Bare shelves are quite common, aren't they?
Thanks so much for stopping by.
Pug hugs 😊
Lauren
15 comments:
I couldn't believe our local Food Lion store where the meats were almost completely gone. Same thing at Walmart but they also had empty shelves of canned goods and other staples. I live in a chicken farming region (Perdue, Mountaire, and another well-known company and almost no chicken.
Maybe it is my monitor but none of that wool looked red, they looked in the purple dark pink range.
Loved seeing your Granny rug on Saundra's blog today ....looks great !
You were lucky with that storm ! We were spared too , we got mostly rain & freezing cold & wind .
Everyone is complaining about the stores being so empty & how much things cost too ....what a mess .
Enjoy Hooking away !!!
I love the colors you came out with. So all good. You are hooking up a storm.
I admit I am a bit of a hoarder. WE keep a very well stocked pantry. I have two of something
such as a box of pasta when I open one of them that is when I put it on my list to replenish. So I have time to find and restock before I run out. granted my pantry is not very large but it has served us well through all of this. We rarely have been out of anything. I went to the grocery store Thursday and the cereal aisle was almost bare. I found what Husband eats and got what I needed. But it is a sad state this country cannot even keep its food moving through the country. We are also trying to not make trips to the grocery a lot just when we do the full groceries. Mostly because of the prices and using up what we have.
Ok said my piece lol
Cathy
I love that color!! So yummy!! Well, we haven't seen that here,that I know of, it wasn't that way on Saturday. It seem like the last time I looked for shells there was only lasagna too. I am working on my Granny rug, but its not going as fast as I anticipated.
I am going to write down that color recipe. I just love how those wool turned out,
Have fun on your rug.
No snow here and I dont care if we get any more the rest of Winter. Love these colors. Whatcha planning on doing with these colors? Janice
Trying new dye recipes can bring some surprises.
If they are not colors you use a lot, you can always overdye the wool. Like Saundra, the colors look purple and a range of dark pink on my computer screen.
I went grocery shopping at our Co-op and the shelves were well-stocked except the Christie Soda Crackers. I grabbed 2 large boxes. Like Cathy, I'm a bit of a hoarder. I replenish my pantry shelves as I use the supplies but mostly I buy when things are on special.
Hugs,
Julia
Newburyarts wrote:
I know the formula...a couple of things could have produced the end results:
1) your water...really can make a difference
2) too much blue in one of those dyes and I suspect it is the black dye. These dyes are formulated and each batch can vary greatly.
3) take each dye seperately, use at least 1/32 in a glass of boiling water. Mix and look at the color or use a white paper towel. Then you will find which one is "off"
This is supposed to be a red with subtle blue overtones...but with the amounts differing on my monitor it really looks purple/plum
The maroon dye packet might also have too much blue in it as well. A test of each one will tell what went wrong. The colors you produced are beautiful and certainly can be mixed well in any rug. You can also dull them down with a mixture of khaki drab/ golden brown and woodrose to produce an antique background to either mix in with others or use the entire group.
Good luck!
Ok....need a photo redo as I'm seeing purple too....pretty, but definitely purply. Oh wait...nevermind...you have hearts to hook and finish. 😳 Don't get me started on shelves. Our local Menard's pet food section is wiped clean...and I stopped at the grocery store after my appt today, had two small fabric bags when I left and it $67....No meat whatsoever, no alcohol (I know, can you believe it?) and nothing whatsoever extravagant. I actually looked at the receipt when I got in my truck to make sure things weren't rung twice or something. Yikes. And I have things on my list that I haven't been able to get for months...despite going to different stores. This is getting real old real fast. ~Robin~
Love those colors, beautiful shades. We only got rain, so a few puddles in the yard, maybe snow later.
I miss stuffed shells and lasagna, but at least I don't have to worry about getting supplies. I have noticed though, the chicken we have been getting is not the best, so quality is down too.
Debbie
I made shells a few weeks ago. Not my usual brand of pasta or ricotta but they were good.
I have military blankets, green, ivory, gray, and two red plaid wool throws (woolrich) with fringe taking up a lot of room but hate to get rid of any wool.
I love to dye wool but it can be a gamble sometimes. I get especially frustrated when I need to dye more wool to match a batch I previously dyed and it comes out different.
The empty shelves are frustrating. We've been fortunate to never experience this phenomena in our lifetime but I suppose our parents' generation saw it during the war and the depression.
WOW! The wools are beautiful and you did achieve a range of colors. Grocery stores--during one of my recent shopping trips, I commented to the manager about the empty shelves and the number of skids of boxes sitting in the aisles waiting to be put on the shelves and he offered me a job!
I scoff at your cute little 6" of snow!! :) We got 30+, and that doesn't include drifts. Only 1.5 hours east of you, but what a difference it makes! Come on out.
Loving the reds. You are meticulous about all aspects of your hooking - from dyeing, to the actual hooking, to finishing. Beautiful work, as always.
Wow!! Hard to believe you got that much saturation in 2 1/2 yds. Of wool. Nice pieces, though. Think that things just take longer the older we get. I had a pile of stuff at the foot of my stairs that just kept getting bigger. Finally took it up yesterday. Blake didn’t even notice, so I guess it didn’t really matter. All the more reason for me to let it pile up again😜🤣🤣. Happy rest of the week.
I'm seeing purples also, especially the top wool. But there's so many variables (lighting, camera, monitor, coffee) between the actual wool and my eyes I'm going to take your word that they are reds. I've been tempted to learn more about dyeing linen due to the stories of woe ordering it and receiving linen that looks nothing like shown. But I'm such a slow stitcher it will be a long time before i need to worry about it. But just in case - what books or other resources are good to learn about dyeing? Is dyeing linen much different than wool?
So far, empty shelves haven't been too bad here. It seems what's empty one week is filled 2 weeks later. My guess is factories are focusing on their top sellers if they have to cut production on something. I'm trying to look at it as a lesson in being flexible and modifying recipes for what is available. And on what I *really* need to keep reserves on hand. There's far too much in the basement stash we don't eat normally, not so much of what we do eat.
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