Last spring I bought some silk yarn to dye.

 

I ‘ve shown it before in my Midwest Moonlight scarf. It is beautiful stuff.  However, thanks to Sara, I now realize that it had not been properly processed when I purchased it.  Can you say *YUCK* ?  I can… YUCK!  Sara helped me with some new vocabulary words (no, not YUCK), sericin and soda ash.  I have been reprocessing this yarn.  What a job.  First, I simmered the khaki colored silk in an alkali bath for a couple hours. Then I poured off the sericin laden water.

That’s the really yucky dark coffee colored wash water.  Smells like what it looks like.  Not coffee.  Then I rinsed.  Here’s the kicker, after the brown left, the yarn started to bleed lots and lots of blue!  BLUE! 

I rinsed until the blue was gone.  It took many more very hot
rinses.  The final rinse left me with a lovely silver grey yarn. 

Ready to dye. 

All this can only lead me to believe that the original manufacturer did not
process this fiber correctly.  Obviously, I am not an expert, a beginner at best.  But seeing
all of this is enough to make me wonder how often is it unsafe to wear
commercially dyed fabrics.  I’ve long held the belief that you should
NEVER wear anything until it’s been washed.  At least get
the formaldehyde out of it. Who’d want perc or whatever cleaning agents
they use next to your skin.  Well, let me tell you, after this little
pre-dye foray, I am wondering if any of it is what it seems.  At least
I know the stuff I dye has cleared.  This commercial stuff was dyed on
top of uncleared dye on top of uncleaned silk.  Can you say YUCK?

After all that, I needed a walk.  It was drizzly and cool and the light was perfect.  I visited my Rock.

Then it was time to dye some silk.  Coming up next…

Sammy came racing into the house, his tail all bushed out, running, as fast as Sammy can run, down the stairs to my office.  A cat fight, I thought.  But I hadn’t heard any cat ruckus. Zak and Bu were sitting in the sun on the deck.  If there had been a fight, they’d be heading indoors, too.  Weird.  I went downstairs and called for Sam.. nowhere, he must be hiding.  I found him wedged behind some boxes.  I saw his eyes and then, I saw his poor sweet little face.  I carried him into the light.  An animal couldn’t scrape his face up, not like that.  When I saw his frayed claws, worn to the quick, I knew he’d been hit by a car.  By that time, I also knew nothing was broken.  I’d already checked his back, his tail, his mouth.. everything.  I left him to hide under the bed for a bit while I considered what I knew, and what I didn’t.  Then we headed to the vet and got a blood test and an x-ray, just to be sure.   We were SO lucky.  He’s stiff, he’s sore, he’s frightened.  He looks beat up.  When dinner came around, he ate everything on his plate and finished what Zak left behind.  Appetite is always a good sign.  I was frazzled. The day took all the stuffing out of me.  I did what I always do when I have to chill.. I went for a walk.  More than any day so far this winter, I could feel spring pushing through.  The light is different, the stream is running strong between the still frosted banks.   Bright chartreuse moss is showing up where the snow has melted off.  After dusk, I stood on the deck, listening.  Any time now I expect to hear the first peepers.  No knitting.  Some music, some reading and a pot of tea.  Sam and I need sleep.

   

 

I’m busy..

Yes, those are patterns.