Sleepy Feline Tuesday

Yesterday, as Monday's tend to be around here, was filled with groceries, housework, and things that HAVE to get done. There was no knitting or spinning so I give you Ramius. As soon as we wake up in the morning and get moving around, he comes back to bed, makes a nest, and goes to sleep. He allowed his picture to be taken this morning before he fell asleep (probably because he'd already made the nest in the blanket and it was warm).

I did get a bit of reading done last night. Remember when I said I wanted to learn to dye wool with "real" (versus food color) dyes? Well, I have ordered a few colors of Landscapes Dyes and downloaded some information about various techniques with them (there are links in the page I linked to above, just above the color listing), and now I'm trying to decide what to do. I do think white wool, and the natural sheep colors, are beautiful, but I'm easily bored by spinning any great quantity of it, and without dyeing, I'm pretty much locked into spinning either natural sheep colors or whatever is available commercially, including the smaller fiber dyers. If I get a wild hair for a certain color of sweater, made out of a certain type of wool, I either won't find exactly what I'm looking for, or I won't find anywhere near what I was looking for and I'll have to change my plans. The food color dyes work OK, but I have yet to get a stable purple or pink and I can only get an orange red, not a blue red and for my coloring, I need to wear blue reds. So that brings me back to dyeing. At some point this week, I'm going to dye something, anything, just to get my feet wet. I chose the Landscapes Dyes because they don't require you to add a mordant for them to bond with the fiber (no additional acids are needed, they are already in the dye). Have any of you used these dyes? Any additional words of wisdom beyond what is on the web? Whenever I do get a chance to do some dyeing, I'll be sure to get lots of pictures!