Friday, July 29, 2005

Dogs

Well Silky came home this afternoon, I don't know if she'll heal up or not, until she does she gets to wear this fashionable object. Need I say she's absolutely miserable? She has an abcess of some sort, they don't know what it's from but I still believe it has to do with the pencil she ate earlier in the week.

Yes she's a Weimeraner, a blue one to be exact.

Looking a bit Victorian! Posted by Picasa

Tonights sky taken at home. Posted by Picasa

Thursday, July 28, 2005

Life, Dogs and Dyeing

Well I didn't get to go out and photograph the sky tonight. We rushed the Weimeraner, dumb dog, to ISU Veternary Hospital around 5ish. She has this big wound thing on the side of her face, her neck and thoat were all swollen as well. So far they have ruled out a bite or a sting. Now they are trying to figure out what the problem is. The only thing I can think of is she ate a pencil earlier in the week, like I said dumb dog.

So no pictures, sorry.

But I did manage to finally get black with natural dyes, I also got two different kinds of grey, a warm gray with reddish undertones and a coolish grey kinda on the blue side. And then there's the mottled grey. This thus far has been with silk cocoons.

I am hoping, its more of a fantasy right now, of dyeing some mohair this weekend in hair and skin colors. I had a really rich mahogany color but I over dyed it with indigo to get the black. It took twelve dips in indigo to get it dark enough, then they were overdyed in cochineal and then in osage orange. But I think I may have finally gotten jet black. We'll see tomorrow once they are dry. I'll post pics this time I promise.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005


Angel. Posted by Picasa

Sunsets and Cool Temps

The heat has finally abated, I don't know if this weekend will be a scorcher or not, I'm just going to enjoy tonight's lows.

Hubby took me for a wonderful trip outside of town tonight. Neither one of us felt like doing anything so we went north west of town and watched the sun set! It was really nice out tonigh, cool and breezy, no bugs, and very quite. Except for the occasional interloper. The birds were quite happy as well.

I took a bunch of photos, until my digital camera died on me. I really wish I had the D100 camera body, to compliment my F100 body. My little digital camera is not the greatest, and I'm starting to see that it's choices of colors, which I cannot override, are not the best.

I took Angel with us, she needed a night out as well. Because she's so small and likes to take off like a shot we let her loose in the bed of the truck, while we stood outside and watched the sun set.

Tonights Sunset Part 3 Posted by Picasa

Tonights Sunset Part 2 Posted by Picasa

Tonights Sunset Posted by Picasa

Afternoon Sky - Five Minutes Later Posted by Picasa

Afternoon Sky Posted by Picasa

Saturday, July 23, 2005

Yard Sales, Wool, & Winter

I went yard saling yesterday, hence the purse find. I also scored 6 really nice baskets, for a $1.50. If you haven't guessed it I love to get a bargin. One has a handle on it, it's rather large, I put my dyed cotswold silk noil blend in it, now to hang it from the ceiling. This is a tabby cat proofing method. Otherwise he'll continue to sleep on it and felt my precious wool. Can't have that now can we!

I now have some cotswold wool, in grey and in white that I need to dye a moss green. I had silk noil it needs to be dyed a dark blue/navy. I just need to buy the cushings dyes, get it dyed and carded (I have a Louet Drum Carder), blended, recarded and I can spin away. I"m planninig on knitting myself a blanket shawl. I have a wool shawl I knitted but it's a triangle, I want a rectangle a big rectangle.

Winter is coming early this year folks. All indications in nature are saying so. I've even seen ducks and geese flying south and it's too early for this behaviour. Hence I'm going to get the woolies done up early this year. They keep saying on the local weather, that we haven't had weather like this since 1965. I asked my dad about the winter of '65, he was stationed in Grand Forks that year. His comment was it was the coldest snowest winter he ever lived through. Since the weather is consistantly a month early I'm concluding that winter will be a month early. Well a girl can dream can't she!

Friday, July 22, 2005


Mid morning sky Posted by Picasa

Interior Dimensions

The interior dimensions are 4 x 6 x 2 inches. making the interior smaller than the exterior. it kinda concaves inward on the sides and has a metal picture frame looking frame on the insides of the lids.

Altered Purse Potential

Ok I picked this up at a yard sale this afternoon for a whole whopping fifty cents! I want to alter it, and give my very own touch. The inside has been ripped out and needs some serious TLC, oh and did I mention it's small!

7.5 l x 5.25 w x 5.5 h to the top of the handle, when the handle is flattened out. The case has a crack in the front right corner, it's some sort of plastic. The handle stands 3" tall and is metal.


Based on how the interior looks it's either very old or went through a lot of water. It' smells like a basement on dryer sheets.

Top of Purse Posted by Picasa

Inside of purse Posted by Picasa

Back of Purse Posted by Picasa

Front of purse Posted by Picasa

Inside of the Purse Posted by Picasa

Some Inky Cap Mushrooms Posted by Picasa

Morning Sky Posted by Picasa

Morning Sky Posted by Picasa

Composting Fabric

This piece has been in the back yard for about 4 weeks now. It started out in the brazilwood bath but I had to toss the dyebath out because it was pretty rank. That and I needed my dyepot back! So it's just been sitting there, the green is a nice contrast to the dirty red color. The fabrics are a combination of cotton and nylons, and I think there might be some alpaca in the mix, the alpaca was in the bottom of the dye pot.

I have way too much stuff to do today, and all I want to do is take a nap. I slept much better last night, one hubby was home, he spent the night in the sleep lab at the hospital the night before, and two we didn't have a major thunderstorm. It rained so hard yesterday morning, ala 4:05 a.m. is when I woke up, that the house was shaking.

Rumor has it that global warming is on the rise due the large number of middle aged women moving to Greenland ;-0 Sounds pretty good to me right now, either we are in a heatwave or someone failed to turn my hot flash o-meter off! I"m a winter person, give me winter or give me winter!

Composting Fabric on my lawn, it's been there about 4 weeks now. Posted by Picasa

Wednesday, July 20, 2005

Surreal Moon Shots

Well in order to get a shot that isn't blurry I'd have to dig out a tripod, and my digital camera doesn't fit to my tripod, it takes a different mount.

So let me tell you it's kinda sorta cloudy out, the kind of clouds that when I see them in the evening I immediately think impending dangerous thunderstorm in on the verge of developing. The fact that it's humid to the point of being tropical outside is not good. It's about 80 degrees outside, and it's almost midnight. I thought they only had weather like this at the equator!

Blurry Surreal Moon Shot Posted by Picasa

Friday, July 15, 2005

Blue Hair

So far I think that Quebracho Yellow and Quebracho Red are my "new" favorite colors. I decided I don't like Myrobalan as the color is NOT coming out the way it's supposed to. I keep gettng dirty blond and it's supposed to be butter yellow.

I dyed a bunch of Mohair blue, with indigo, this is a base color for some of the browns and black colors, mainly browns. I'm going to try for Raven Black tomorrow, but I'll need to get more Mohair first.

The Quebracho Red it kind of a champaign pink color, way cool, that was with 1 tps of QR to about one quart of water. No alum here, QR is a substantative dye and doesn't need any alum.