A Sow's Ear, A Silk Purse, and a Bowl of Soup

Skeins of yarn waiting to be dyed.  L to R - Tunis, Romney, Shetland, and Wensleydale

In the world of fiber and yarn, sometimes things simply refuse to go as planned.  Mildred and I had been planning for months to experiment with dyeing yarn with black turtle beans.  I had read every blog on it, every Ravelry post, and we had viewed photos of yarns in various shades from gray to greenish to turquoise to indigo blue.  It appeared that black turtle beans produced the most reliable color, so we bought beans from the local co-op.  We had spun up two pounds of yarn to dye.  We thought we had it nailed.  We were wrong.

Using alum and cream of tartar as a mordant (a dye fixative), we carefully weighed the skeins and measured the correct amount of alum and cream of tartar into my large dye kettle, then gently put in the skeins, which had been soaking in water.  We heated the water slowly and simmered the skeins for an hour to bind the mordant to the yarn.  I rinsed the skeins the following day and hung them to dry.  So far, so good.

The black turtle beans (7 pounds of them!) were soaked for 48 hours in a food-safe kettle, and on Friday night, we re-wet the skeins and carefully - oh, so carefully - skimmed off the soaking water with a ladle, pouring the liquid through a sieve into the clean dye pot so that no bean particles or sludge would contact the yarn, which we had read would cause the yarn to turn grayish,rather than the blue we were hoping for.  We then lowered the skeins into the dye pot and left the pot on the floor to soak.  The beans were put into containers, and we froze them for use in soups later since they were just soaked and not spoiled or fermented.

I checked the skeins periodically.  The yarn turned from a pinkish color to a grayish color to a bluish-green, but the skeins didn't seem to be absorbing the color well.  I gently stirred the skeins from time to time, hoping that all would be well.

On Sunday morning, we took the skeins out of the depot and rinsed them to see what the results were.  It was not a pretty sight.

A dyer's disaster - (clockwise from top left - Tunis, Wensleydale, Romney, Shetland)

The yarn was bluish-grey with greenish-brown splotches.  f you can imagine a Confederate army uniform that has been buried in a horse stall (with the horse) for a week, you'll have an idea of what we had.  This was a dyer's disaster.  While parts of some of the skeins were sort of an interesting aqua color, the brownish splotches spoiled them completely.  The Wensleydale skein was beyond ugly.  It looked like part of a costume piece from a zombie movie.  This was particularly unfortunate as it had been spun for my friend, Leah, who had been given the wool by Neil Kentner, a notable Wensleydale breeder and wool judge.  

Clearly, an overdye was needed, so out came the big dye pot again, and we filled it with water.  I added about a cup of white vinegar and then combined about a tablespoon each of two Jacquard acid dyes - turquoise and brilliant blue - and stirred them into the dye pot along with a fervent hope that all would be well.  

We slowly brought the yarn up to a simmer, left it simmering gently for an hour, then let it cool for a few hours before taking the yarn out.

To our immense relief and pleasure, the results were better than we could have hoped.  The black bean disaster had created a lovely base for the blue overdye, and the hideous brownish blotches had absorbed the dye in a slightly different way, mellowing into subtle, slightly deeper blue shades which added depth to the yarn.  It would have been impossible to create this color without the prior disaster.  The skeins from each breed of wool are just a little bit different than the others, and all of them are stunning and rich.

The re-dyed skeins - Wensleydale, Shetland, Tunis, and Romney

I can't explain why the original dyeing went so wrong, resulting in such muddy colors.  I suspect it may be because we have hard water in our area and have to use water softener salt, but the next time I want to do a natural dye lot for blue, I'll be using tried and tested indigo or woad.

A happy ending:  Since the beans that we had soaked for dyeing had been frozen, I took some out and Mildred and I decided to celebrate our (eventual) success by making bean soup and home baked bread.

Note to self: There is a reason why black beans are not included as a reliable dye source in books on natural dyeing.  The results can be appalling.

Note to self #2:  When in doubt, prepare to overdye.