Category: Dyeing

Yarn and politics might seem like a sort of odd mix until you start looking around on the internet and realizing that there are an awful lot of political knitters out there.  Really.

On the yarn front, this week I’ve been dyeing this.

The yarn is a lace weight blend of silk and a fiber spun from seaweed.  It’s very soft.  It’s intensely beautiful, and sadly, it is all for custom orders and I do not get to keep any of what is already dyed, although I have plans to save some of this yarn for me.  I’m dreaming of lace scarves in a simple pattern like feather and fan.

On the politics front, I want to share a really touching story that a friend who was an Obama poll watcher told me.  He was at an old church called Mount Zion, a ballot box that was primarily African American.  As he stood outside, he saw a woman who he later learned was 80 years old walk out of the building in tears. 

He asked her what was wrong and found out that they had invalidated her ballot.  Through her tears she told him she had waited all this time, and now she was going to die without voting for a black man for president.  "No you’re not m’aam.  You can vote for one today," was the response.  They took her back into the polling place, only to learn that the machine spit her ballot back out and instead of understanding she could redo the ballot, she walked out in tears.  The situation explained, she obtained a ballot and was able to vote.

And it’s just that simple.  It’s all about helping others.

I don’t use the word perfection lightly.  In fact, I don’t particularly believe in perfection.  But for me, at least right now, this is it.

Perfection in a sock yarn! I am really in love with how these colors play together.  So, I apologize for the tackiness of rhapsodizing on and on about my own yarn, but this one is just the right yarn for the way I’m feeling right now.  Although I truly am not permitted to start another project until I finish at least one, I’m trying to decide what to do with this yarn.  Should it be socks?  I have a few skeins and could also do a wrap, but it would have to be something simple to let the colors show through.  What to do?

You know how I knew it really was perfect?  My seventeen year old gave it the ultimate teenage seal of approval.  He asked for naming rights and called it "Nightingale."  Oh my.

And one last thought: if you’re in a Mega-Super-Tuesday state in the United States, go out and VOTE tomorrow.  Vote even if your weather sucks.  The whole point of living in a participatory democracy is to participate.  So get out there and do it!

It’s a cold January day, with a forecast of *S*N*O*W* for Alabama — an almost unheard of event.  I thought I would give you a sneak peak of the new colorways in my dyepots, to help warm up your day.  Does that sound like fun?

There are a few that I have been dyeing up batches of and haven’t offered anywhere yet.

They include Jonquil, pictured here on cashmere.

I’m in love with cashmere right now and have kilos coming in. 

Then there is Blue Eggs & Ham (as most of you know, the children generally get naming rights on new colorways)

I’m afraid this late evening photo doesn’t capture the sheen and depth of this colorway, but Ellie pronounced it her all time favorite, which is saying quite a lot.  Pictured here on a bamboo blend sock yarn.

This is Pellucidly.  I had to look that word up when I came across it in a recent Supreme Court opinion.  It describes this yarn pefectly.

I love pink.  Girly-girl pink.  So I decided to do an almost solid pink for spring.  This has some very gentle, subtle color transitions, and knits up into a really nice, makes the light around you look beautiful, not quite solid color.  Its called Pink Love.

And, because every family in the South has one, this is renegade, on a wonderful Alpaca/Merino blend.

There are also a couple of colorways that I have already previewed.  Katie is the most popular new colorway since Treasure premiered.  I find that the feminine but not-too-girly Katie looks fabulous on every single fiber I have tried it out on! 

Finally, there is Satellite, a Mardi-gras riot of welcome to spring colors.

*Sigh* I love them all.  Dyeing is an awful lot of fun.

And now, here is a surprise.  I no longer am able to do custom orders because of the whole volume thing.  But I’m in love with these new colorways and thought it would be fun to offer a few customs, say five of them (maybe a few more or less depending on the number of skeins in each order).  So, if you want a custom order, be one of the first five people to email me at Joyce at Elliebelly dot com.  You can pick any of these colorways on any of my instock fibers, which currently include, well, a whole lot.  Cashmere, Silk, Blue Faced Leicester, Merino, Organic Merino, Alpaca, Bamboo, and more.  I will also be happy to do solid trim skeins for you along with a custom.  The only catch is that it will likely be February before customs go out — certainly no later than mid-February.  If you’re interested, just let me know.