September 16, 2008 - Tuesday
More results!!
Mushroom: old Phaeolus schweinitzii (Norwegian: gulrandkjuke, English: "butt rot" - tee hee)
Here is what old gulrandkjuke looks like before it's dried.
Mordant: alum (details about the mordanting here)
Ratio: 1:5 (5 g of dried mushroom to 25 g merino yarn)
Result:
And then! I found a whole bunch of Cortinarius Friday afternoon!!
Mushroom: Cortinarius semisanguineus (Norwegian: rdskivekanelslrsopp, English: Surprise Webcap or Red-gilled Webcap)
Mordant: alum
Ratio: 2:1 (20 g of dried mushroom to 10 g merino yarn)
Result:
*sigh* Isn't it gorgeous??
And this...
... (inspired by Adrian's adorable mushroom pulse warmers) is what I'm making with the yarns!
Posted at 5:57 pm |
September 13, 2008 - Saturday
Result!!
Posted at 5:14 pm |
September 9, 2008 - Tuesday
Mushroom soup!
The mushroom of the day is Sarcodon imbricatus (English: Scaly hedgehog mushroom, Norwegian: skjellstorpigg) (or perhaps S. squamosus?). You can read more about dyeing with this mushroom on this Ravelry thread, this post or at Leena's wonderful, inspiring and information rich blog.
I found a lot of these, all in one big bunch and I think they were under spruce trees - apparently this type of mushroom yields blues when found under pine, but we'll see what we get...
I wound up with about 170 grams of dried mushrooms. I filled up the stock pot with water, and added the dried mushrooms.
On the advice of the Ravelry threads, I added enough ammonia to bring the pH of the dye soup up to 9.
And let the whole pile simmer for an hour.
When the hour was up, I strained the mushrooms - gently squeezing out as much water as possible out of the mushrooms without breaking them up or making the dye bath muddy.
Then I sat the dye bath outside to cool and the left over mushrooms in a clearly labeled plastic container in the freezer to use again to try for a second dye bath.
Today I checked the pH again and found that boiling the mushrooms had lowered the pH to nearer 7. I added quite a bit more ammonia to bring the pH back to 9 and added the yarn to the dye bath and turned the stove on low and set the thermometer to tell me when the temperature reaches 85C / 185F.
I'll let it simmer at 85C for an hour. Check back tomorrow for the results!!
Posted at 9:23 pm |
September 8, 2008 - Monday
What I'm learning about mushroom dyeing - part 2.
Mordanting! What a strange word. It sounds like murder. Which is perhaps appropriate when we're dyeing. Ha!No, seriously folks, a mordant (Nor: beisemiddel) is substance that fixes a dyestuff in or on a material by combining with the dye to form an insoluble compound. Mordant can be added to the dye or the fiber can be prepared beforehand - or "premordanted". In other words, you do something to the fiber before you dye it to help the dye "stick" to the fiber. Mordants are strong stuff, even hazardous - some more than others. You'll need a pair of rubber gloves, utensils - spoons, a strainer, a bucket, measuring devices - and a stainless steel or enamel stock pot that will be dedicated to dyeing. Also an electronic digital scale makes things so much easier.
I used the alum (Nor: alun) mordant recipe from the mushroom dyeing class I took last fall to pre-mordant 100 g of a sport weight merino last night to be ready to start the dyebaths today. (Though to be honest the mushroom gathering is such a big job, I'm rather hesitant to "waste" them on actually dyeing yarn. *Sigh*)
By the way, the yarn needs to be in hanks - tied securely but loosely!! at several points - and soaked in lukewarm water until thoroughly wet before the mordanting process begins.
There's a very clever system for remembering which of the most common mordants was used on which hanks...
- knot = alum mordant
- knots = chromium compounds (we're fond of the Earth, we're not using chrome)
- knots = tin
- knots = copper
- knots = iron
I dissolved 25 g of alum and 15 g of cream of tartar (Nor: vinstein) and 4 liters of water and turned the stove on medium-low. Then I added 100 g of yarn to the mix when it had reached about 35C / 95F and mushed it around so the yarn got completely submerged. I let the whole thing heat up very slowly until it reached 85C / 185F, set the thermometer to ring if the temperature got up near 90C / 195F (yarn shouldn't actually boil!) and the timer for 1 hour.
When that hour was up, I turned off the stove and went to sleep. This morning I rinsed the yarn (use the rubber gloves, the alum will irritate your skin - I stuck my hand into alum mordant during the class last fall and a small cut on my finger got VERY inflamed) and hung it to dry.
Tomorrow, mushroom soup and dye baths!
Posted at 11:56 pm |
September 7, 2008 - Sunday
What I've learned about mushroom dyeing, part 1.
- First step - gather the mushrooms! I hear wonderful things about this field guide by Miriam Rice, the mushroom dyeing guru. It's on its way from Amazon to me now, so more on it later.
- Identify and label your finds as soon as you get home. Particularly with webcap mushrooms (i.e. Cortinarius, slrsopp) the spores can easily loosen and fall off making sorting very difficult. Once they're dry these:
now look like this:
- Most mushrooms can be sliced into 1/2 cm / 1/4 inch (or less!) discs and dried on newspapers. Remove moss and twigs while you're at it.
If the mushroom is very small - like the webcaps - just remove the stems from the cap and perhaps break the largest caps into bits.
- Mushrooms that are not poisonous (NOT POISONOUS!) can be sliced and dried in the oven if you have one of those ovens that you can turn the fan on but not the heat. Leave the door open to let the moisture out of the oven. I repeat, do not put poisonous mushrooms in a place where you make food. Don't make me come over there.
- Mushrooms that are prone to having larve - Boleus edulis (steinsopp) (Yes, you can dye with these if you don't eat them first.) and Suillus variegatus (sandsopp) sometimes have wormy things in them and can be frozen instead.
- Oh, and the utensils you use for processing poisonous mushrooms? Label them and keep them in a special place - don't use them for ANYTHING that has to do with food ever again.
Next up, mordanting with alum.
Posted at 12:58 pm |
September 3, 2008 - Wednesday
Love!
Posted at 6:28 pm |
August 31, 2008 - Sunday
Saueklippdag!
Today was sheep shearing day at the Norwegian Folk Museum and the Oslo/Lillestrøm SnB'ers invaded en masse.The sheep were spælsau - Old Norwegian Short Tail - a small, primitive breed with a long outer coat and a finer undercoat.
Adorable! The shearer was the very talented Caroline Ann Nicol - she makes it look SO easy.
She demonstrated both manual and electric clippers. If I were the sheep I'd insist on electric ones.
We did some carding...
...some spinning...
...then some more spinning...
(They all seem to think I'm some sort of expert - HA!)
There was also yarn dyeing ...
...loom fondling...
... and lefse snarling.
AND I got a new toy!
It was a Very Good Day. Tusen takk jenter!!
P.S. Click on any of the pictures to see LOTS more! Other pictures from today can be found here (thankfully NOT including the one of me licking Eli's gorgeous new mulberry silk shawl) and soon here, I imagine.
Posted at 9:03 pm |
August 29, 2008 - Friday
Mushroom season
Last fall I took a mushroom dyeing class given by my local craft guild. The instructor was Trine Parmer and these are the samples we made, with their Norwegian name, scientific name, ratios (I think this was mushrooms:fiber, but I need to check!!)of dried mushrooms to fiber, which mordant was used and which bath it was, if there were more than one.
From left to right:
- Old Gulrandkjuke (Phaeolus schweinitzii), 1:5, alum mordant
- Sennep kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius croceus), 1:1, alum mordant
- Blodrd kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius sanguineus), 1:1, alum mordant, 3rd bath
- Gulrandkjuke (Phaeolus schweinitzii), 1:5, tin mordant
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) stalks, 2:1, alum mordant
- Kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius cinnamomeus), 1:1, alum mordant
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, alum mordant, 2nd bath
- Blodrd kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius sanguineus), 1:1, alum mordant, 2nd bath
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, tin mordant, 2nd bath
- Blodrd kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius sanguineus), 1:1, alum mordant, 1st bath
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, alum mordant, 1st bath
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, tin mordant, 1st bath
- Tobakksbrdsopp, 4:1, iron mordant
- Sandsopp (Suillus variegatus), 3:1, iron mordant
- Kanelkjuke (Hapalopilus nidulans), 1:5, alum mordant
- Skjellstorpigg (Sarcodon imbricatus), 7:1, alum mordant
- Cortinarius residual bath, alum mordant
- Smrsopp (Suillus luteus), 4:1, alum mordant
- Smrsopp (Suillus luteus), 4:1, iron mordant
- Sandsopp (Suillus variegatus), 3:1, alum mordant
- Gulrandkjuke (Phaeolus schweinitzii), 1:5, iron mordant
- Flyelsrrsopp (Boletus subtomentosus), 3:1, alum mordant
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, alum mordant, 4th bath
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus) hats, 2:1, alum mordant, 3rd bath
- Rdskive kanelslrsopp (Cortinarius semisanguineus), 2:1, iron mordant
- Flyelspluggsopp (Paxillus atrotomentosu), 1:1, alum mordant
- Rustbrunpigg (Hydnellum ferrugineum), 3:1, alum mordant
- Skjellstorpigg (Sarcodon imbricatus), 7:1, iron mordant
- Flyelspluggsopp (Paxillus atrotomentosu), 1:1, iron mordant, second bath
- Duftbrunpigg (Hydnellum suaveolens), 4:1, iron mordant
- Flyelspluggsopp (Paxillus atrotomentosu), 1:1, iron mordant, first bath
- Rustbrunpigg (Hydnellum ferrugineum), 3:1, iron mordant
- Duftbrunpigg (Hydnellum suaveolens), 4:1, alum mordant
- Flyelsrrsopp (Boletus subtomentosus), 3:1, iron mordant
I'll (fingers crossed) be finding more mushrooms and doing some dyeing in the weeks to come!
Posted at 8:26 pm |
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