Friday, June 6, 2008

Wool Dying Teach and Learn

Cleaning wool with boiling water....
Taking out yarn from our "coloring" pot.
If you remember a blog from a couple of months ago - there are members of one of our village banks that were learning how to dye wool with natural plants. Those same members were teaching others this afternoon how to dye wool. Teaching is the greatest learning process in my book, because of the transfer of knowledge that the teacher passes on reinforces the knowledge that one holds in their head. Priscilla and Andrea did a great job. They had this group of 6 women wrapped around their fingers. We cleaned their wool and yarn with boiling water, boiled the plants in a big pot, and added the wool for 1/2 hour to "cook" and absorb the color. We were hoping for a green, but got yellow yarn. The general consensus was,"not bad for our first time." The group learned that they need to gather more plants if they want to have a stronger color, their wool needs to be clean (no grease or poop), and they can easily dye wool naturally instead of using chemicals (which is how all of the women currently dye their yarn). I told the group that they need to try it again - see how it goes - and if they need help, we'll call the experts and get Priscilla and Andrea back in action.
Rinsing finished yarn/wool in canal next to house.
All finished, let it dry in the sun.

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