last wednesday, the 22nd of october: a goldenrod update

last wednesday was incredibly windy. (milly was looking for a treat from me which i had forgotten to put in my pocket.)

we were really getting blown about as we walked along the river. i purposely walked by the goldenrod plants at the playground.

they've all gone to seed and they look beautiful.

and here are my two goldenrod skeins resting in the sunlight with zuzu in the background.

today's project

on wednesday i was running errands (i visited a library branch on 23rd street to pick up a book to take when we travel soon to florida to see greg's mom) and i stopped by the union square petco store for a few more cans of cat food. it was then that i realized i was near the green market where korrina had just bought a huge bunch of goldenrod. when we were visiting vermont at the beginning of september, i kept exclaiming at all the goldenrod everywhere one turned! fields and fields of goldenrod! i didn't bring any back with me as in order to dye with it, it's best to work with it fresh and i wasn't going to be able to do that as we were stopping in lenox, massachusetts for several nights. however, on wednesday i picked out a large bunch to bring home. i shook the branches out in the courtyard and snipped off the flowers and a few inches of the stems. once upstairs and in the pot, i brought the temperature up to 180/200 fahrenheit and let it sit there for an hour. then i let it cool till the next morning so that i could easily strain it and have it free of debris for the yarn i wanted to dye (which was already mordanted).

(flowers and stems were composted)

i first wet the skeins before putting them in the dye bath . . and then followed a similar time pattern. i brought the temperature up to 180/200 and let it sit for an hour, and then it cooled overnight.

after a few cool rinses in the sink, i hung the yarn up to dry. i can't wait to see how it looks in the daylight.

friday

i met greg at the ice cream shop after my afsc action hour zoom call. i ended up not eating my strawberry ice cream with hot fudge because the hot fudge froze on the ice cream. it was too thick and chunky. i ended up getting a refund. so strange. it really wasn't very good. ah, well.

the rascals are searching for the bag of dry food which they had discovered in this closet a week ago. of course we moved it to a new location to keep their claws from tearing it to bits and eating all the food.

dinner tonight was leftover hot dogs with homemade pasta salad.

korrina sent me this photo when she got home from work this evening.

a beautiful skein of yarn she bought as a special treat.

pluto and my yarn

pichinku!

i've been following this fiber company on instagram for over a year now. it's a small company of several women in peru. they collect plant material from the surrounding countryside and boil it up in a courtyard in cusco. you can see their short kickstarter video here (scroll down), and their website here. they don't always have their beautiful dyed baby alpaca wool available but a few weeks ago they announced that the iskay dk weight was up in the shop. i took a few days to decide on a pattern and colors, and then finally placed an order. it came today and i am very excited! i'm really pleased with the colors i picked (it's not easy choosing from a computer screen) and am glad i took my time and thought carefully at how they would work together. i hope to make joji locatelli's odyssey shawl. i was first going to put the brown in between the greens, but am now considering having the greens next to each other. should the brown be the top color of the shawl, or the bottom?

i love how they include the plant on the label.

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greg made us an omelette for dinner.

i also had a wonderful book club meeting with homeschooling friends in the afternoon . . we'll be reading braiding sweetgrass by robin wall kimmerer for the next meet-up on february 23rd.