As you’ll see later in this post, sometimes the yarn or fiber selection leads the inspiration process. With the fiber having a high contrast, I wanted the colors to work with that. I started thinking of what would be fun with a bunch of bright colors against dark, and ran a search for Paisleys. It did not disappoint, this tie has just the vibe I was going for.
Our yarn is Titanium Tiger Twist, a two ply blend of soft superwash merino fortified with nylon and a healthy hosiery twist. I dyed the background a nice uneven kettle dyed navy blue, then worked in orange, yellow, turquoise, and pink-purple on the undyed parts. The idea is to get a reverse speckle effect. Here’s the yarn:
I was hoping to show you a completed sock, but life got in the way this week. Here’s my swatch, though….it shows you how the speckle might work up (it will vary depending on your gauge and stitch number, just like any variegated yarn).
As I said earlier, the fiber was leading the way in color decisions. I used Jacob Humbug. Jacob is the sheep below. If you remember your Bible stories, Jacob made a deal with his FIL that he could keep any spotted sheep born of the flock. Humbug is the prep of this combed top, and just means they separated the colors of wool and combed them, then made a final pass with the colors together, so they stay in bold stripes.
I kept the dark brown as the background color, then variegated bright orange, yellow, turquoise, and a pink-purple, then generously smooshed everything so that it would blend and give us greens and darker blues and yellow oranges, and even pinks where the purple split. I’m very pleased with how it turned out.
This particular Jacob wool is on the rough side of medium, so I’d suggest making something outerwear, and/or lining it with something softer. It would make a colorful hat or boot toppers, be great for mittens thrummed or lined with soft wool inside, or maybe make some potholders in your favorite fiber method…knit, weave, crochet, felt….
Thanks for being a part of February Club. Would you like to join in the fun? I have a few spots open for March, but grab yours fast….March 15th is the last day to join and I’ll start dyeing on the 16th.
