I had some very sad fibre in my stash – the colour looked a bit dull and flat, the prep wasn’t the best (lots of nepps), and I suspected it had a high content of alpaca (not my favourite to spin). Time to do something about it.
Deciding to put my drum carder to good use, I used a dark merino that I hand dyed a few days ago as a base, then added the mystery fibre to it. Since there were very light tones of pink in it, I decided to add more. Much, much more. I knew telling the Universe pink was nothing but an unsuccessful red would come back to haunt me some day.
Then came the sparkle, in two tones of pink, also hand dyed by me (don’t tell anyone I have this in my stash!) Then more black, then the sad fibre, and so on until I ran out of the main fibre I wanted to rescue.
I ended up with two batts. True to the handmade nature of these things, one came out a bit brighter looking than the other. It’s interesting how one is more on the pink side, and the other one has more sparkle.
My plans are to spin them in the near future. After my first Spring Market of the year, when I’ll have the brain space.
Now the question is, how to spin them? Core spin? Two-ply? Singles? Decisions, decisions.
Do you have a drum carder? Have you ever “salvaged” fibre you didn’t like this way? Tell me all about your experience.
Felt Buddies (and stuff) 
I would do a two-ply with a single from each batt 🙂 That would give a larger quantity of similar yarn. I like spinning alpaca, and top, and almost anything else 🙂 I’ve also found that overdyeing a blah natural with a bright pink or blue can result in a deep heather that is pretty. I really need to play more with my (stored) carder since your batts are so pretty and would probably make a nice art yarn too!
If you want a larger quantity of yarn, a singles would do better 😀 I didn’t think to overdye this fibre because to be honest, I’d pretty much given up on it (glad I didn’t though!)
You should definitely take your drum carder for a spin, you might end up making lots and lots of fresh batts to spin 😉
I noticed that pink in the first photo of your fiber before I read about it. Where did that even come from? I like what you did with it. I too have spent more time than I should disrespecting pink. I’ve come to appreciate it in moderation. It can be an amazing accent, as you’ve made it here.
Thanks, Cameron! I’m happy I don’t have to look at the fibre the way it was before (and am very tempted to give the same treatment to a couple of other braids I have laying around).
Having to dye my own pinks now, I’ve definitely come to appreciate them – in fact, it’s kindled a love with all colours, which is a wonderful thing. I still mostly only wear black, though 😀
I love what you ended up with ! It’s surprising how mixing the colours changes them too 🙂
I hadn’t seen this comment before, Sharon, sorry! Yes, the end result was much more pleasing to the eyes 🙂 Now to see how it will end up spun, because we know that will also change things even more…