Images of the garden
I’m afraid my dyeing activities have been curtailed during recent weeks because I have dislocated my hip for the second time since Easter and this means that sadly I am now even more limited in what I can manage physically. However, I hope to be able to embark on some more dyeing experiments soon, with the help of two kind friends who have generously offered to help with lifting and carrying etc.
In the meantime, here are some photos of my garden as it looks at present.
The photo below was taken a few weeks ago and shows woad in flower, with a dyer’s broom bush in the foreground.
Oh, that sounds extremely painful. Hope you recover soon. The garden looks lovely – my last year's woad was covered in flowers this year and now has masses of black seed. At what stage do you harvest your seed, i.e. how do I know when it's ready?
Chris
Thanks for your good wishes, Chris. Woad seeds should be ready to harvest when they are black/deep purple in colour & quite dry. Last year my woad seeds remained grey/beige even when dry. I harvested them & hoped for the best but only 2 seeds germinated when I sowed them this year, even though I sowed two separate batches, and none of the fallen or shaken seeds germinated in the woad bed either. This is the first time in over 25 years of woad growing that this has happened to me. Usually I get plenty of plants from self-sown seeds and plenty of plants from seeds sown in seed trays.
The same thing happened to me – nearly half a world away in Vancouver, Canada! My last-year's woad seeds didn't germinate and instead I ended up replanting with old seed from 2009. They grew just fine! Go figure. I think we're having rather similar weather. It's been really cool and rainy here, even more than usual.
Take good care of yourself, Jenny, and get better soon.
Hope you are healing and to have someone lifting my pots is enough to have me faking a sore hip…lol…in fact my hip is getting acupuncture these days! doesn,t like stair climbing but so far felting and dyeing are okay…be well..
Cedar
I hope you feel better soon! Thanks for posting the images of your lovely garden, it is gorgeous!
Thanks for your good wishes, Caroline.
Jenny I am so sorry to hear about your hip. I do hope you can manage a little dyeing to lift your spirits. How about small amounts of silk fibre or silk yarns in small pots which could be dyed alltogether in a water bath? Are you able to spin? Because small amounts of silk fibres do go a long way. I find spindle spinning a top whorl involves twisting the body – not good for you no doubt -but a lovely Tibetan supported spindle spins yak down and that can be supported between your knees sitting upright.
best wishes
helen