Gifts from the Goddess of the Dyepot

For the past few days, I've been playing in the dyepots - and making appropriate sacrifices to the goddess of the dyepot. First, the warps.



This is 24/2 mercerized cotton, purchased for the grand sum of $1 per pound at a long-ago CNCH, where a vendor parked a truck out behind the conference hotel, and unloaded huge numbers of mill-sized cones of fine cottons. I guess I was among a very few interested customers, because I filled my car to the gunnels. Most of it is 20/2 or 36/2 unmercerized, some is 24/2 mercerized, and there were a few cones of mystery sizes. Thank heavens for the McMorran Balance!

The McMorran Balance, by the way, is a wonderful resource when you're faced with a yarn whose grist you don't know. You can't figure the right sett without knowing the grist. The McMorran Balance is easy to use. Cut a length of yarn (several yards is good for a very fine yarn) and drape it over the balance arm. Snip at the yarn, gradually shortening it, until the arm "balances." Measure the length of the yarn left draped over the arm, multiply by 100, and that's the yards-per-pound rating of the yarn.

For more accuracy, you can do this three times with different pieces of yarn, and average the results. That'll give you a more accurate count. Especially with textured or slubby yarn :)

Once I know the grist, I can figure out what the right sett will be.

Here are the weft skeins. They're still on the drying rack, and will be a bit lighter once they're bone dry.They're the 36/2 unmercerized cotton.



There's actually more difference in hue between the middle skein (pure turquoise) and the skein to its right (half turquoise and half RGS "forest green"), but my camera couldn't see it in that light. Oh well. Unfortunately, although she's a great help with yarn, the goddess of the dyepot isn't in charge of digital camera color sensors.