Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Roving Teaches Free Form Crochet Working in Ends As You Design Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza 2014

When starting a scrumble  I like to work in the ends as I crochet. When making a starting circle, leave a tail a couple inches long. Hold the end of the yarn to the left and work over that end,into the center of the circle. covering it well. I also leave a tail when adding a new color of yarn. Hold that to the left and work over it, into the work and cover well. I have included a needle felting needle in your hand out packet, I use this to completely secure the ends. I  use a felt ball to set the work on, find the yarn end, needle felt it down, trying not to poke deeply, just stay on top of the ball, and move often so it does not stick to the ball. By securing the ends, your finished piece looks very neat and professional. Stray ends look unkempt and yell home made, not hand made. By finishing as you create, when you are done, you are done. Your finished piece is ready to use and enjoy.

Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Roving, Unspun Roving Flower Tutorial, Free Form Crochet Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, Hot Springs, AR Sept 18-21,2014

Wrap the unspun roving around the pegs, I went around twice

Pull a loop through to the back, slip stitch around the center until it is secured.

I used a needle felting needle to secure all the ends, making a tidy little flower.

I will crochet through the loops to create the next scrumble.  Though each loop, chain 3 seems to make a nice smooth piece. 

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Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Roving Teaches at Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, #ArFiber2014 Sept 18-21

 The progress on the scrumble that started with the UNSPUN ROVING  flower loomed and needle felted flower. I used a thin yarn and a large hook to crochet around the flower working through all the loops. The next rounds were some double crochet and bullion stitches.
The ball of yarn I was using evolved into art yarn towards the end. It got a lot thicker so I switched to a smaller needle. The color changes are all in the yarn. The scrumble is about the size of my hand. By making several of these I will have the basis for my hat. The yarn behind  for sale in my dudleyspinner.com  facebook page
This hand spun yarn  is a wool alpaca two ply.
You might want to snatch it up
 because it  looks like it is a perfect
coordinating yarn with my colorway for this hat.

Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Roving teaches at Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, My Bio

I am teaching three classes at the Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, Hot Springs, Arkansas, September 19, 1:30 pm-3:00pm, Adding Beads To Spinning. 3:30-5:00 Free Form Crochet. Sept 20, 8:30 am-10:00am, Simple Lacy Socks.

This is a little about how I got started spinning wool, knitting, crocheting, needle felting and dying fibers.

Becoming a Fiber Artist was not something that I aspired to as a child. I was very much like my daughters in the photo, just a kid that liked to go feed the bottle lambs with my Grandma. Grandma Bosselman would have me stay over and "help" her to go feed the lambs in the barn at night. I remember Grandma  filling the pop bottles with milk, and putting the rubber nipples on them. Grandma putting on my boots, the cold ground, seeing my breath as we walked to the barn. If I promised to be careful Grandma would let me carry one of the bottles.  I remember  he smell of the hay and being greeted by the hungry lambs bleating as we came close to them.  I loved the feeling of being a big helper. I am sure that just going by herself would have been much easier for Grandma, but I would not have learned about the wonders of wool if not for Grandma Bosselman. I slept under a wool comforter in our unheated upstairs  thanks to Grandma and those sheep. Those sheep and the memories kept me warm.

I learned to knit when one of the girls in my class wore a headband to school that was knit. I loved the texture and wanted to learn. Grandma took me to Woolworths and bought me my first pair of knitting needles. A pair of size 4 Boye straight needles and a skein of pink yarn. I did learn to knit when the girl in my class taught me how. I knit straight garter stitch for many years. By the time I was in high school, my Home Economics project was a cable knit scarf and mittens knit with Black Red Heart Wool, from the dime store. At that time all the yarn was wool, acrylic was not available.

When my husband and I got our first home that needed livestock for weed control I wanted sheep. The first trip to sell the wool I purchased a drop spindle and started making my own yarn. A dye class got me started with dying wool with natural dyes. A friend taught me how to use fiber reactive dyes for tie dye T-shirts. I sold T-shirts for several years. I later took those tie dye skills and applied them to wool roving  making my signature Tie Dye Rovings in bright rainbow colors. Along the way I learned crochet, then started doing some Free Form Crochet using UFO's in my work. I hate to see all that effort wasted.

 Spinning with a drop spindle was nice, but I wanted a wheel . Another trip to sell wool and an Ashford Traveller followed me home. I learned to spin mostly on my own, with a little help from the Mother of one of our friends.  Now my herd of spinning wheels has grown to 5 wood wheels and one electric Babe made of PVC pipe. I spend my days and nights knitting, crocheting, designing patterns like the purse I designed for the 2008 edition of Interweave Felts which uses UNSPUN ROVING . 

I haunt the thrift store in my local town to find unusual toys to use to make small scrumbles. Broomstick lace, hairpin lace, small weave it type looms, potholder looms, small table looms, knittng nancy looms,  all make it into a free form afghan.

I love yarn and color, so for me playing with a bunch of fiber toys and dying yarn and fiber is a joy.

Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Roving Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, Hot Springs Arkansas

This little plastic flower loom can be used with unspun dudleyspinner roving.
I just followed the numbers and wrapped the unspun roving around each peg in a figure 8 pattern. Then I took a coordinating yarn and stitched over two loops, then under one loop until the loops are all secured. to fill in the center I took some of the yarn and used a felting needle to secure the center. To use this little flower in a free form piece I will just hook through the loops and build around it.  I love to visit thrift stores and have a collection of little tools like this. This is one of the scrumble starters I will have at my class at the Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, Hot Springs Arkansas Sept 18-21. It is a very easy method of making a little flower shape. The possibilities are endless.

Dudleyspinner Tie Dye Rovings Teaches at Arkansas Fiber Arts Extravaganza, Hot Spgs Ark Sept 18-21

Free Form Crochet is a fantastic way to stash bust. You can use small amounts of yarns with different weights, textures and colors to make anything you want. I have made hats,afghans and jackets all using small scrumbles and putting them together. A scrumble is what we free formers call the small pieces created by just starting out with some yarn and letting the piece grow as it will. I usually start with a small circle, and then build out. I like rainbows, so starting out with a red center, then adding a row or two of orange, then yellow, then green, blue and purple makes a very striking scrumble. You can also start with a few rows of single or double or treble crochet and build from there. Putting colors together takes a little thought.  If you have two colors that don't match or go together very well, try putting a buffer color like sky blue, or earth brown or lawn green between them. Colors in nature always work, so go look at a flower garden that has many colors. Why don't they clash?  The green leaves and brown dirt buffer them and it works.  You can also use two yarns to tone them down. A turquoise that is very bright can be toned down and made more natural looking by adding a strand of orange.