To cozy crafternoons

This post will - in contrast to my usual posts :P - contain mainly pics and only little text. I want the pictures to speak for themselves, I hope I succeeded in capturing the pleasant atmosphere of the cozy afternoon I had with my best friend Eeffie last week.

I really enjoy those crafty meetings we regularly have, sharing our passion for fibers, dolls and a lot of other random stuff. I meant this post to be a little homage to 'crafternoons' (or mornings, evenings…nights?!) with likeminded people, celebrating creativity while inspiring and helping one another.

Our goal for this afternoon was to dye some fibers. After following an awesome workshop on wool dyeing some time ago, it was time to try it out by ourselves. We ordered acid dyes and un-dyed roving, bought vinegar, rubber gloves and sealable bags and started saving plastic bottles a couple of weeks earlier (preparations, preparations!).

Because we also celebrated Eeffie's birthday already (she would turn 36 some days later, which is still a very young age - really, it is!), I bought her some extra un-dyed fibers she could use for more dyeing practice. Eeffie's youngest cat Pebbles found all those different kinds of fiber very interesting!

Another great advantage of sharing a creative hobby is the ability to share tools and supplies. We divided all the bottles of acid dyes we ordered in two - still both having more than enough for what we aimed to do with it, while simultaneously saving money, yay!

Dyeing roving is such an exciting thing to do! It's like a blank piece of paper, ready to be painted on. We experimented a bit with mixing colors and leaving in blank spaces. I managed to kick over my bottle of fiery red(!) acid dye, I can be so clumsy…haha! Even though we made a great mess, luckily no permanent damage was done.

Okay, so the grown-ups are making a big mess with dyes, while the kids are obediently sitting on the couch, busy with the i-pad. There might be some role-inversion here…just saying!

Above is the roving cooling down after being heated for about 30-45 minutes. Pretty colors are already showing here! We almost couldn't wait to rinse them, to see if the colors had really set and wouldn't 'bleed' anymore...

…which it didn't! Check out Eeffie's beautiful shades of green! I think this can only be spun up into grass :)

No cozy afternoons without coffee and cookies. And a little piece of cake, for Eeffie's birthday!

Beside my roving, I also dyed some fibers that will be used/sold for Blythe reroots. It was my first 'professional' try at this, and I'm beyond happy with the results.

I also got to try out Eeffie's blending board, making my very first two rolags ever. It's amazing how you can make such an interesting blend out of otherwise dull, plain fibers. I'm very curious to see how this will spin up, with the fibers aligned in a different direction then usual (horizontally instead of vertically).

With 5 cats living in Eeffie's house, we had a constant company of those curious creatures. Here you can see the oldest (left, Casper) and the youngest (right, Pebbles).

Thank you Eef, for this cozy 'crafternoon' and all the others we had. May there be lots more to come!

Do you have regular crafternoons? With whom, and what do you do on these creative meetings? Let me know in the comments, to continue this celebration of crafting together!