I married my wool today

Easter dinner will be at my house this year. My two brothers and my sister, with their families will be here. This week will be spent getting ready for that and putting some finishing touches in the kitchen. My husband and I completely gutted our kitchen this past fall and finally finished it up right before Christmas. I still haven't made curtains or added finishing touches to the kitchen, mostly because it's painting that needs to be done outside, in nice weather ...which we haven't had too much of lately. This is my sewing project for today.
I'm going to turn this fabric into 2 window valances. Still not sure exactly what the design will be, but it will get done today. yessiree, it will.

Ok, marrying wool doesn't require anything but some wool, some string, a pot and some water. Basically marrying wool is using one color of wool to bleed into a lighter color wool, creating a nice mottled mix of colors in the lighter wool. So here, I've a red piece of wool and scrunched up a piece of white wool.

 **NOTE:  This works well with most recycled wool...wool from skirts, jackets, etc.  It doesn't work most times with hand-dyed wool since the methods used to dye will set the dye into the wool so that it doesn't bleed.**

Fold the two pieces up together. I prefer to wet the wool beforehand, but dry wool works too.

Use some string to tightly tie the wool. I don't use rubber bands because I've learned from experience, that the rubber bands can break during the cooking process.

Using tongs, carefully place the wool bundle into boiling hot water. Let it simmer on low heat for ... I dunno, maybe 30 min or so. Carefully take it out of the water, rinse with cold water, cut the strings and open up your surprise package.

Voila! This is what it turns into...a nice mottled blending of colors. Reds always marry into shades of pinks. At least for me it does. I never get a true red. It's nice to use this method when you need several different shades of the same color. I'm planning to use this for tulips and roses.

Ok, kitchen curtain time. I'm dusting off my sewing machine RIGHT NOW!