Tidying my handspuns one day, I collected a selection of natural fleece colours plus a rainbow assortment of brightly coloured small balls, the latter dyed with natural materials at several of our Guild's annual dyeing days. The time had come to use up some of my collection. So I bought a ready-wound black wool warp from our local Saori dealer and threaded my four-shaft Saori loom for plain and twill weave. I placed to hand the box of natural colours and arranged the dyed yarns in two trays, one with reds, yellows, oranges and the other with blues, greens, browns and any other dark colours. After weaving a firm heading with some spare yarn, I began with one of the natural colours. Then, in plain weave, I did one pick from the red tray, one natural, one from the dark tray, one natural and so on. After each dyed pick, that ball was placed in a separate basket and was not used again until I completed the cycle. Apart from alternating the trays, colour selection was random (almost; I avoided having all red picks together, or all greens, and so on). After completing the cycle, the balls were returned neatly to their appropriate trays.
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