Yarn dying experiment…

ok, I have long since wanted to make gradient dye jobs, but I am too lazy to do as I have seen so many time and dye it in portions. So I thought about it.. What would happen if you wound the yarn into a cake and then dyed it? I can tell you.

First I admit I used a LOT of food coloring here, I like jewel tones, and I have learned that I need to use a lot of dye for that. I use Wiltons  cake decorating gels, the ones you get at Jo-anns or Michaels, in the cake section. I used an entire jar for this experiment.

First I wound off my yarn (100% wool, Jagerspun Heather, fingering weight, to be specific.) This yarn is destined to be leg warmers for the cool mornings here. Mainly around the house wear, so it didn’t really matter how badly the dye job came out. I did wind my yarn doubled, so that they will match mostly. Later I will rewind it into individual cakes.

I took the wound cake of yarn, and soaked it in a water and vinegar solution (I never bother to measure I just pour some in. I admit this was a pretty strong vinegar solution.) I set the cake into a pitcher and added the water and vinegar to it, when the cake floated I took a mason jar and half filled it with water and set it on top of the cake, after about half an hour I removed the jar and the cake stayed submerged. 

Next, I prepared my dye bath. Same quart jar I had used earlier, I dumped the food coloring into and more vinegar, this time about half a cup, and a couple cups of water, I used my whisk to stir well, dissolving the food coloring, I poured this into the bottom of my small (4qt) Crockpot I set the yarn cake into and rinsed the jar out with the water/vinegar mixture from the pitcher until it covered the yarn cake. I set the Crockpot on Keep warm, put the lid on and walked away fro several hours.

When I came back I removed the yarn cake carefully with a slotted spoon and set it into a bowl to cool, once it was cool to the touch, I mean room temperature. I put the cake into a colander and ran room temperature water over the cake, occasionally flipping it over to rinse the other end, until the water ran clear.  I shut off the water and set the colander over the now empty bowl and let it sit there for about an hour, dripping as much of the water off as it would give. Next I very carefully wrapped the cake up in a towel and added pressure to squeeze out as much of the water as possible while disturbing the construction of the cake as little as possible.   I carefully reshaped it (from the smashed oblong it had become back into a cake) and set it in front of my fan (yes I am still using fans here.)

This is what the exterior of the cake looked like this morning, just as it came out of the dye bath, but dry.

It was a little more purple looking that the photo shows almost a grape color.  And then I rewound it, starting at the outside and working in, so that what is now  on the inside of the cake is one the outside (this was done mostly to dry it, but also cause I wanted to see it.)

This is the rewound cake.

there are spots of the darker color all through it, but the closer you get to what was the core the more of the bright Caribbean blue that there is, I totally love it so far.. right now it is sitting in front of the fan again, but once it is dry I will separate the two strands and we will see how it knits up.

Oh.. and I have to share this one, just because I love the shot.

you can see all the little hairs and the definition between the plies and the two strands that were held together in the winding.  Ahh.. the fiber, you can almost feel the yarn love.

The repurposing of a bag…

Last month some time, I picked up one of the several one skein knitting books that are out there, at my local library. I liked several things out of it, and I made a couple of them.. One of the things I made was a soap sack. I don’t know why, we haven’t used more than 3 bars of soap in the last 5 years, we are just a liquid soap family… But the urge struck, and I figured if nothing else, I could always give it as a gift. So I finished the bag (really fast knit, took me less than a day) and it has been sitting on my desk waiting for me to decide what to do with it.

Fast Forward to yesterday. I was sitting at my desk, watching my NCIS DVD’s and knitting when my 3yo runs up to me… both hands overflowing with marbles, telling me he needs a bag to keep his “Marmles” in. So, I looked around, and spot the soap sack. Solid fabric, so the marbles won’t fall out, good size, and drawstring top. Perfect. We dumped the marbles out of his hands into the bag, then we went into the play room and gathered the ones that he had dropped. He has been hauling it around ever since. As if it were his favorite blanket. I am guessing this is a repurposing win. At least this is putting the bag to us, and he loves it..

Dear Michael’s and Joann’s stores

I regularly browse through your yarn sections, and continually end up disappointed. I do appreciate the new trend towards natural fibers, I love that paton’s classic wool comes in fifty billion colors and between the two stores, you have them all. And Wool-ease is great for a lot of things, the warmth of wool, the washablity of acrylic… Beautiful!

But can we please, Please, PLEASE get some decent sock yarns? The quality of the yarns you carry now (with the exception of the Bernat Sock, who wants plastic socks?) is not a problem.. the color selection however leaves much to be desired. I have no desire to knit socks that are mottled with hot pink and baby shit yellow, and honestly, no one I know wants to wear them either. What colors would I like to see? Hmm… Solids. Tonal variations, like kettle dye. Stripes, in none clashing colors, are ok too. White.. Black..

I really want to be able to knit socks for members of my family who are not into the whole world has gone psychedelic thing. My 80 year old grandfather has no desire to wear hand knit socks that look like a hot pink and purple cat puked on them . My husband, who is only 35, has strict limitations… No ‘Foofy’ colors… this means he will wear black, blue and white. solid only, no stripes, no variegated.

Please realize that in some places (like my backwater, wannabe city)  you two mega mart stores are the only walk-in yarn source some of us have.  We are your customers, listen to us.

Remnant Socks.

I am working on my 25th pair of socks so far this year. This pair is a little bit different from what I have done the rest of the year, as they are made using remnants of sock yarns. I will walk you through how I have done them, and then, if I remember, I will post pictures once they are done.

1. Gather up all sock yarn remnants and sort. I don’t want to mix fingering with worsted (yes, I have made worsted weight socks this year.) And I don’t want to mix fibers, mixing a merino/nylon blend yarn with an alpaca blend yarn will lead to wonky results after you wash them. Not to mention that the alpaca felts and the merino/nylon does not.
2. OK, now I had 13 balls of merino/nylon blend yarn. Most balls are around 30 yds, and I have  a decision to make… Do I want them to be totally miss matched, meaning I grab a ball and knit till it is gone, then grab another, for both pair… or do I split each ball in half and use in the same order to make an actual matched pair.
3. I decided to split the balls.. but with such small balls of yarn, and no yardage meter, how do you split them evenly (or at least close?) I used my ball winder, first I wound the ball into a cake, then I took the yarn from the outside and the center of the cake and wound them again, together, when I reached the end, and a loop of yarn where the middle was, I cut it and began rolling it into 2 balls. I did this with all 13  yarns.
4. Next I took two bowls. I put all the balls into one bowl and cast on my first sock, the matching ball to the yarn I was using went into the second bowl. When I ran out of yarn, I would go to the first bowl and choose another yarn, taking out both balls of that yarn, one was added to my sock in progress, and the other is added to the second bowl (second bowl just makes it easier to do the second sock later on, since you don’t have to dig and hunt for the matches.)
5. Once the first sock was done, you just use the yarns from the second bowl, in the same order (or different if you choose) as the first sock.

Simple…

I think I may have enough yarn remnants here for a second pair of socks… I will see, I am just over half done with the second sock, and should finish this weekend.

it’s done!

my little wrap that is… I finished the knitting last night, went button shopping today, and wove in ends and blocked it this morning. Here it is..

it’s not really big, it wears like a cape, and is not quite elbow length. or can be rapped tighter and worn like a scarf. I totally love it. It was a great quick knit! 

I will have to take a closer picture, but the button is a dragonfly, that the wings almost exactly match the yarn of the upper portion.

small knitting obsession….

I am a big fan of Knitty. For those of you who don’t know.. Knitty is a free, online knitting magazine. It comes out  quarterly, but not on any set date that I have been able to discern.  And then, some time between the time an edition is published and the next edition, there are bonus patterns that just seem to *appear*.

Anyway… the Fall edition of Knitty came out last Friday. I browsed through it, several times, and I really liked several of the patterns in it. I usually really like one or two patterns per edition, but this one was great, I really liked at least 6 of the patterns. All of the shawls, and several of the sweaters. One of the shawls was Colonnade. I LOVED it… The more that I looked at it, the more I had to make it. But I had to make changes.

#1. I live in southern Arizona. It does not get cold enough here to warrant aran weight wool. 

#2. I don’t want to BUY yarn for this, if I can help it. Wool is hard to find here, all we have is Jo-ann’s and Michaels, and that limits availability.

#3. I don’t have 10’s needles.. I don’t like working with them, but if I had them, I would use them, even with worsted.

Because of the smaller yarn and needles, I didn’t get gauge, being unable to use larger needles to get gauge, I had to adjust the stitch count, doable, but more work mentally.

I hunted through my stash and found several skeins of Patons Classic Wool Merino one in Peacock, and two in Too Teal, perfect! I cast it on and got started on Saturday night, and by the time I went to bed on Sunday, I was 3/4 done. I haven’t had time to pick it up today, but once the kids get in bed, I will work on it more. I can’t wait to get this finished.

Help!

ok, I have decided I want to make pillow covers for my couch, not cushion covers, just covers for the 4 throw pillows that match my couch and loveseat. I have determined I am going to knit them, and button them closed. I am pretty certain I am going to do a mitered square on one side and the Op Art pattern on the other.. The problem is colors… I have no clue what colors to use with my couch/living room.

My walls are white (we have been in the house about  2 1/2 months and just don’t have the money right now to repaint) the only other upholstered item in the room is faux suede, in a med to dark brown. All other furniture is wood finish. Here is the couch.

those leafy pillows are the ones I want to cover.. I want to use something other than the brick color of the furniture.. and I need 2 colors, hopefully something to lighten up the pieces.

Help me… Suggest colors..Please…

Knitting quandry…

I have been working on a bag for the last week or so, it is supposed to be a carrying case for a netbook. I wanted a sleeve style, but a knitted one, and I decided I would do what is called Button hole handles.

I knew I wanted the bag felted, because felted has more strength, and less stretch/flexibility, plus, the process of felting makes the fabric more dense and pads the computer better. I did a couple swatches… and decided I liked the thicker fabric that a seed stitch makes better than the one a stockinette makes. So I started my bag. After working the bottom, and several inches up the side of the bag, I noticed that the seed stitch spirals around the bag, and my marker, marking the corner of the base, and the beginning of each round, was migrating around the side of the bag. Which made the handle placement a little more difficult.. So I asked around on Ravelry about if this is normal, how will it effect the handles when I felt it?

I was told that the spiraling is a charicteristic of seed. and to just follow the corner of the bag up and place my handles from there… So I did.. I made the bag, and when I cast off all my stitches, the handles were centered and lined up. I put the bag in the washer, set on hot to felt it. It felted beautfully, until I went to block it to dry it. I fussed, I fiddled, I pulled. This was the best line up of pictures I could get. Now I have to figure out what I need to do to fix this. I am thinking I will cut one side of each handle and sew up the extra on the other side. I am hoping this works.

And in the future, for bags, that I want to do in seed, and have buttonhole handles for? I will be knitting the bag solid, felting and then just cutting the frigging handles into it.

Some things I have realized..

yes, even in I have deep moments.

1. My children are teaching me tolerance ~ I can tolerate them running and screaming through the house for about 3 hrs.
2. My tolerance is not yet perfect ~ after about 3 hrs, I am forced to find them each separate jobs so that they will be quiet and stop running.
3. Knitting is teaching me patience ~ I can wait almost forever when I have my knitting with me.
4. My patience seems  conditional ~ if the kids are with me, or if I don’t have my knitting, my patience is apparently absent.
5. Knitting has also taught me that time is relative ~ when knitting a sock, those first 8 inches seem to just fly by, but that last inch, though worked at the same pace, can take hours.
6. There is no such thing as too much yarn ~ just trust me on this one. And don’t ask how much yarn I own.
7. I love my extended family, and sometimes I love them more the further away they are from me.
8. In some ways, I am a very old fashioned woman ~ I love cooking, canning, putting up food, making things “from scratch” as in not using mixes, taking care of my family (though the whole washing dishes by hand thing, it is for the birds)  and just in general being a homemaker.
9. In other ways, I am very modern ~ I love my computer and internet, and I am not willing to give them, or my cell phone up. (mind you, cell phone is our only phone, we gave up a land line years ago)
10. Knitting has taught me to plan ahead ~ it is easier to use up extra yarn than to find more of the same color and dye lot to finish a project.
11. I have learned that beauty is relative ~ I have a red circular shawl pinned to one wall, I knitted the shawl, and dyed it myself, I am very proud of it and I thin it is beautiful, I have had people ask me why I have a huge doily on the wall.
12. I have learned that by the age of 3 children can no longer hear the sound of their mother’s voice.
13. A child who loves to read is a gift, though sometimes you may wish that she reads slower, so that it is easier to keep her in reading material.
14. A child who doesn’t love to read, sometimes just hasn’t yet found something she enjoys reading.
15. Time spent reading is never wasted. Trust me on this one, ignore the rest of my family.

Hubby socks

ARE DONE!!!!  I finished them yesterday, with just 4 days left until he returns (today it is 3 days, but not like I am counting or anything)  They are in hiding with the rest of the Christmas stuff…

On the other hand, I am seriously wondering about my children’s sanity. The oldest (9) and the youngest (3) are each holding pencils rolled up in  washcloths, and then a rubberband to hold it on.  They will at random point them at each other and shout things. Things like “Expeliarmus“  and “Impedimentia” but I think my favorite is from my 3yo. He is pointing his at his sister and yelling “Expelidavra” I am wondering if it will kill the wand that flies across the room?

Ahh… the joys of children…

I will let them do this until I can’t stand it anymore, and then I will find work for them to do.

See, Mom’s not so dumb.