actual knitting!

With all this newly dyed yarn around, I finally found a little knitting inspiration!

I was tipped off by a friend to the 3-hr cowl pattern and decided to give it a go with the hank I dyed Saturday. What do you think?

I think the stitch pattern worked okay with the dye job. I did get quite a bit of pooling, but it doesn't bother me.

I'm not a fast knitter and bigger projects seem to suck the knitting mojo out of me. lol I have an alpaca blanket that may never get finished. I love what's done, but it's reeeeeeally slow going. And I have a pair of socks languishing in their bag. I also still have a crochet bag that's just a bottom at this point. None of these are calling my name. I suppose I just need instant gratification. =)

dyed in the wool

Ah, yes. My new favorite hobby has surfaced once again. After getting my errands run on Friday, I had Saturday to do as I pleased (thanks to rain taking yard work off the table). So, I pulled out some wool and my packets of Kool-Aid and got to work!

I started with some variegated wool that I'd picked up on clearance a few years back. I used some for a pair of slippers that were a gift, but still had about 3.5 skeins and no interest in making anything with that colorway. So I decided to over-dye it! Ugly can be fixed. I had three partial skeins and started with those, using a packet of mixed berry KA for each. The result? Perfect!

The original is on the right and the new, muted skeins on the left.

Pretty, no?

I'm thinking those two full skeins might be taking a blue bath soon too!

Then, I used more mixed berry, lemon-lime, pink lemonade and black cherry/grape for an off-white skein.

This one, I'm not so sure about. We'll see once it's been knit up if it'll need another date with some Kool-Aid or not.

I'm not so sure about that lighter, pinkish segment.

After finishing those, I was still inspired to try another technique I'd seen - dyeing yarn while wound in a cake. First, a bath in lemon-lime:

I then flipped it and gave it a bath in mixed berry.

Poking around in the cake, I realized I apparently wound my cake a bit too tightly and the color didn't make it to the center of the cake so I mixed up some more of both colors and used my baster to inject color into the center, nuking, checking and squirting in more where needed.

After winding this back into a skein, I could really see the results:

Oh, so pleased with this! I'm not entirely sure it's worth the extra effort to dye in the cake though. I think I could get very similar results from hand painting and could avoid having to re-skein a wet cake of yarn.

 My efforts yesterday did produce a colorful living room while things dried:

I'm already thinking what else is in my stash that I want to over-dye. =)

mmmm, peanut butter

Since work is slim today, I decided to try out a new recipe for dog biscuits. Reilly's always a willing taste-tester though he's probably not really the best judge since he'll eat just about anything. lol

I used the peanut butter dog treat recipe from Chloe's Kitchen. With only four ingredients (whole wheat flour, water, molasses and peanut butter), it couldn't be quicker or easier. The most time-consuming part is cutting them out.

They are definitely Reilly-approved!

"Stay" only last so long when homemade peanut butter biscuits are involved!

This has quickly become one of my favorite cookbooks and I'm so glad I splurged on it!

gradient

I dyed up another small hank of yarn to try out a new technique. This time, I used neon liquid food coloring. I first dyed the 35g hank of winter white wool in what was supposed to be turquoise (according to the box), but the wool took up much more of the green than the blue even though there was very little green added. lol Once this was dyed and rinsed, I wound the hank into a ball and mixed added it to a bowl of dark purple. Sorry, no process pics this time.

The result:

I'm loving the mix of colors! The 2nd color is mostly taken up on the outer layers of the wound ball and in lesser degrees as you move inward. I did squeeze the ball a few times to help the purple soak in a bit further. I definitely plan to try this again in the future!

Any suggestions for 35g of a worsted weight wool in a gradient?

stash reorganization

A couple weeks ago, I decided the stash needed a good toss (and a serious culling). My intention for awhile now has been to get my stash down to just what would fit into my vintage steamer trunk. This is what I started with:

Lots of plastic bins full of yarn!

This is where it ended up:

The bag is sock yarn. Sock yarn doesn't count, right? lol

Wanna see inside? The bottom layer is all wool and wool blends, mostly in sweater quantities:

The next layer is smaller amounts of wool, alpaca and a bit of cashmere, surrounded by smaller bags of linen, cotton and bamboo:

Then, I filled out the top with more cotton and linen and sock yarn in larger quantities:

The top tray now holds my needles, hooks, a styrofoam head for blocking hats, purse handles, my ball winder and some cotton blends perfect for baby items:

Sadly, my swift is about an inch too long to fit in the trunk in the tray. I might have someone cut it down jsut a bit though so it will. I love having it all in one spot like this. =) As I work on a design for a tiny house, I'm keeping this trunk in mind. I'll have to work it in somehow.

I've sold a good chunk of the yarn I culled, but still have some to go. I don't mind holding on to some of the wools since I can overdye some and use those, but most of the acrylics are going one way or another. If they don't sell soon, I'll be donating those. I have nothing against acrylic, I just don't really enjoy using most of them and I have too much great yarn to waste space on the cheap stuff. =)

adventures in striping

Thanks to a break in work - I had work, but we were not allowed to work, waiting for possible changes to the rules that never actually changed. Yeah, thanks boss for costing me a whole day of work. :-/ This waste left me with free time on my hands yesterday and this morning so I pulled out a skein of winter white Patons wool and got to work with a plan to make some self-striping yarn. =)

What I stated with:


I pulled out my swift and started wrapping:

I used roughly a 10-yd repeat for this one for thicker stripes. I'm thinking of making a cowl with this.

Getting the colors together:

teal - 4 pkg berry blue, 1 pkg lemon lime and about 1/2 pkg grape


brown - 2 pkg lemonade, 1 pkg orange, 1 pkg grape and I added about 1/4 tsp brown Wilton's icing paste to darken the brown

After about an hr in plain water, the divided skein went into the color and into the microwave:


Nearly clear water took 4 2-minute stints in the microwave:


Success!


After I had the skein rinsed and hung to dry, I still had time on my hands... and more yarn! So I set up for a 3-stripe skein:

Really glad I got this type of swift - no need to build a separate board to do this! =)

I went more basic with the colors on this one:


Super simple!


And very spring-y!

This one was about a 6-yd repeat. I'm thinking socks. =)

Next, I'll have to do a gradient...

meet my new roommate

Annie was born in a humble home - can it get more humble than a reused applesauce jar? No one expected much of Annie. Though she had simple beginnings, but she had high hopes for herself. She knew if she worked hard, she could accomplish great things and be more than just "Applesauce Annie." So, she began to grow and grow, until one day, she was ready to bake her first loaf of bread. No, it wasn't perfect, but it showed promise and hints of the flavor she knew she could someday produce. She was still rather young after all. Annie knew she needed a new home, a larger home where she could grow bigger and live up to her potential.

So Annie got a new home:

and decided to reinvent herself. This was no applesauce jar. This was the home of a lady. Annie decided she would now be called Arianna. She was quite "airy" at this point. =) She now has high hopes for her future, imagining many wonderful loaves of bread, stacks of pancakes, batches of muffins... the possibilities are now endless!

(For those curious or maybe wanting their own Annie, I used the sourdough starter recipe here though there are  of course other ways to start. My Alaskan sourdough cookbook's starter uses thick potato water. It also says to not use a metal spoon, go with wood.)