Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Back to Basics

Plain old vanilla socks ... but wait ... stripes, glorious stripes!


This is yarn I dyed up with food coloring back on July 14th.

First, I wind up a cake from the HUGE cone.  I did 60g this time, I never use all the yardage for socks, so I figured, why wind and dye all of it??


Then I make a REALLY big skein out in the yard.


Then soak the yarn to prepare it for dyeing and mix up the dyes.


Dye each section separately.  I try and measure and double check that sections are the same lengths (so my stripes are the same).  


Heat it up to set the dyes!


And let it dry!  Then I wind it back onto a kniddy knoddy so its a manageable skein.


And wind my cakes for knitting!


Honestly I don't know how yarn dyers knock these out all the time.  I know you can use a warping board, but you still have to warp it, so its gotta take the same amount of time to prepare the skein.  And you have to be OH so careful not to make a mess or your stripes won't be clean and separate.  I've done this several times now and it still takes at MINIMUM an hour per skein.

Thursday, September 10, 2015

Moonin' Frog

Peepin' Tom ... NOPE! Moonin' Frog!

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

FO: Undine Socks


Pattern: Undine by Valerie Johnson
Yarn:  Premier Yarns Deborah Norville Serenity Sock Weight Prints (Merino/Bamboo blend)
Needles: Addi Sock Rockets US 1 (2.5mm)
Cast On: August 21, 2015
Finished: September 7, 2015

These were a quick and fun knit!  

Friday, September 4, 2015

Spinning with beautiful tools


Mirkwood Nimrodel spindle and an amethyst bowl I got recently.  It works wonderfully as a spindle bowl.  This is for the Mirkwood SAL that ends at the end of the month.  I am a little behind here, so will be trying to spin a bit each day and hopefully finish this one by then!