Smells like wet sheep and boiled Kool-Aide!

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Mmmm... a smell like that means that I've been up to some of my own dying! There we some serious tangle issues with the skein - due mostly to my own fault - but I finally got it all undone after the cat got regulated to the bedroom (to her dismay) and I worked from the back to ball it and then got around to skeining it correctly.

As you can see from the pic, I was attempting to do a gradient fade from dark grape (mm - warm artificial grape smell!) to purple. However, I don't know if it was the yarn I used or if it was the vinegar I added to the dye bath but it soaked up much quicker than I thought it would... so instead of a gradual fading it goes from a super dark quarter to a much lighter quarter to a basically un-dyed half. I kinda like it though - looks really nice as it dries. Hopefully it'll be all set to go by the time I get home so I can take better pics.

I think my next set are going to be a series of "monster" colors for gifts - I'm thinking of designing little monster cozies for friends cellphones/MP3 players for the holidays. So a purple and green mottled one, a red and orange set, and maybe a yellow-green-blue mix... Any other ideas?

How to dye with Koolaid - SUCCESS!

The Mamajama and I, with the strict supervision of Poppy and LeeLuu, had our first dying workshop! We had hoped to use both Jacquard and Koolaid for dying, but we had so much fun with the Koolaid that we never got to the Jacquard.

The Mamajama took Notes:

KoolAid Workshop Aug 15 2008

Yarn: Treadsoft 2ply Superwash merino wool.
Mom bought a cone of yarn. I'll have to get her to add the website to the comments. I skeined up approximately 50 grams of the yarn with my trusty niddy noddy. Its a bit thinner than fingering weight, which was frankly a bit of a disappointment. We had great debates about if we should keep it or not. Mom also got some bare "worsted" weight for Claire, but my wraps-per-inch tool told me it was more like a DK weight. But, it should work regardless.

The Procedure:
We soaked the yarn in warm tap water for about a hours. Actually, it was probably closer to two. I put the yarn in to soak and then we decided to have dinner (Three Cheers for Kelbasa! We had a culinary celebration of our Slavic roots!). Once dinner was done, we covered the table with news papers and got ready to go!

After we squeezed out the yarn skeins, we laid them out on a double layer or plastic wrap. For the first two skeins, we mixed one cup of water with one packet of Koolaid. Then we went to town with foam brushes! One thing we did notice was that the dye did not soak all the way down so we had to flip the skeins over to get even color distribution.

Mom did Little Girls Dream. She used 1 package of pink lemonade and 1 package of grape.

I did Morning Grasshopper (named because we met a grasshopper the next morning who was the exact same shade of green!). I used 1package of Lemon lime. and 1 package of ice blue with 1/2 a package of grape mixed in, that produced a lovely periwinkle.

After we painted the yarn, we sprayed it with full strength white vinegar (I bought a gallon jug of it for $1.89!) .

With our next experiment, we laid out two more skeins. This time, we added a tablespoon of vinegar IN with each cup of color. Mom said she did not notice any difference. I felt like the dye got immediately sucked up exactly where you put it. I found it more difficult to "push" the color around.

Mom did Tropical Sunrise with 2 packages of cherry, 2 of orange, 2 of lemonade, mixed into individual cups with 1 cup of water and one table spoon of vinegar.






I did Tropical Sunset using the same orange and lemonade but with 2 packages of black cherry. As you can see, the reds do make a big difference!








The last skein we did was Shaken Not Stirred - Bombay Sapphire and I'm not telling how we did this one!! Trade Secrets!!!!

After we dyed each skein, we rolled them up in the plastic wrap and steamed them for about 30 minutes each. Then we rinsed and dried! Its very exciting. We had so much fun, and we have to restrain our selves from immediately dying more!!!

Fiber Mania

This is my week of Fiber Mania! I met Bev (AKA emmasdaughter) at the College Street Café in Clinton on Monday. I think we might make Mondays a regular meeting! Then I met Vanessa (AKA DivaMissV) at Panera’s on Tuesday. I hope to make this semi regular too! Yes yes, I know! Three days of knitting (because we can’t leave out the Rome Wednesday’s group!) might be a bit much (especially when MissV and I forget all about the time and leave poor hubby sitting in the parking lot for HOURS! Sorry MrV!!). But I think I’m going to need the inspiration. I’ve got a lot going on:

The Sock Madness:
The Mother has roped me in to some sock insanity. We’re in the “Pair-a-Month” challenge on Ravelry. I joined a few months late, and the Mother has convinced me I need to catch up. I have 5 and a half pairs done. So in the next 5 months I have to do 6 more pairs. August will be tough to double up on this challenge (see madness below), and Sept and Nov are reserved for the Pentathlon. But if all goes well, this should be no big deal (so sayeth the madwoman).

Ravelympic Madness:
The Ravelympics – sign up, choose an event, cast on during the opening ceremony, cast off by the closing ceremony. Mom has convinced me I can knit a sweater in 17 days. You know, its insane and an almost impossible task, but I’m going to go for it!

Secret Surprise Project:
This one isn’t going into Ravelry, and I have to get some yarn for it. But it shouldn’t take too long.

Claire’s Jawbreaker:
I’ve finished the back but the front is giving me some trouble. I just have to concentrate for a bit. I hope to have this done for her way before Rheinbeck (crosses fingers)

The Super Secret Super Exciting Project:
This one is going to throw a wrench in all my plans! I’m so excited about it that I’m obsessively tracking my LoopyEwe delivery (see above). I just can’t wait for the yarn to arrive so I can get busy!

The Shawl(s):
I got it in my head that I wanted to spin and knit a shawl for myself in 2008. Then I thought I’d spin and knit 2 shawls for 2 of my girlfriends. Well, that might have been a bit ambitious. I’m not even all the way thru the first 4oz of fiber. Its just been too hot an humid to spin! The stuff just felts in my fingertips! So I’m not sure I’ll get THREE done, but I do want at least 1.

Whew, that’s a lot of stuff!

A slow few days

Things have been quiet on the crafty front. Well, that’s not exactly true.

Remember my Inferno Monster plans.

Well, I got Phase 1 and Phase 3 done. I like phase 1 a lot. Not so happy with Phase 3. It didn’t turn out the way I expected. I wanted solid colors with a hint of accent color. It’s certainly a lesson learned! I can’t wait to see how it knits up.

Phase 2 of the Inferno Monster is by far the easiest. It’s just solid sections of color with blended sections in between. My problem is to figure out how big each section will be. Since I’m Navajo plying, the color sections will shrink to a third of the length of the single. I’m thinking I might do fairly small sections, break it up the way I did for Phase 2 so that I’ll get short color changes and less of a stripy effect. I hope. So far, little has turned out the way I wanted it to. It’s supercool, nonetheless, albeit not how I predicted (Oh how I love words that are actually more than one word mushed together ie., none-the-less) I think am going to have to try and get good pictures of how to Navajo Ply. It’s a very cool technique and I’m sure if I don’t do it for an extended period of time, I’ll forget. Handy thing about blogs, they are like your own personal reference guide!

I’m off to visit the Mamajama for the weekend! I’m bringing the Inferno Monster but I probably won’t work on it. Spinning is kind of a solitary obsessive process for me. I have to figure out something to do with the Spring Mix. I’m just not happy with the scarf. It will probably meet the frog pond for the second time. I’ll show mommy and then decide.

Sock Knitters' Pentathlon - Sock 2

Start your engines!! Sock 2 of the Sock Knitters' Pentathlon is announced tonight. All we were told about the sock was that it would be more girlie and would work best in a lighter solid color. While I LOVED the yarn I chose for Sock 1, I took the recommendations to heart and I bought a skein of Cherry Tree Hill in Island Red from the Loopy Ewe. It's pretty. Not a ME color (since its not purple) but I'm hoping it will suit the sock well, whatever it is... OMG I have just 40 minutes!!!! AAAAAAH AND ITS LOST NIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sock Knitters Pentathlon - Queen Mermaid

Enchanted Knoll Farm Enchanted Knoll Queen Mermaid
Originally uploaded by amynowacoski

This is Queen Mermaid - a hand dyed superwash yarn from Enchanted Knoll Farm. Its quite lovely, and this picture doesn't really do it justice. Its much more subtle and very evocative of the sea. Being a Pisces, we do adore images of the sea. Ironically however, I don't like swimming in the sea because I am not at the top of the food chain there.

This is the yarn I'm going to use for the up coming Sock Knitters Pentathlon 2008. The first pattern will be released tonight.

I'm very excited. OK, I'm a geek.