Adventures in Color

This week saw some progress in spinning the Waimea Rooster Merino and black Tencel roving from AlohaBlu.

I’m loving the colors in the singles. Sometimes my bobbin looks gold, then it’s blue, then a purplish pink. Never boring.

I’m getting ready for Tour de Fleece, which starts July 2nd to coincide with the Tour de France. (While they’re spinning bicycle wheels, we’ll be spinning fiber.) The Knitting Community Orphans will have a team on Ravelry. We’re focusing on AlohaBlu fiber in this first participation, and she has designed the special colorways for us: “The Frog Prince” and “Knitting Community Orphans,” both based on the photos from our Ravelry group. You can participate with any fiber, but a bunch of us will be using AlohaBlu fiber. It should be fun.

Common Threads met at my houseon Thursday. Karan brought this lovely shawl for show and tell:

Everyone was knitting. It was a companionable meeting, as they usually are.

I had planned on spinning, since we met at my house and I was expecting a small turnout at first, but at the last minute several other people were able to join us. It would have been a bit crowded with my wheel out in the room, so I worked on the ribbing for my “So-not-my-palette Cardigan.” Since then I have made more progress and am into the colorwork section.

I'm using this pattern by Kathleen Taylor for sizing and shaping directions, but with colorwork patterns chosen from Alice Starmore's book, Charts for Color Knitting.

The next band of pattern will be bright green and a very dark green. I can hardly wait to start on it. After that will come a band of several shades of gold.

Speaking of colors, we thought the puppy we were considering was going to be blue. Last Sunday, we decided we liked one of the boys better than the other and made our pick. We shot the breeder an email to let her know we would take him, if he was still available. She emailed back saying that she had just finished grooming all four pups in the litter. Oops! The guy we picked is going to be silver instead of blue. Did we care? Actually, that’s better. He will still be a color that doesn’t show the dirt from the trail so much, but he will be easier to see in dim light as we get older. Here’s a link to poodle colors. (Scroll down to find silver.) Silver, blue and black all come into the world black. The puppies that won’t remain black have some white hairs among the black hairs between the pads on their feet. As the pup grows up, he will lighten until he reaches his designated color. They call this “clearing.” In miniatures (like ours) it can take a couple of years to “clear.” In standards the change happens even more slowly. The hair on the feet and face are the first to show the lighter color. At four weeks, there should have been some lightening in his face for a blue, but it was quite a bit more than should have been the case, thus the surprise. Here’s our little guy after grooming a week ago.

His blue siblings have much darker faces.

We are officially the owners of half of this pup. I’m not sure whether the half we own is the intake half or the output half, but we don’t have to look after him yet, so it doesn’t really matter. We have named him Dusty. We plan on picking him up July 1st.

The decision-making process has been an adventure. First, we had to decide how soon to add another dog to the family, then pick the right one. We consulted a pet psychic to help answer these questions. She told us Sunny still hangs out with Rocky, so he doesn’t miss her, but he misses her warm body. He was OK with waiting to get another dog until later on…at first. We were looking at a litter of four that had the two “blue” boys and one blue girl. Rocky did not want the white boy in the litter, because he was “bossy.” The breeder confirmed that the white boy was the first born and was the alpha. Rocky liked the girl first, but by the time we found that out, she was taken. We thought he just wanted a girl and had made up our minds to wait for the next litter, but then the pet psychic said Rocky had contacted her and had decided he liked the two boys, too. She asked us if we were drawn to either of the boys more than the other, which we were. Although they looked identical in the photo, we both liked the one on the right better.

While I was waiting to hear from the breeder whether that boy was still available, Rocky started pulling on my pants leg and dancing in a circle. He was clearly excited and trying to tell me something. Then my iPad went “ding,” indicating I had an email. It was from the breeder, telling me the boy we preferred was still available, but he was going to be silver. Rocky seemed to be telling me, “We’re getting a puppy!” 

Speaking of Rocky…and colors…he is a lovely basic black. Here’s a photo of him right after his grooming appointment on Monday.

For an older dog (11+ years), he's still pretty dark. 

We have been doing some walks and hikes, because the weather has warmed up and is nice. (It’s about time!) It could still snow, but that becomes less likely every day.

What's on my needles: Still hand-quilting the “Delectable Pathways” quilt. Working on the “So-not-my-palette Cardigan.”

What's on my Featherweight: Still waiting for the next project.

What's on my wheel: Still the Waimea Rooster Merino/Tencel from AlohaBlu.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished Split Second by David Baldacci. It was interesting, typical Baldacci. Now listening to Terry Brooks’ The Sword of Shannara. It’s a long one, but is interesting so far. Reading Remember This by Shae Buggs on the Kindle app on my iPad.

What's in my wine glass: Glenn Ellen 2014 Merlot in the big bottle. It has been one of those weeks.

What's my tip of the week: If you’re knitting a pullover or steeked (cut open after knitting) sweater on circular needles and want to try it on, just put half of the stitches on another circular needle. Then it can be slipped over the intended recipient’s head to check for size. If you change needle size from the ribbing to the body, you can do this without any extra work. Just stop working the first row with the larger size when you reach the halfway point.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Rain and Sun, Roosters, Frogs and Pups

On Sunday I finished “Sunny’s Socks.”

I’m using Charlene Schurch’s “Baby Cable Rib” pattern. The yarn is Knit Picks Stroll “Sunny Afternoon” hand-painted sock yarn, a gift from a dear friend, a remembrance of our Sunny, who was sunny all day long.

The "Waimea Rooster" Merino and black Tencel roving spinning is coming along. Saturday I received more of this luscious fiber in the mail, along with some “Knitting Community Orphans” and “The Frog Prince” colorways from AlohaBlu using the same fiber. The gigantic 8oz Waimea Rooster is in the middle. 

The braid on the left is the "Knitting Community Orphans," and the one on the right is "The Frog Prince," based on the photos used for our Ravelry group, The Frog Prince and His Knitting Community Orphans. I have 4oz of each. I ordered these two for this year's Tour de Fleece.  (Our group will have its own team this year.) The Tour de Fleece (TdF) runs concurrently with the Tour de France in July. Spinners on Ravelry sign up for teams and challenge themselves (or just relax and spin) with wheel and/or spindle.

In quilting news, the binding is finished on my “Seeing Stars” quilt. Here it is on the bed:

The design is based on Connecting Threads’ “Clara’s Journey.”

Vintage Stitchers met on Thursday. We met at Diane’s. She had her “Hop To It” quilt on the wall.

Barbara was sewing the binding on this great sampler quilt. (You may have seen this before, but just as a top.)

Marilyn is almost done with this great quilt:

I worked on hand-quilting my “Delectable Pathways” quilt.

DD sent me this photo of Miss Daphne and Daphne Jr., who is wearing her Red Riding Hood outfit. She wanted to show me how much she is enjoying her birthday present.

We’ve been getting a lot of rain lately, but Saturday was mostly nice, so Rocky and I went for a walk/hike, which started and ended up on-leash on the street, but included a nice section of off-leash time for us.

What's on my needles: Still hand-quilting the “Delectable Pathways” quilt. Working on the “Sunny’s Socks.” Still have Aran sweater for Daphne Jr. and “Trickle Sock”s on needles.

What's on my Featherweight: Waiting for the next project.

What's on my wheel: Waimea Rooster Merino/Tencel from AlohaBlu.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished Dragon Rose by Christine Pope on the Audible app. It was delightful. Now I’m listening to Split Second by David Baldacci. Good so far. Still looking for a book to read on the Kindle app on my iPad, but I’ve been catching up on my magazines on Zinio.

What's in my wine glass: Crane Lake Malbec 2014, one of our faves.

What's my tip of the week: If you’re mostly using the same set of cutlery, you can save time unloading the dishwasher if you train family members to put all the big spoons in a certain slot in the cutlery basket, all the little spoons in another slot (always the same), etc. Then when you go to unload the cutlery, you can just grab everything that’s in one slot and put it away at one time, no sorting. Of course, you would have to deduct the time it takes to train family members to put things away in the dishwasher in the right slots.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals were harmed during the production of this blog post.

To Everything There Is a Season....

A time to be born and a time to...dye. At my place, summer is a good time to dye using the method I like best. The sun-tea method with Kool-Aid and food coloring.

I'm sort of a health nut, so this is the only purpose I ever put Kool-Aid to, but it's a good product for that. I started out with the instructions I found on Knitty. 

The instructions are mostly designed for top-of-the-stove or microwave, but being a health nut, I'm also concerned with using renewable energy when I can, so I use the sun-tea method, mentioned in passing in a small side bar in the Knitty article.

I have two sun-tea jars dedicated to dyeing. 

I made a lace shawl a few weeks back, using lace-weight yarn left over from the gown I made for Miss Daphne's naming ceremony, back in July, 2010.

I don't know what I was thinking when I calculated how much lace-weight yarn I would need, but after making the gown and bonnet, I ended up with about 500 gm of Knit Picks Bare Merino Wool Lace Weight yarn (now called "Shadow," like the predyed version), most of it already wound into "cakes."

I really enjoyed making the shawl, as well as wearing it, so I decided I needed to make more shawls, but not all in "Bare." The line of Bare yarns are designed to be dyed as well as knitted or crocheted up as-is, so....

Here's the finished yarn:

Here's how I did it. I had about 4 oz. to dye, including one of the cakes and what was left over from the shawl. The instructions said to use one packet of "dye" (Kool-Aid) to one ounce of yarn, so I used four packets: two cherry and two orange. I added a few drops of black food coloring to grey-down the color a bit. I soaked the yarn in some warm water with a few drops of mild dish soap while I mixed the dye bath in my sun-tea jar. You don't need to add vinegar to the water you mix your dye in, as the drink mix is pretty acid, so I just used warm water. (No sugar, of course!) I added the yarn and more warm water to cover, and put it out in the sun. About an hour later, the dye bath was clear (exhausted), so I knew it was ready. I wanted the kettle-dyed look, so I didn't turn the yarn over during the dyeing process. The pups and I went on a hike instead.

Because I didn't turn the yarn over and open up the hanks of yarn during the process, the dye bath didn't reach all of it. The effect is nice in the finished yarn, though. It came out lighter in some places and darker in others.

If you want a yarn that's consistently the same color all over, you will need to open up the yarn and turn it several times during the dyeing process. Use tongs or rubber gloves for this, or you'll be wearing your dye for a while. (Your skin qualifies as an animal fiber for the purposes of this project.) This is because to dye with Kool-aid, the yarn has to be all or mostly animal fiber, although nylon will dye nicely. (My sweater dryer, made of nylon net and a PVC frame, has dye spots on it from previous projects.) Cotton won't take up this dye. This is why you want to be sure you are wearing old clothes you don't care about or 100% cotton fabrics. A cotton apron in a dark color (just in case) over your clothes is perfect. Since wool comes from an animal, it's perfect for dyeing with Kool-Aid, and my yarn is 100% Merino wool.

I rinsed the yarn in water close to the same temperature as the temperature of the dye bath and handled it gently, so the yarn wouldn't felt/full. I put vinegar in the first rinse and then Kookaburra Wool Wash in the last rinse. One disadvantage of dyeing with Kool-Aid is the lingering scent of (phony) cherry and/or orange, which eventually goes away. Neither is my favorite scent. The Wool Wash and vinegar seemed to take care of that problem, although in the past I've had to smell it all the time I was knitting the project.

Since I still had lots of leftover yarn and more hours of daylight, I decided to try tea dyeing. I found instructions here.

I used pretty much the same method except I didn't worry about getting my hands in the "dye bath." I was careful not to spill on cotton clothes, though, as tea will stain cotton, which means you can use this method to dye cotton.

For this batch, I used eight black tea bags in hot tap water. I poured in a couple of tablespoons of white vinegar, just in case. Very old tea works just as well as fresh tea, so this is a good use for tea that is past its prime. I was looking for a light color, so I didn't leave it in too long, but kept checking every 15 minutes or so. I don't think the tea dye bath "exhausts," but I'll have to experiment and report back in a later blog post.

You can get different colors from herbal and green tea, so it's fun to experiment with. Heres what I ended up with:

The original yarn (I still have more to dye), is on the left, and the tea-dyed yarn, on the right. Now I have yarn for two lace shawls and they aren't "Bare" anymore. For me, the hardest part came at the beginning and the end. because I had already wound up my yarn and didn't want the kind of regular pattern you can get from just putting your cake of yarn into the dye in a dish, I had to get out my knitty-noddy (which my wonderful DH made for me out of PVC pipe) and rewind it into hanks. Since it was lace yarn, this took for-ev-er! Then when I went to wind my yarn into a cake again after it was dry, the yarn kept flying off the ball winder. I finally got out a new TP sleeve to fit over the shaft of the ball winder, bent the bottom edge in so it wouldn't slip, and had no further problems, other than it still took for-ev-er even when it worked correctly. 

I was happy with the result and look forward to dyeing the last of the leftover lace-weight yarn on another nice day.

On almost any sunny day in the summertime, you can hear me paraphrase the famous Klingon battle cry: "Today is a good day to dye."

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Watch for my regular blog, returning July 27th.

High Fiber--Playing with Cards....

As I write this, I just finished carding fiber for a hat for DH. Here's what I had to start with and what I ended up with:

From left: dyed merino, dyed merino blended in drum carder, bay black alpaca, dyed blended merino and alpaca carded together, and same mix carded further.

I ran the dyed merino through the drum carder until I had a homogeneous batt. Then I carded it with the black alpaca by making sort of a sandwich on the tray of the carder.

I carded the fiber several times until it looked like the fiber on the far right in the first photo.

The poodle fiber was very short, perhaps an average of 1/4 inch, so I added it by making a sandwich of the carded fiber with little pieces of poodle in the middle, covered with more carded fiber.

Here are the carded batts.

It will be interesting to spin. I'll post a photo of the singles and finished yarn. The batts are very soft and silky. You can still see some of the chunks of poodle fiber if you hold the batt up to the light. I call the fiber Pacapoo.