I think I may have my first commission

I have been making good progress on my Hermione whatever whatever's. I just have to start decreasing for the top of the mitten, then the thumb and the. The actual convertible portion.

A couple of days ago I dyed the other DK skein that I had in order to make the second hand and hopefully the hat. Don't ask me what made me decide to look into my drawer of caked yarns but lo and behold, there sat the other half of my first skein, all caked and ready to go...I think I'll have enough. At the very least, it's was an activity of duplicating colours and I think I passed the test.

One of the ladies from the Thursday evening knitting circle was admiring the yarn and then asked me how much I would sell it for. I told her the cost of the base yarn, added a few dollars and told her I could attempt to dye a skein for her. She said she would be willing to buy and that she would bring the scarf she wanted me to try to match. Cool! I think another order from ACME Fibres may be necessary since I have none left. Mate I should get 2; one for testing the colour and another for the actual dye.

1:09 am Friday
Am I happy or what? I closed the hand of the left side of my Hermione's whatever whatever! I'm going to add the thumb and then start on the right hand. I JUST managed to finish this cake of yarn. I had about 6" left to sew in.

I'd rather not repeat today

Let's just say today was not a good day. Moving onto knitting.

I have done the thumb gusset (I think that's the term) and I'm about to close off the palm before continuing up the hand and having to start decreasing. All for the Hermione whatever-whatevers.

I think I was generally accurate for dyeing the other hand. It's a little bit darker in places but it still looks okay, as you can see in the side by side pic. I'm really wanting to dye a skein of sock yarn in this colour. I think it would look lovely on my feet.

One is apparently not enough

As I continue to knit my Hermione Fingerless gloves, it becomes apparent that I need more yarn which means I have to redye Carol's Eyes. It's my first time attempting a redye but it's looking right. I guess I'll see how it turns out soon. It just has another 2 minute nuke and then it's to be hung out to dry. Hopefully by morning it will be generally dry and hopefully it will match. I have no more undyed DK yarn to do it again. Also this time, my fingers are less blue.

For the gloves, I started the thumb increases and it's coming along nicely. I think about 1-2 more pattern repeats before the thumb hole will be done. I hope I can get everything done before the end of the month.

I've decided to put the Pirouette socks on hold until Thursday so I can get help from T.

Off topic: I'm watching a little mini doc on the release of Star Trek Enterprise season 1. Imagine my shock and surprise when I looked up the show on iTunes and saw the cost for the season to be $54.99 per season! This show has been off the air for like 10 years. I don't want to watch the show that badly.

She has proven herself knit worthy

Yuppers, my aunt is definitely on the approved knitting list. Last week I noticed a lone pair of socks hanging in the laundry room. When I examined them, I realized they were the Wanida socks I knit for my aunt last year. She washed them in delicate and hung them out to dry. I feel much better about giving her hand knit socks.

Since today is March 31st, I checked on the Koolaid dye group I. Ravelry to see what the challenge for April was.

April's challenge: dye and knit a project in a month.

While I do enjoy knitting socks, I already have 2 pairs of Cookie socks for the Sock Club to do in the next 2 months. Something tells me I wouldn't finish something in the allotted time. I had to think of something to knit on a much smaller and less complicated than socks. In comes T, who on Thursday showed me a pair of fingerless gloves that she had knit in a DK weight yarn. I loved how they looked and decided that I wanted to make them in a Tanis skein like she did. Guess what? While I do like Tanis, I am not Tanis therefore I need to dye it myself.

I don't actually own any DK weight yarn but after some searching and an email to Acme Fibres, I was able to purchase 2 skeins for my dye and knit project for April. True I won't be able to wear them until much later on this year but who cares?

And now, I will start playing the Quiver Podcast on my phone, sit back and continue to work on my Blankie.

Also, I'm still going to get the skein of DK weight Tanis, perhaps this week.

It still doesn't have a name

Even though the Ernie Socks are not done, I have I already started planning my interim socks. It was the whole reason I was looking forward to this gradient dyeing challenge.

A few months ago, I got my Nekkid skein of Muscadine from Springtree Road with the intention to use it for the Tree of Life Socks. I had to reevaluate the idea since I still can't get access to the pattern. I found another colourwork pattern called Dark Isle by Julia Mueller Laris and I knew I couldn't give up on the gradient dye project.

I figured yellow, orange and red would look nice and it reminded me of a sunset.

I dyed the skein in yellow, using 30 drops of yellow food colouring and 1.5 tsp of citric acid. It turned out quite nicely, almost like a skein of Sunshine from Tanis Fibre Arts that I currently have sitting in my stash. I let it dry overnight before moving onto the next step.

I caked to skeins. I tried to get them to 52g a piece and somehow, despite using a scale and weighing 52g, I ended up with 50g and 54g cakes. I dyed both of the cakes at the same time in 20 drops of red food colouring and 1.5 tsp of citric acid.. Problem is that I didn't get the red I had wanted. It didn't occur to me that red on yellow made orange, not red! I was having a slow day. I did like results though and was willing to keep it as is.

I recaked it and had another duh moment. For some strange reason, I thought the cake would be inside out if I was winding it from the middle. That didn't work but it did show off the colour transitions better.

I let it dry off somewhat overnight while I waited to get an answer as to how to add a colour in the centre of the cake. I decided on purple. I caked a small portion of each centre and dyed it is a neon purple and a bit blue food colouring. I had more trouble untangling the mini cake (not cakes because the other one behaved itself).

I recaked the two cakes while they were still damp and I loved how they looked. I just wished I had dyed more of the centre of the cake purple.

Up until this point, I had not heat set anything since the yellow set in the beginning. I skeined the mini cakes. I put the two skeins back in water and nuked it in the microwave for two two minute sets. I let it cool and put it up to dry.

By this morning, they were ready! I so enjoyed the work to get these done and I want to do more gradient dyeing in this method.

I think I need a detangling shampoo

Ernie Socks have reached the heel flap. I should be able to finish that and the turn heel tonight. Then it's much smoother sailing after that.

I'm still working on my dye project and managed to get my third colour in thanks to a suggestion on Ravelry. Somehow, my yarn decided to be ridiculous and get itself all tangled. I spent 45 minutes trying to untangle a small portion of yarn. I usually don't spend that kind of time on untangling yarn but because I'm dealing with colour transition, I'm making the effort. Next time, don't be lazy and pull out the Corningware. Something tells me I wouldn't be having this trouble

Just a little bit longer

I think I've done 3 repeats more on the Ernie Socks and that means just one more before the heel flap. I think once I make it to there, I'll finally feel like I'm making real progress with these socks. I don't think I'm ever going to do these ones again. While they do remind me very much of my BFF Socks, which I love very much, they are just not as interesting to me. So that now cuts out the guarantee of making both pairs for each delivery.

As for the sock yarn I was dying, step 1 was completed by this morning and looked exactly like how I wanted it to. Step 2/3 went well as well. Step 4? Not so much. It's not turning out the way I had planned, or more actually, the colour I was expecting is not what's on the yarn. I'm debating if I should try to do an over dye, or leave it as is. I'm giving it a few more hours for the rest of the dye to soak in, before I make up my mind.

Potential yarn name number 2? One in Two. Yeah, I'm not really feeling that one myself.

One down, one to go

I finally finished one sock of the Ernie socks. The second sock will be cast on tomorrow. I still don't love them like I do the Newton socks but that could also be because I got spoilt with the MCN Sock Yarn from Indigodragonfly. Despite the fact Julep has the same properties as the MCN Sock (Merino 80%/Nylon 10%/Cashmere 10%), the MCN feels so much softer. Maybe the Julep sock will feel differently once it gets washed.

On the dyeing side, for March Challenge is gradient dyeing. I'm going to use the Nekkid Muscadine from Springtree Road. I was going to save it for the Tree of Life sock but as of yet, I still haven't gotten the book and no one has replied to the email so I'm assuming I won't be able to get the book that way.

Anywho, back to the yarn. The plan so far is a multi step process:
1) dye skein in light yellow
2) cake yarn in 50g parts
3) dye outer part of yarn in orange
4) re-cake yarn
5) dye outer part in red
6) re-cake
7) using a syringe, deposit some purple in the middle of the cake.

Hopefully, all of that will create a one of a kind one way gradient. I'll use that along with another Muscadine sock yarn to do another colour work sock.

Status update on the cookies: out of 48 cookies, there are less than 10 remaining. What the heck is up with the people in my house?

Almost done

I think I'm going to finish the Newtons. I just have the toe to finish and I may or may not finish it tonight. I'll definitely be starting the Ernie's tomorrow.

Today I randomly decided to dye another skein of yarn in my new crock pot. It turned out really nice. I used a Superwash skein of BFL. I'm not sure what I'll knit with it but I will do it soon. I really wonder how the yarn would have turned out of it had some silk it it. The colour is already has an iridescent look to it. Someone named it for me. It is now called Peacock Fury. If only I had kept notes as to what I did so I can at the very least attempt to repeat it.

Snow and dye and cookies

I'm hunkering down in the house in preparation of (apparently) the biggest snow storm to hit Toronto in the past 5 years. I'm planning on spending my extra time knitting.

The plan for tonight is to attempt my MaddieTosh dye-along skein. I'm still wanting to try the grapefruit look alike. I have an idea as to how I'll do it but I haven't used food colouring before.

I was happy when I reached home and found my first skein of Cookie A's Sock Club 2013. What I found interesting is that the yarn is by Indigodragonfly, a Canadian Indie Dyer that I already own a skein of, left Canada, went to California and back to Canada just for me. I haven't gotten the patterns as of yet but it was said that it will come on the 11th (Monday).

So I shall stare at my skein in all it's loveliness until I either get the pattern or the swift (hopefully it comes tomorrow or else I'll have to unskein it by hand. That just takes more time than I want.

Off to dye!

Never really seen MaddieTosh before

Which surprisingly is almost true with the exception of a charcoal grey on time that I saw someone else knitting with. It's not really an accurate way of seeing the kind of colours they have. For next month for Kool Way to Dye, the challenge is to dye a skein of yarn to look like Madeline Tosh skein. I found a skein by them that I do like called Grapefruit. It's a light and a medium pink tonal which looks lovely. I don't think I have enough for Koolaid but I do have 3 packs of food colouring (+ the citric acid required). I'm going to give it a go next month.

I am very pleased!

I am almost finished the panel :) After this is the sleeves and then the button panel an such and it will be done. I was thinking pockets would be great however I'll decide when I finish the rest of the cardigan and that means learning how to steek (and pray that I don't ruin this thing).

On another, I finally found squeeze bottles and I picked up the citric acid. I cannot wait until the Jacquard dye comes home. I've got 2 undyed skeins from Knitpicks, a nekkid skein from Springtree and a skein of BFL sock yarn from Acme Fibres. I'll try out the gradient dyeing maybe on the Stroll before using the nekkid skein (and if I get the book it'll get used for the Tree of Life socks). I still have to get a couple more masonry jars and I think I'll be generally set with the exception of a crock pot.