Thursday, January 27, 2011

Dying with the kids

Today is a lazy day since Danielle and I aren't feeling so great right now. One of the things I've been wanting to start doing is dying yarn with Kool-Aid or food coloring. The idea is to get good enough to dye reclaimed yarn and possibly start selling it.

What's reclaimed yarn? It's yarn that is from unraveled knit and crocheted things bought from the thrift store. I've only done a few for practice, mostly acrylic. But I have quite a few waiting for some attention...namely cashmere, merino wool, silk and such. Even if I don't sell it, there's NO WAY I could ever afford to pay the prices that these types of yarn cost when new. So at the very least I have cheap expensive yarn to work with. I'd love to make a cashmere mobius scarf (scarf made into a continuous circle, twisted on itself...like this). I also think a cashmere hat for Meghan would be awesome. Or double layered mittens with the inside layer being cashmere.

So anyways back to the original thought line....Dying Yarn. I kept thinking about doing it and putting it off because there were projects to work on and then sweaters to unravel. I couldn't take it anymore. I had to DO IT! I was about ready to pull out a sweater and start ripping it apart when I remembered I had some Moda Dea Cartwheel (100% wool) in my stash. The skein I'm using is grey and white but it should still work. The whole line has been discontinued and it was at the dollar store. (wish I'd know it was discontinued when I first found it...I overlooked a lot of nice stuff I'd probably like to have now). Which means if it's a failure, I've only lost a dollar or so.

The process is so safe that the kids can do it, so I decided to make it a project for the little ones and I. I broke out the yarn, wrapped it into a hank around my arm, tied it off in a few places and away we went. The intention was to use food coloring until I discovered we were out of vinegar....so Koolaid had to be included somehow. That is if I could find it. I tore the kitchen apart and just as I was about to give up I found ONE packet of grape Koolaid. YAY!!!

I filled an 8c measuring cup with water, poured in the grape KoolAid and away we went. (no I didn't allow it soak for a set amount of time like you're suppose to...that would be boring!). Danielle picked blue, Sean picked red. I was sad to see the container of yellow had dried up. Then I got the brilliant idea of adding water to it and see if we could get every last drop out. So there's a splash of yellow in there too. I just had the kids drop the color in, one on each side and swished it around a tiny bit, trying not to mix the colors too much. We threw it in the microwave....Sean setting it for 2 minutes, me microwaving my coffee for 2 minutes while the yarn cooled a bit and then Danielle doing the yarn for another 2 minutes. It's sitting on the counter as I type. It has to cool down before I can rinse it out and examine it. I wanted to take some pictures but Eileen can't seem to find the battery charger for her camera. Hopefully we can find it soon.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

PHEW!

Took a looooong break from blogging but not from crocheting.

I made my cousin Christine's wedding afghan after a restart. I found out that white wouldn't work well with her decor so remade the hexagons with Caron one pound in off white. I made it 6 hexagons wide by 7 hexagons long, measuring... 45" x 65.5". Unfortunately I never got a picture of it before my mom took it to Tennessee. Christine loved it!

I started a Spiderman blanket for Sean using Stitch 'n Frog's Superhero Dreamcatcher pattern. I have the last 2 sections to finish (about 9 or 10 rows) then the webbing and it's all his. He's been "using" it, hanging tails and all when it's accessible.

Pat and Alex got married Nov 13th. I didn't end up making them an afghan. I figure I have their whole life to get one done. Besides I think one of the two Tree of Life afghans I have started is suppose to be their's. Alex requested an afghan for Christmas and I obliged. I used Hobby Lobby's I Love this Yarn for the first time and made a ripple afghan for her. It was done with 3 shades of blue I started from the bottom and made a section of each color, starting with 6 rows per color. Then I'd start the color sequence again but decrease a row each time. Once I got to 1 row I started increasing again. Can't quite remember whether I ended with a 3 or 4 row section at the top. It was finished with hdc around and then reverse single crochet in the darkest blue. Unfortunately I didn't measure it or get a picture of it. I wasn't too crazy for it and told her she could exchange it at a later date for an afghan of her choosing. She said she liked the one she received.

Next I started an afghan for my mom for Christmas. She'd recently redone her livingroom with dark brown, red and dark green furniture. She also purchased a large painting of a poppy that's on the wall. So I took a few patterns...mutilated and mashed them together and came up with the poppy trellis square. The poppy was made using this flower as a base (with a few modifications. The I surrounded it with the leaves and trellis from the Rose Trellis Afghan pattern in my new book... 50 Sensational Crochet Afghans and Throws. There are so many revisions I can't list them all here. If you want to see them check out the project on my project page at ravelry. Here's one of the squares...



I didn't finish in time for Christmas so she got a box with 24 out of 35 squares in it. She's really excited for me to finish it. BUT...



I had to put my mom's present aside because we had a baby shower and a bridal shower on the 8th and 9th of January that I needed to make presents for. For the baby shower I picked up this blanket that I started in August. After buying more yarn it didn't take long to finish the body. It was the border that took for work. I hate deciding which border best suits which afghan. I decided to do alternating stripes of white and coordinating colors (mint, yellow, pink and baby blue). The white was done in hdc. The coordinating colors were done with 2 strands held together and in sc. I finished with a stripe of white and then reverse single crochet. Again no picture of the completed project.

For the bridal shower I picked the pattern Proposal from the 50 Sensational Afghans book. And again, I wasn't finished by the time the shower rolled around. I had the whole body done so wrapped that and then asked for it back so as to finish it. :o) After I got it back I decided to add another row of blocks to increase the length. The border itself took hardly any time. I had to give my hand a rest for a few days (thumb was getting extremely numb quickly) but had it done by that Wednesday. Now if I could just get the finished afghan to her before something happens to it. Here's a finished picture...

Photobucket

Closeup of the square....



Today I'm back to working on my mom's afghan. Hopefully I can get it done by next week. (told her it would definitely be done by the end of the month) Then I'd like to finish Sean's blanket and maybe a few other WIP (works in progress).