FO and Fun in the Sun

I've got lots of pics for you from the last week, but I'm going to break them down into separate days.

First, here's the spruce ankle socks that I finally finished. I left them at Mom's. On purpose, natch. I have an extremely narrow foot and these were way too wide for me. Luckily, Mom has a wider foot than I, so someone gets to enjoy them. Forgive me for showing you two pics, but read the captions and you'll understand. They turned out okay, but I wasn't real enthused about them. Not sure if it's the colorway, which is very pretty, or the plain stockinette, but it took sheer willpower (why can't I use willpower to get over the chips ahoy cookie fetish I have?) to get over the second sock syndrome this time around.

This is sort of a hybrid sock I suppose. It's a toe-up sock (love the toe-ups - so practical.)
I used the magic cast-on for the toe, which is awesome by the way. Plain stockinette for the foot, and used Wendy's generic toe up recipe to do the short row heels (which I'm getting the hang of - sorta) and 2 x 2 rib for the ankle.

Blurry, but the color is right

Clear, but the color is way too dark

I started a new toe-up sock, but I'll share that later.

Fun In the Sun Part 1:
Look at these two photos closely. Can you see a shared trait? Can you tell they're brothers? Check out those tongues stickin' out!

Baby Kimono!

I like this FO. This will be one cute baby gift if I do say so myself. I went on a ribbon hunt today at several craft stores and came home with a sheer lime green with white polka dots to go with this outfit. This is the Baby Kimono from the Mason Dixon Knitting book. I used Lily's Sugar'n Cream cotton yarn in Sunny Sky. This is a lovely soft worsted weight cotton. This went so fast. Especially after working with sock yarn. I felt like those needles were flying!

I really liked this pattern too. Easy and fun. I just can't say enough about the Mason Dixon book. I can't wait to try some more of the patterns from it.

Yarn dyeing and Hair!

Two subjects to write about today: Yarn dyeing and Hair!

First, Hair. I was completely put in my place yesterday. I'm a bit opinionated when it comes to children's hair, specifically boys hair and even more specifically, the length of it. I'm old school. I love to see a super short, clean haircut on a little boy. Nothing long, nothing shaggy. Well. There's this little boy that I know who has very long hair. If you didn't know he was a boy, you'd swear he was a girl. Of course, I was being snooty and looking down my nose at him, thinking that his Mom must just like that kind of thing and doesn't that make me better than her cause my boys have short hair? I feel like a total tool now. I was told that this little boy made the decision to grow out his hair for Locks of Love. What an amazing thing this little boy is doing. Some little child is going to be thrilled to get that red, curly hair. How much crap has this little boy had to put up (by people like me) with over this wonderful decision that he has made?

To defend myself at least a little bit, let me add this. I live in an area where redneck parents think it's a good idea to not only let their kids hair grow out for fun, but they let them do it Mullet style. ick! Let me add a bit more: I'm not against grown men with longer hair. Can we say Viggo Mortenson from Lord of the Rings, anyone????


Okay, on to Yarn dyeing fun!

1. I got some knitpicks Bare sock yarn - 2 skeins of it and couldn't wait for the fun to begin. I have absolutely no experience in doing this kind of thing, but couldn't wait to get started. I soaked the yarn in very hot water and let it sit for about 45 minutes.

2. Dye - for this go around (won't be my last) I used Dylon permanent fabric dye in Poppy Red, Royal Blue and Sunflower Yellow.


3. I knew I wanted a variegated yarn, so I used two quart jars per skein. I only wanted two colors, thus the two jars. I did two combinations: Red/Purple, Orange/Green.

I did not follow the exact directions on the dye packs. For the red I used one dye pack (it's powder). Purple - One Red pack and about half of the blue. This was gorgeous. It turned out a dark heathery purple. For the Orange color I used half of the yellow and about two or three tsps. of the red dye. The Green was fun. It turned out a fabulous moss green. To get it, I used the other half of the yellow and about a tablespoon and a smidge of the blue. As you can tell, I didn't get exact measurements. We (my Mom was playing too) just kept adding until we got the color we wanted.

I added the recommended amount of salt (4 tbsp) to the mixtures to help set the dye. If you do this, make sure that you cover your work surface really well. (Mom would have killed me if I had messed up her granite counter tops. It's fun to craft at someone else's house, but the repercussions could be hell if you mess up!)

4. So I place the dye jars close together in a big pan on top of a great big splat mat, then added the yarn. This yarn is a superwash sock yarn, so I didn't need to be as careful of it felting, but if you use other, beware. Make sure you do some research first. Warm water, not hot and don't agitate! I divide the hank in half and put one end in one jar and one end in the other. Make sure that you have used some twist ties or waste yarn to secure the hanks as best you can to prevent tangling. I didn't do this well enough and it took me forever to get out the tangles when I went to wound this into a ball.

Notice that there is a little bit of no man's (or dye's) land between the colors? I loved that. The white turned a pretty light gray between the red and purple and a sunny yellow between the orange and green.


5. I let everything sit for an hour. Then I rinsed each hank in cold water and then in cold water and vinegar. I added the vinegar to make sure the dye set. I absolutely do not want runny socks when I'm finished with the final product. I'm paranoid that way. (I must also mention that the smell of wet wool and vinegar is not a lovely aroma.)

6. I then set the to dry out on the porch over night. My mom has a brand spanking new dryer that has a sweater shelf attachment and we put the still damp yarn on it to finish drying the rest of the way the next day.



7. Here's the final results in all it's yarny goodness. Um, I'm not a professional ball winder. Can ya tell? At least I got the job done. I can't wait to knit these up. I'm thinking of maybe doing the Sidewinders over at Nonaknits with one of them. Let me know if you like the way these turned out:

Snakes and Ladders is complete!

Yippee! It's done. The Snakes and Ladders Stole is now in the blocking stage. It's final measurements ended up being approximately 5.6' x 30". I am now a true believer. I didn't believe the people who said that blocking makes all the difference when dealing with lace, but I'm now a convert. This turned out gorgeous. I know the recipient will be pleased. Of course if she isn't, she'll lie and say she is, cause that's what Mom's do. Yes, the ends were wonky at the time of the photo, but they've been adjusted since. This is my first lace project. Yes, there are mistakes. Fortunately, I'm the only one who will ever notice. I figure that even for someone who knows what they're looking for would be hard put to find the mistakes on a moving target. And don't forget, I'm allergic to perfection anyway.

complete!, sorta

I got some yarn p@rn for you:

This lovely ball of merino sock yarn came from a lovely lady at ebay. She calls it Spruce. It's got a beautiful brilliant blue that keeps popping up every so often. The colors remind me of what you'd find in a peacock feather. So pretty! New socks are now in progress cause I couldn't wait. If you try and click on the pics below to get a better look, you won't. I couldn't get a clearer pic to save my soul tonight. But I tried!

Look Mom! I got toes!

Ahh! no foot!

Mother's day and cat beds

Happy Mother's Day!

Mine's been great. I got to sleep late (always a huge plus), at least til 8:30. The main reason? The baby slept til 8:30, which never, ever happens. Then we went to the in-laws and had a fantabulous dinner; filet mignon, basil grape tomatoes, creamed spinach, twice baked potatoes and to top it off was the most wonderful cheesecake I've ever had in my life. I was bad and had two huge pieces of the cheesecake and I'll be paying for that for the next month.

I finished the silly socks! Yeah! I also got in some time with the stole. I have until June 22nd (my mom's bday) to get that done.

Silly socks on the Silly boy's feet.

I know that most people have fancy cat tents or home-made cat beds, but really, why have those when you can have something that is obnoxious, doesn't match any other furniture, and takes up a quarter of the living room floor?

couple of FO's and a score!

Several things to mention today. I have a couple of FO's and a score!

First, the score:


I found a mink stole/capelet at an estate sale this weekend and got it for $14 bucks. It needs a little tlc, so I'll have to get it to someone who specializes in fur garments. Now, I wouldn't go out and buy a brand new fur and don't necessarily condone the killing of animals for the pelts, but I figure that it's already dead and sewn and for $14 bucks, I'm not passing it up.

Now, the FO's:



This knitted summer tank is now in the blocking stage. Yeah me! It's a bit tighter than I wanted it to be. We'll hope that it stretches since it's cotton. Big thanks to everyone at Crafster for holding my hand through this one. I've already got a new project planned, but I'll have to keep it under wraps for a while since it's to be a gift. Just pray it gets done in time.





Finished a sundress! This pic absolutely doesn't do it justice. I did discover during this process that I am a terrible seamstress. Patterns are not my friend. My mom got several long distance calls during this ordeal. Not that I won't sew again, but it was a frustrating process. I hate being shaped like a pear!


We could use a little prayer here for our family. My husband is having a difficult time with work (mortgage broker) and there's not a whole lot of money coming in and we have some big bills. We're about as stress as we can be at the moment and my husband is hurting in the self-confidence department. Any prayer is much appreciated!

It's been a while...

Yes, it's been forever since I've posted anything. But, lest you think that I've been idle, here's a little of what I've been up to:

To combat being cold, I made a "Snuglet". It's a blanket that you wear over you that has sleeves in it so that you can be warm and still have your hands free. I used the leftover fleece to make draft stoppers for our doors. It's made a huge difference in the temperature of our house.

I also made a ton of reindeer ornaments. I would highly recommend these at Christmas if you work with preschoolers or early elementary age children. I had about 70 kids make these in an hour. It was pretty awesome and cheap too! I hit a thrift store, bought three puzzles (100 piece size) and spray painted them brown. The whole project, including the spray paint, tiny red pompoms, small googly eyes, yarn and puzzles was around seven dollars. I used the leftovers that I had and made about twenty more for my son's kindergarten class and still had more leftover. You can get about 100 ornaments made for around $7.00 or less. You can get the directions on how to make these here. Personally, these are cuter without the legs and much easier on everyone if you leave them off. If you're in a hurry and are using regular school glue, the pieces tend to slide off. If you add the legs to the ornament, that's just more pieces to have fall off and you'll end up with some really upset children.

We've dealt with a bout of the flu with our oldest child. He had to miss his class party, so I went for him and took the ornaments with me and got his goody bag and gifts from classmates.

During this time, I managed to finish my youngest son's sweater! The first sweater that I've ever knitted! Kinda proud of myself, since this is only my second ever knitting project. Here's a pic of the little guy modeling it:

We also made it through his first birthday party. He was born on New Year's Eve, so we held his party in the evening and combined it with a New Year's party. We called it "Reece's New Year Jammy Jam" and asked that everyone bring their children in their pjs so we could put the kids to bed and the adults could ring in the New Year. It was pretty fun. Here's the cake that I made (he's really into Blue's Clues) and a pic of him and his brother with the presents.