I'm Dyeing Again

At Christmas my parents gave me a set of four leather parsons chairs.  I went out shortly thereafter and purchased some chair covers for them from Bed Bath and Beyond.  They only had a couple of colors and most of those (to me) were hideous, except for the white ones that came home with me.  I bought them on sale for $1.99 a piece, which was an excellent bargain.

Such a good bargain, in fact, that I decided that I could dye them and if the color turned out to be horrid, I wouldn't feel guilty about tossing them.  With that thought, I promptly put them away and forgot about them until this past weekend.

When the Eldest had his birthday party in September, we used some RIT dye to make some camouflage shirts.  I had one container of Tan dye leftover and that's the color that I threw in the wash with my chair covers.  The covers are cotton, so I knew they wouldn't take the dye as readily as some other fibers would.  I ran the water in the washing machine then added the dye and covers and let them sit for a few hours.  Then finished the wash cycle and then re-washed with detergent after that. 

So how did they turn out?  Lovely!  I got the most beautiful champagne color and it was exactly what I wanted.

It's difficult to see any color in the above pic at all, so I added a white piece of paper:

Look closely at the bottom right of the pic and you'll see how pretty the gold/champagne color really is.  I'm very pleased with these!  Now to get a good table cloth that will compliment them...


By the way, My neighbors must think I'm an absolute nut.  I drag the weirdest things to take pictures of out onto my back porch all the time.  One chair, with cover, one piece of paper with a knitting pattern on it.  yep, weird.

Believe it or not, I got more than enough time to knit this past weekend. I actually finished the Owls Sweater. It's not blocked yet and I don't have a modeled photo of it yet (fits great, but snug - note to self: block it bigger, lose weight or get another pair of Spanx), but I do have this:

I used glass beads for the eyes. They are not gold in real life. They are red with swirls of gold, green and blue and are stunning to look at. This pic does not do them justice. I tried and tried to get a good one for you today, but the stars were just not aligned right.

This morning I took a trip to Walmart for some 50% off Easter goodies and boy, did I find them. Check it out:
Normally 88 cents a piece - Got 'em for 40 cents a piece. I bought 20 of them. Gotta love a good sale. Have I told you that Sale is one of my favorite words? It ranks right behind the word Free. :) These should color a heck of a lot of roving/yarn. Not pictured: I grabbed some dessert paper plates and napkins for 50 cents a piece, 1 yellow and 1 green. Also, some cute brightly striped kitchen towels for a buck a piece.

Somebody got some fake teeth in his Easter Basket this year:

A face only a mother could love?

Notice the chocolate on his face as well. Boy devoured his chocolate bunny in about three seconds flat.

Dye from the Garden

My Mom has spent the whole summer canning food from the garden. Hours and hours in front of a hot stove with two pressure canners is not my cup of tea. She, on the other hand, thinks I'm crazy for spending so much time knitting and spinning, but to each his or her own right?

Besides getting free food for the winter that she throws my way, another off shoot of the project is pulp that I can render for making dye. She made jam from some blue berries and I got the pulp.

I started the rendering last night:


Just dumped the berry pulp in the pot and added some water to it. I boiled it for about 20 minutes and then strained it off into a glass bowl. I would have used plastic ones, but I really didn't want the bowls turning blue, ya know?

I'm going to freeze it until I have time to experiment with it. Neat huh?

While we're on the subject of canning and growing garden-y things, check this Lima bean (in the South we call it a Butter Bean) plant out. This plant, when it came home from school in May, had only two leaves. Now does it not only have more leaves, it has a bloom! My Mom thinks it'll only be a false pregnancy, but who knows? We might have a miraculous Butter Bean conception!


Now on to things yarny:

Progress is sloooooowwwllllyyy being made on the Baltic Sea Stole. See?


If I pick up another project that has a deadline, would someone please shoot me? At this point, the bride will be having her 50th wedding anniversary before this is complete.