Amy's Hand-Painting Party

We had a wonderful dyeing party at Amy's house in Monmouth Saturday. The weather was gorgeous, which was surprising after a day of rain on Friday, so we were able to take over the back yard as well as the house. Here is Donna, who I have to call Queen of the Dye pot. She taught herself most of what she knows, and we all benefited from her help. She also brought the camp stove, a bazillion acid dye colors, and a bunch of other things we were grateful to use. Stephanie brought something like 6000 (yes, really) yards of very fine cotton yard which she dyed with a tie-dye kit. She got some great colors out of it, nothing neon, which was what I would have expected from a tie-dye kit!

Anne and Amanda watching Amanda inject dye into her merino, it came out a really lovely amber color.

Jocelyn, well I can't recall exactly what she was doing here. Possibly squeezing excess liquid out of her sausage. So many off-color jokes available here, but I will refrain.

Laia, who has resolved not to mix beer and dye and yarn in the future. (I don't know why, it was kind of fun to watch.)

My roving, which came out more Jello colored than I intended, but I do have a 5 year old who can wear stuff like this.

Amanda and Donna trying to get the merino out of the dye pot.

I think I can safely say that we all had a great time!

FO:Cupcake hat

Here is the yarn I spun from some BFL locks I purchased at Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival a couple of weeks ago. I opened them up a bit with a hair pick and tried to leave some curls sticking out a bit. There was quite a lot of dirt in them which got all over me whenever I was working on it. I also washed it in 3 sinks of water after that, and there were still some small bits of stuff in it, but it was so pretty I wanted to knit something with it.I spent the better part of this week trying to figure out what I could make with it, and after a bit of trial and error I decided to make the top of a hat with it.

I wrote all the details on the Ravelry page, and don't feel like rewriting them here, so I'll just show you the result. A hat which to me resembles a cupcake. Unfortunately I am a bit too old to look cute in a cupcake hat, but I still like it because I love the yarn.

I knit the bottom in Ultra Alpaca that I had leftover, and finished it off with an I-cord bind-off.

FO's: One Day Beret and Bunny Ears Hat

I have been slow on the knitting of my sweaters lately because I was distracted by a couple of side projects. I found this funny yarn at my LYS in the free bin, Esslinger Wolle Geisha, and fell in love with it despite its rather low natural fiber content (85% acrylic, 15% mohair.) For some reason I love this color too. The photos aren't showing it very accurately I am afraid. I decided to knit Kirsten Kapur's One Day Beret. Even with my enlargments, it still isn't quite as floppy as I thought it would be, and the edge isn't as defined. Part of the problem is the yarn, I think you need to be knitting a pretty tight gauge so the fabric is more stiff, and I wasn't. I also didn't block this because I thought it pointless to block a mostly acrylic yarn, but if that isn't true, please let me know!

I knit a bunny ears hat for my friend Dana who wants to photograph newborns in it. I made this one out of Peter Pan Double Knit yarn (by Wendy.) Again a nylon/acrylic blend so as to be sure it won't itch the baby. Since it is to be used first with a boy I used i-cord ties instead of ribbon. They do need the ties for the ears to look right.

Next on the schedule is a bear ears hat.