Summer busy

What have I been doing. Well not a ton of sewing is getting done, maybe a little bit.

The knitting bag was in great need. I keep on knitting socks and wanted a cute bag with this fabric. Love the little horse zipper tag I fuzzy cut out. The yarn is my Purple Pansy yarn I dyed back in April.

The Purple Pansy Socks are now done and ready to show off. I am very happy with them. I think I have enough yarn left to do a short pair also.

Another knitting bag was made with my camper fabric. The yarn is some watermelon yarn I dyed in May. The socks are now started and being worked on. I have the first sock done and the second one is just ready to work the heal decrease and then the foot and toe. Soon to be done.

These short socks are now done too. I finished them as we drove home from camping in June. The yarns are also yarns that I dyed this spring.

Dyed yarn to show off what I might knit up this summer. A few are hand dyed yarns I bought from a local yarn dyer, Rose Hill Yarns. So far I just love to buy her stuff. I can pick it up just on the other side of Leduc.

My beast Dolly, she and I have been doing lots of agility training this summer. It has been hard to get in training in this hot weather. This is after a water break on evening.

Mini Colour

 

I am having some colour fun. Mini hanks. I am playing with the colour and yarn to see what I can do. I needed a couple of small ones to go with some others I had dyed already. At least 3 of these are to go with a bigger cakes of yarn. 

Your going to laugh at me. I do not like grey. But I dyed a small one at the left end, well I had to add some more colour on it. HA PINK

I am liking this set together. I think it is very garden flower like. I might have to do more soft colours still. All of these have a touch of pink. 

Lime is over dyed a bit more blue so not so much yellow. The dark blue is also a over dyed as it was not deep enough yet. The medium blue is an over dye of sprinkles that was not great. Better now. Pink is half hank and just to have more pink. You can never have too much pink. 

My experiment with recycled yarn. A few years ago I bought an old sweater at the 2nd hand store to take a part, dye, and reknit. Well I am part way there. 

The cakes need to be put into a hank and washed to get the kinks out. But it is getting some where. It is 100 % wool so I am thinking I might use it for mittens or fingerless gloves. Socks would break down too quickly. 

Ok Pink is in every photo today. 

Socks and Bags

 

My shoes today match my short socks. Love this sea green colour. Of course hand made socks that I also dyed the yarn too. 

Another set dyed with the plan for more short socks for summer. 

I had fun doing the sprinkles on this yarn. I gave the yarn an all over pale pink and then sprinkled the Yellow, Turquoise. and Pink on the yarn. 

I also got this mini iron bag done for my mom. 

 

I had done two for me and made hers to match another bag I did for her sometime ago. 

Summer Socks

 

Sock pair #10 for the year finished!

#9 start and finish for 2021! 

 I got these done in time for the spring weather. But where is the warm weather. I love this dyed yarn I dyed in early April. I was thinking about beach and cool waters but also the touch of lime. The free pattern is from Ravelry Rose City Rollers but then I changed so many things.  I wanted to know how to get the roll at the top. Well it is just knit, I used my reinforced heal that I have been doing. Also I tried Eye of  Partridge on the bottom the feet as I get hole there every time. Then I finished it off with my favorite toes.  So not sure I followed the pattern much.  Very happy with the socks and I have enough to do a second pair. Maybe I will but add something like a different colour heal or toes. 

Up next was a big sock repair. The ankle of these socks are what is left of my 1st pair of socks I knitted 18 years ago. I had repaired the foot, toes and heals a few different times. It was time to say good bye. So I reknit from the heal down with new yarn that was at least a good colour match. Pretty good repair. But so cold I have to wear these winter like socks and the short ones. 

What is next?

Well I dyed these mini yarns on Sunday night. I just love them. The two colours I need to remake in a larger volume is the Dark Purple and the lime green both near the bottom. I will maybe do others. Like I group of more blues. 

But I had to use some right now. 

Well the next start! colour strips! in a short sock! 

How fun is that? 

See Why I need more Purple and Lime. I just had to use them right as quick as I could. 

Dyed Yarn

Pansies I love them. How could I not dye some yarn to look like Pansies. I love this yarn. I have used a sock yarn base with some nylon in the yarn. I love all the purples I got in there. Then the shots of yellow and pink. 

I have done it into a cake already. This might have to be knitted in to socks soon. 

I did this sock yarn too. I kept the repeat a little shorter on this one. I kind of hope the purple might join up when done in socks. We will see. 

Now this one is not easy to wrap. It should give me strips in the three colour families. The pink will be repeated between the blue and green. It will be fun to see how it goes. I wish I had kept track of how many repeats are in the one ball. 

Also caked up to start anytime now. 

I got swishy mail yesterday! My yarn for dying has arrived. I am not sure what I will dye next but I am thinking more flower colours. 

Inspiration can be found! I might have to take more photos this year.  

Look at the dahlias. I had to buy one of these. Kind of wish I could have a whole garden of them. We will see how it does. About 10 years ago I planted some Dahlias and the bugs yuck. I had crazy black aphid things all over them.  I hope they do not show up again. We will see. 

Here is my dad also picking out some dahlias for his pots. This is the Best! the first day at the green house! I love that my dad and I got do this together.  Turns out last year the 29th of April was also our first day to the green house. It was after 6 weeks of lock down because of Covid. And we still live this covid lockdowns. Not much has changed except we have found a few better ways to live. I got one vaccine so far. 

Stay safe! 

To Garden is to have Hope! 

Green Socks

 

I got another pair of hand knit sock done. This pair I tried out more knit 2 purl 2 and did it all the way down the front of the foot. They ended up kind of narrow for my feet. So Angelia. my son's girlfriend, got the socks. She was pretty pleased. They look great pulled up over her leggings.   

My plan was to wear them with the top turned down for the summer. Or you can pull them all the way up. I love the bands of yellow and darker green that came out. 

This is pair # 9 finished this year! I am on a roll! 

Here was the yarn after dyeing twice. The first round of dye was Easter egg tables, but it was kind of boring. So in the pot it went again. that is when I added the darker green, mostly by adding blue dye over the paler greens. I did leave a bit of that nice lime green. The blue was sprinkled on touch with dry dye. so very spotty. But I love how it knit up. 

The yarn base was Diamond Select Footsie yarn. 

Here is the yarn all in a cake. So you can see I had hope it would look better. 

Yes I have started another pair! You will have to wait to see what is next! 

Birch Tree Socks

 

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Wow Sock Pair #8 for the year done.

I dyed this yarn earlier in this winter. My inspiration was Blue Sky and Birch Trees. I was very happy with how they knitted up.

I did the ribbing with Knit 3 Purl 1 and then kept doing that down the top of the foot. They fit nice I am happy with this pair. I also did the reinforced heal and heal cap. I can not say I used a real pattern as they are kind of the vanilla pattern I use all the time. but just changed my ribbing. 

  I was thinking of socks I could wear over the summer months so I plan to turn the cuff down. 

The yarn started out as Lion Brand sock yarn with 75% wool and 25% Nylon. 

Dying Sock Yarn

 

Wow I love how soft this yarn came out. I can be a little heavy handed with the colour and this time I was hoping to have soft. I think I got Soft! The dyes that I have are Fast Acid dyes from Prochem. The colours I used where Lobster Bisque #339, Lilac # 845, Magenta # 338. I did my favorite casserole dish covered and in the oven for 40 mins. 

I used a 100 gram skein of sock yarn with 25% nylon, Diamond Select Footsie. Not sure yet which kind of sock I will knit. Maybe a short sock for summer. 

Here is the yarn all caked up, ready to knit. 

Then I started on blues with a touch of lime green. The skein on the right has mostly blue with a touch of light lime. I love lime.

 I then did the left on because I had the colours mixed up. It has more Yellow to make up all that Green.

Both of these skeins is used colours Brilliant blue 490, sea breeze 408 and sun yellow 119

Here is my mostly Blue one, I am for sure keeping it for me. In fact I have just started to knit it up, only just started so not much to show yet. 

The skein with more green is caked up and I gave it to my mom. She knits socks too. So I thought it was a fun colour for summer. She is finishing up some socks for my dad then she can do this for her self. 

Here is my blue ball ready to knit. I think I will do short socks for my self. I looked up a free pattern called Rose City Rollers. They are cute. Let you know how they turn out. 

Ugly Green Yarn

 

I did some over dying yarn the other day. 

I hand done this sock yarn, with Easter egg dyes and did not like what I had.

So Over dying to help out. 

I added bight blue and some National Blue in speckles. maybe some other green too. I just played with the colours. Well I am not sure I like it now either. 

But Wait

I then put it in to a ball. Wow it changed so much. I think I like it now. this is closer to how it will knit up and it looks pretty good now. Sometime Over dying is the best thing to do. No more sappy weak green. Now just bright bolder colours. 

Easter Monday Socks

 

Chocolate Strawberry Yarn has been knitting into Socks. This is the 7th pair I finished this year (pair #6 start to finish for the year). I started these March 20th and had them done by March 30th. 

I used a pattern I had but slowly I make changes. So this pair, the new thing is how I cast on and the heal cap has reinforcement stitches, both I learned while doing a sock a long, with Kate Atherley. It was a good class done on line. 

Here is the yarn dry and ready to roll into a ball. The dyes I used for this yarn was a fast acid dye from Pro-chem. I used a casserole dying technique, in a pan with vinegar added and set in the oven to steam covered. It is a low emersion technique I learned for dying wool fabric. 

So I dyed more but this time I tried Easter egg tablet dying. Here is Green and Yellow tablets at the beginning. 

I couple minutes later.

So here is all the tablets. But I wanted more variety. So I added Bright orange dye in the one area.  

Dried and dyed. But I am not sure I like it. Maybe I will over dye some blue in there. 

Here is the pink blue and purple egg dying tablets. I used 9, 3 of each colour. This skein I used a the casserole dyed in the oven and low water levels.  

Here is the yarn dry and ready to roll into a ball. This is Cathy Colours for sure. 

So sock repair is also a thing I end up doing too. This was a very early pair of socks I knit. It started as a real pretty 100% Merion wool, super wash but the wool did not stand up to the wear of a sock. They were nice and soft. I decided to save the top ankle and re-knit from the lower ankle down. They look odd but you knew what? they are one of the best fitting socks I have. Lots of ankle room but not to big anywhere else. The new yarn used on the foot is Knoy yarn with 25% nylon so it will stand up real well.