Solar Dyed Yarn

I did this Yarn by wetting the yarn then sprikling it all over with the colours of the rainbow. Each colour has a salt shacker and I have mixed in the crystal citric acid. I also flipped the yarn to get enough on the yarn. I wanted colour. I placed a little plastic over it so the yarn would not dry out, it was like a little greenhouse. Then washed it out and dried. Magic.

The two on the ends where done with more liquid dye but in the try and covered like the one above. The mini yarns I set up in my jars for dying and place the lid on and left in the sun for the day. All the colour was getting taken up fast. I might over dye some of these colours still but I gave me a nice flower set of yarn to start with.

Ok this set is double dyed. First I did a light dye colour on each mini yarn, also done in the sun with my jars. Then I wound them back up into the mini skein that they are, with the twist in the yarn. a small amount of Crystal citric acid and dye went on the bottom of a dry jar, then a skein, then dye then the next skein. Untill I had all five in the jar and dye also on top. I then added water to top it up. Put a lid on and set it in the sun. Yes I changed colours of dyes the yellow, green and blues. They match each other with out being the same. I just love them. So far I am just dying yarn with the plans to use for my sock knitting. Some might end up as mittens or little half gloves. But mostly specail socks. I see some people have done some ice dying, I have done ice or snow ding on cotton but wool dyes likes the heat. Maybe I will look into it as I might need the sun to melt and heat it all up for wool.

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. 

Dyed Yarn

 

So this sock yarn is a self stripping yarn. It was a bit hard to plan what I wanted. It might be a nightmare to sort into a ball. I hope it did not tangle to much. I have many many cotton strings to help keep it sorted. I like using cotton because I can see it. Cotton does not dye well with the acid dyes I use on the wool. 

I tried speckles. Well not really happy with it. It is a different yarn and is kind of sparkly like. The undyed parts got very very white as I washed it. It Asperitas from Knomad and has 50% recycled wool and 50% Tencel. 

I am thinking I might over dye this and hope it works better. More dye can help these wimpy colours. 

This set of minis was also Asperitas and turned out great. It takes the dye well but the speckles do spread. On this set it all works well but not on the white one above. 

My order from Knomad, so much fun! 

I hope to do some more dying maybe even today. 

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. 

Quilts for Boys

My Mom, Betty, and I often work on quilts together. These two where done by both of us. My mom did the patchwork and I did the machine quilting. I wanted to give my sister in laws two boys a quilt each. I had given them a baby quilt each but no new ones for years. You can see they are way to big now for baby quilts. They needed small man size at least. 

This quilt I had an Oiler fabric (Edmonton's Hockey team) on part of the backing so we did make it more orange and blue. Both boys love hockey and their dad is a hockey nut. Some winter's dad has build a ring in their back yard. 

Both quilts were done in time for the birthdays they had in Aug 2020. I am behind showing of stuff from last year when I hardly wrote on my blog. 

Dog friends - I have not gone to the herding breed yet, the cattle dog is their dog. 

 

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.