Short one (for once)

I'm at my dad's house right now and all of the pictures and projects I want to post are at my mom's so right now it'll just be short and sweet.

So in the past couple days I started a mock-cable scarf from SnBN with my green angora. I also started a shawl/capelet thing from a knitting magazine whose name I can't recall. I forgot the capelet pattern at my mom's so I ended up frogging it because it was knitting up smaller than it was supposed to anyways and it was boring stockingette. With the scarf I ended up getting bored of the stitch pattern so I just turned it into a "therapy scarf" for knitting therapy. I even made the word "therapy" and a knit/purl pattern. I'm pretty proud of it. I'm pretty much just going nuts with easy, relaxing stitch patterns that look really nice and eccentric but don't piss me off too much. So far I have simple garter stich as separators between different blocks of stich patterns, yo/k2tog, seed stich and the mock-cables.

Oh! I also finished spinning up my red/orange/pink silk.. I have never been so proud of anything I've done in my life. I've decided I love spinning and will now officially start yearning for a really nice spinning wheel that I won't be able to afford until I retire.... Depressing, ain't it?

And now I would like to show whoever the hell even reads this thing my two new favourite yarn shop websites.

Jenny Neutron Star
This place has Jenny Neutron Star and Drucilla and they are both awesome! Lots of superchunky yarns with insano-slubs and these really neat beehive thingys. I's really like to try the beehive thingys. And they also have another thing I've never seen before, some of the yarns have little stuffed animals spun right into them! Don't ask me how...

Pluckyfluff
This one is so cooool! She (i'm assuming it's a she... or shes) spins the craziest fibers! Aluminum... Aluminum! And she have yarns with whole silkworm cocoons spun in!

Oh my gosh! These two sites are so inspiring! So awesome! I finally have a rad use for those ass-nasty christmas tinsel garlands! I'm going to go buy some rexlace too... knit that up, saweeet.

KATIE MAD!!!!!!!!

I HATE CIRCULAR NEEDLES! I HATE THE MAGIC LOOP! I HATE ANGORA FINGERING!!!!!!!!!

It BROKE?!?!?! BROKE?!?!! IT BROKE!!!!!!! IT FREAKIN' BROKE!

I quit!

I have started and restarted this project about 20 times! (literally!) I've tried it on corculars with the magic loop, dpns and two circulars! I finally made some really great progress and the flipping yarn broke from a row I had just worked and I couldn't fix it before the whole thing fell apart! grrrrrrrrrrr...

Does anyone have any suggestions? Does anyone even read this thing? I would hold the yarn doubled but I'm not sure I have enough of it... I think I'll try it anyways. Nothing else is working...

... Ok it's working way better now, yay!
No more freaking out for a while!

Ok holy crap, nevermind... my flat screen monitor all of a sudden fell down! I caught it before it really touched anything though. It's the stupid base, the monitor just clips into it and you can't really tell if it's secure or not.

So I started to dye stuff this weekend, it was really fun! All Kool-Aid goodness. FYI, I'm smart! I am! Really! I made the prettiest olivey-brown color with lemon-lime and cherry! See? Yes, I'm smart! Look!









I couldn't really get a very good picture of the color but it doesn't look anything like the dye did. It's much darker and more brown. I think the third picture gives you a pretty good idea.

That was my tester batch. so i mixed up another batch and put in two big hanks of the yarn.
Just then, I happened to be having a moment of utter blondeness. I seemed to have forgotten that, even though I mixed the dye the same way as I had for the test batch, it would not nessicarily turn out the same. DUH! Same amount of dye + way more wool = lighter yarn and stupid katie. But I don't mind, the color that came out was actually closer to the color I had originally intended to acheive. Much more springy.

I have also discovered a way to dye my silk hankies. Just like the regular wool, of course. I just mixed up the dye and put in a corner of the hankie(s). But you've gotta make sure that the hankies don't touch the burner and burst into flames. So far, on this batch of hankies, I have one corner of strawberry and another of orange. I also intend to dye another corner with cherry and the last corner and the center of the hankies with strawberry-kiwi.

The first picture is when the hankie becomes fully saturated wich only really starts to happen when the dye gets hot. The second picture is the hankies before they're saturated, the color doesn't sink in and it just beads off or pools on top, when the hankies begin to saturate in spots, it will look like holes are forming at first, it will make the hankies very transperent but that means it's working and it will dry back to normal. (3rd picture) I thought that I had melted holes through mine! Scared the crap out of me.

With the left-over orange dye, I over-dyed a skein of my White Buffalo LAMA. I really like the result, it didn't really color the wool so much as it brightened and intensitfied the pre-existing color. Before, the yarn was also very ratty and I think it needed to be washed. Boiling it seemed to bring it back to life and puff it up a bit more, it's alot softer now.

Sooo, I think I'm done here. I love Kool-Aid, blah blah blah...

Love KT

It's wet outside

Hey, remember the angora yarn I was talking about yesterday? Well, I had this idea on the way home today that I could dye it! Duh... I wish I had thought of that before. Pink really isn't my color. So I was thinking I could do a kind of green-like color, (use up my kool-aid) although it might turn out funny because of the light pink being there. I dunno, but I plan on doing this today.

After dyeing it I think I'll make this. It looks relatively easy and it would actually be my first sweater-like object, probably the biggest something I've ever made. I want to dye the yarn to either a dark/olive green or brown, if I can figure out how to mix that, I'll probably have to use food coloring. I will dye a small sample first. (I'm not crazy)

The fuzzy pink yarn has a purpose! Let's get koolin' aid!

Knitting Overload Much?

Ok, so I created this blog a couple of weeks ago, but I haven't actually gotten around to doing a first post until today... lame, I know. That's me, the wondrous Procrastinator! So I'm afraid this entry is going to be quite um... huge. (very photo intensive...) Can I do entry cuts on blogger? You know, like the ones on LJ?

Any ways, I've started and finished many many projects over the past little while.

That was from... oooh, two/three weeks ago? Yeah, first thing you all need to know about me is that I am probably the biggest procrastinator you'll ever hear of.

This first entry is still going to be huge, even more than intended, and very photo intensive, but I will finish it.

Finished Objects

Project ID: Loopless Muff?
Ok, my first knitting project ever was a muff, you know, one of those hand-tubes from the Jackie O era? Yeah, superfun. Kind of boring and I modified it a bit because I couldn't figure out what the hell they were talking about when they said "embroidery loop stitch," I searched it and everything, about a million times over. So I just crocheted some flowers and stuff instead because I wanted to get the damn thing over with. I was very sloppy with this pattern but hey, at least I finished it eh?

Pattern: Spun Magazine: Loopy Muff
Materials; Lion Brand: Jiffy Thick N' Quick Adirondacks
Red Heart; Super Saver in some dark red color
US 7 and US 15 Needles
Time: A week?

Project ID: One-Hour Hat
This was a superfun project! I managed to knit it up in an hour or less!

I really loved the fun yo, k2tog pattern, it makes a really cool design. I saw someone else use it on a scarf with a regular garter stitch border and I think I might use up some of my stash for it too.

I cast-on with some of my leftover Jiffy Thick N' Quick for a cool lookin' brim and, instead of using the crochet flower patterns that the hat pattern suggested, I used the knit flower from the Head Huggers Patterns in Stitch N' Bitch Nation. I think it looks better knit, and I hate crochet.

Pattern: Flower Cap (scroll down to find knit pattern)
Materials: Dark teal chenille yarn (very thin and fragile) held doubled, from unraveled sweater
Lion Brand; Jiffy Thick N' Quick Adirondacks
Red Heart; Super Saver in some dark red color
US 11 needles
Time: About an hour

Project ID: Mmmm Riblets...
The name of the project is because I suddenly crave BBQ sauce smothered ribs... But, instead, I munch on overly salted sesame sticks.

Onwards, Just a simple, knit/purl rib scarf. It's kind of short, and a little stiff, but very warm. I think this scarf used up exactly one skein of Thick N' Quick

Pattern: k2, p2 repeat...
Materials: Lion Brand; Jiffy Thick N' Quick Adirondacks (yeah, I have a lot of this stuff, the muff pattern called for 3 skeins before I chose to nix the loop stitch and I still have one whole skein left)
US 15 needles

Project ID: Pink Flashy
I just could not get a good picture of this thing, it's a camera case, complete with wrist loop and strap closure. I don't know if I'm happy with this, I might have to make another one. I think the strap is too fat looking, I need to invent a different closure method, like a button or something. I used DPNS and this kinda cool boucle type yarn, patons I think.

Materials: Patons Melody Magenta
Fat DPNS

Project ID: Little Pink Bowl
This was my third-ever felted project. A crocheted pink bowl, made of this really lovely, fat wool I got from Knit One, Chat Too.

The only reason that this one is crocheted is because I couldn't figure out how to knit a bowl-shaped something.

Materials: pink, purple and orange 100% wool fat yarn.. zombie find label later.
Time: 15 min

Project ID: NO KITTY! YOUR PI!
This is the ever-popular kitty pi. I experienced a weird sense of project monogamy with this one, so it ended up going quite quickly, which was good. This was my second ever felting project and, so far, neither of my cats really uses it with out me going all pageant mom and coaching them to do so, and this bed was really meant for Mittens (cat in picture) anyway.

Hey, he just jumped into it all by himself! YAY! Good kitty...
Note: The two yarns I used for this project have been long discontinued, I got them from a thrift store (very cheap!)

Pattern: Kitty Pi
Materials: White Buffalo LAMA rusty red [100% Pure New Wool]
Papillon intense blue with orange and green slubs [55% Acrylic, 25% Wool, 10% Mohair, 5% Nylon, 5% Viscose] apparently you can make a whole sweater with just one bag of this (not suprising for 250g of the stuff)
Random fat DPNS and fat circulars
Time: Weekend plus a day or two

In Progress

Project ID: Little Blue Socks
Ok, this is pretty much my first pair of socks ever. I mean, I started another practice pair but they were boring and I wanted to get the real pair out of the way.

The first picture is of my first attempt which I had to frog because I had somehow managed to twist it somewhere, the right hand picture is of my current attempt, obviously foing well.

These are a pair of socks for my dad, he picked out the yarn (he loves bright colors) and I'm doing the knitting. This yarn was pricey for me, but , then again, I'm a high school student with no job, (get a job Katie!) so I guess it wouldn't really be that bad to anyone else. This yarn was also the first that I bought outside of Michaels or Wal-Mart, so it makes sense. I got this stuff from Pudding Yarn and it's really nice and soft and it doesn't split easily, which is a good thing because I tend to split plied yarn and then go nuts. It's very nice to work with and I can't wait to finish them. When I'm done, I plan on going back and getting more of the same yarn in orange and pink and making my self a couple of pairs.

I like the zig-zaggy pattern I'm using for these socks, it's really fun to do and sooo not boring, which is good for me with my super knitting ADD.

Pattern: MagKnits Jaywalker Socks
Materials: Skacel Kokon Bright Turquoise [35%Silk, 35%Cotton, 30%Acrylic]
5 US4 DPNS

Project ID: Freakin Fuzz...
This, my friends, is a great big (HUGE) ball of very light pink angora fingering thant I unwound from a sweater/tee that looked crappy on me. (it accentuated my wide shoulders, something normal t-shirts shouldn't do) I absolutely hated unraveling this thing because it is two ply and soooo thin it broke about a million times.

The reason this is a WIP is because I'm going to make something out of it, I just have no idea what yet... I tried to do this, but I kept screwing up after a few rows and I couldn't fix it without frogging it and starting over. So the idea is that I want to do something lacey and I have alot of this so I think maybe I'll do a shrug or something... We'll see I guess.

BTW my camera takes kick-ass pictures, it just has to have kick-ass lighting.

Other News:

I am now the proud owner of a ball-winder! YAY! My mom took me out to DeWinton (just outside of Calgary) on the weekend, when I was really sick. We went to this place called Shuttleworks Ltd. owned by a really nice man whose name I've forgotten. (sorry!) They have tonnes and tonnes of Brown Sheep stuff which is what I originally intended to buy there. I ended up buy absolutely no wool (I'll be back though) but I got two drop spindles, big and small, a ball winder, and 100 g of natural white cultivated silk hankies. I'm so excited!!!

We also went to Safeway to get some Kool-Aid to dye the silk, but now I'm hearing people say Kool-Aid isn't strong enough for silks. Is this true? Will it work at all or will I just get pastels or stripes? Can I handpaint with Kool-Aid? How?

If anyone actually reads this yet, please help! Leave a comment.

The yarn on the smaller spindle is some cotton wadding from the inside of a new Cold-FX pill bottle. It spun up quite nice. I want more now. (the cotton, not the pills)

I wound all of this yarn the night I bought this winder, and it was fun! This is almost all of my stash except for a few skeins that are in use at the moment.Try and count 'em! It's like the game where you guess the jellybeans in the jar!

Ok! I think I'm finally done! Yay for me!

See ya later,
Katie