Cartoon Life

PH: So, um, what's going on here?

Me: It's a photo shoot. I'm blocking a snowflake. Stay off the sheet, okay? No cats allowed.

PH: Cats? I see no cats. I am the world famous photo stylist and knitwear photographer, PH, and you are in desperate need of my help and expertise.

Me: Oh, brother!

PH: Look. Wrinkles! These must go. Holey sheet!

Me: What?!

PH: Those holes! What are they doing there?

Me: Well, there's this story that goes along with the holes, see. I thought it might make a cute entry for my blog.

PH: Cute, is for puppies and squirrels. Well, maybe not puppies. Here, give me that.

Me: Whoa! Whoa! Wait a minute! You can't just take my camera! Wait! You don't have thumbs!

PH: Oh, yeah? Who needs thumbs.

**SWIPE!**

PH: Now hold me up.

Me: Sigh...okay.

Me: Why does my life feel like a Garfield cartoon?

PH: Are you calling me fat?!

Seriously, folks. That is what a snowflake looks like with a background attached. I finished another one since this one and it is blocking right now on the same holey sheet. You know, even the backgrounds are fun to do. It's a little different for each flake, so you have to pay attention, but you don't get bored.

So, why does the sheet have two holes in it? Well, it was just the best costume ever! Okay, maybe not the best, but after PH forced me into giving it a big build up, now I feel a little dumb saying that I went to a party with this sheet over my head, with two holes cut in it for eyes, and declared myself the "Gingham Ghost". Spoooooky! Kind of Charlie Brownish. Hee hee hee! The best part I saved for last. It's a fitted sheet! Har har har! So, I'm cheap. It wasn't even my own sheet. Heh heh.

Well, now that I've cracked myself up, I'm going to sign off and knit another snowflake background and watch, Silverado, with DH. He's big into westerns. I'm getting kinda fond of them myself. Please, come back!

Snow Day in June!

While the rest of the southeast United States is sweltering in the heat, it's snowing at my house!

Blocking snowflakes takes sooooooo many pins! I had to empty several pincushions and then used needles and safety pins, as well. I was eyeing the push pins when I discovered that the last snowflake to be blocked had a mistake in it.

See that big hole in the upper left corner? I'll have to re-knit this one.


There are two more that I am going to re-knit as well. Somehow, when I started knitting these, I made, two, using the wrong size needle. They are smaller than the rest. I hope I haven't overcompensated knitting the rest of them. I seem to always knit a little tighter than the writers of lace patterns. My shawls always end up a little smaller when blocked out. Usually, it's not a problem, but I have been conciously trying to loosen up on these snowflakes. I hope I haven't carried the "binding off loosely" too far. I imagine I'll find out when I start knitting the backgrounds.

They look cool, don't they? Sharon Winsauer is so talented. The flakes go fast and are fun to knit. I might have to make another one of these shawls. Maybe a scarf? We'll see if I change my tune after I begin the backgrounds. I'm going to start one tonight.

On another note, I did make two skirts! They turned out really cute, and they fit, although my zipper sewing skills leave much to be desired. I need to hem them first, and then I'll take some photos. I have fabric to make even more and more skirts. I am determined that this will be skirt summer and I will wear nothing but cute, breezy skirts!


Oh, here is my excuse for not making my bed this morning....


Good kitty.

Dropped Stitch Shawl

It's fun to finish things! The Dropped Stitch Shawl is done, but not blocked. It really might not need to be, it's so stretchy and will probably grow on its own, but I think I'll probably do it anyway. It's a fun, free pattern by Knitpicks and you can download it here. I made it on really terrible, old, gray, plastic, size 8, circulars with a stiff cord. Bleah! (Love my Knitpicks Options!) The yarn is called, Twist, in the Broadway Lights colorway, which is a dark navy with lots of other colors running through it. It's the Knitpicks yarn called for in the pattern (on sale for $1.99) and it is made of cotton, viscose, acrylic and nylon.

It is a great, mindless travel project with an easily memorized 6 row repeat. I kept holding it up to look at the shape of it to make certain that I was on the side that I needed to increase a stitch, when I had a "duh" moment. Gee, dummy, if you just use a different stitch marker on each side instead of using two alike, for symmetrical beauty, you will always know where you need to increase or decrease. Thus, the simple project became simpler.

Here is the fun part. At the end, you get to unravel the five stitch border to make fringe! Just slip that needle out and...
tie each unraveled row in an overhand knot!
Oooooh! Unraveling!
See? Fringe! (I did this in the car while waiting for DH.)
Here it is.
I guess I'll get to blocking it sometime, but, right now, I have the urge to finish some skirts I've started making. I went shopping the other day and bought a couple of cute skirts that actually fit me. I managed to draft a pattern off of them and have set to making some more for the summer. I've also pulled out the snowflakes for the Winter Wonderland Shawl by Sharon Winsauer. Someone on Ravelry asked me a question about the construction, which prompted me to want to work on it some more. Oh, and just in the past couple of days I've foregone the wheel to spin a bit on my Kundert drop spindle. It spins so nice. Then, there's that book I just bound in leather as an experiment....

F.O.!

I've been spinning. In fact, I spent an entire day at the wheel. You can ask PH.
PH: Yep.
This was the BFL that I dyed the other day. This is the only handspun that I could get a decent photo of. I'll have to try again with the others. I spun some purple mystery roving and some natural. Then, I decided to finish another UFO! The Lace Dream Stole!
I have yet to get a good photo of it in all its blocked glory. This will have to do for now.
I am now working on another UFO. The Dropstitch Shawl, a free Knitpicks pattern. It is going so fast. I'll be done with it very soon! Then, maybe I'll spin some more!
PH: Oh, joy.

A Bird in the Hand...

Le Peacock!


Here's the Blue-Faced Leicester that I dyed after the shawl. I used the turquoise and poured in some royal blue and some violet. I am spinning it up now.
See?
This little monkey came home with DH today! More monkeys for me! My DH is such a sweetheart to surprise me and to think of adding to my great wall of ape. DH has been away on business for five days. Now you know how I accomplished so much and lived to blog about it! Between the knitting and spinning and dyeing, I've also been altering a dress pattern to fit and doing a bit, just a bit, of cleaning and hiking. Oh, and, Natalie, I have finally, just today, finished spinning the last of the "big blue ball"! Hooray! I think I'm getting a little tired of blue, although I love it. I have lots more wool to dye, so I think I'm going to try for some very different colorways. I may try to dye some fleece in different colors and card them up into heathers. Gotta get out my dye books!

Can a Bird Change Its Feathers?

A peacock can! Here's a reminder of what the Peacock Feathers Shawl looked like in its natural, scariegated colorway. Ewwwwwe!


Prepare to be amazed!

I tried everything, but I couldn't get accurate shots of the dye swatches. The colors turned out so much deeper and more saturated than they look on the computer. They came out a deep teal, and intense, jewel-like royal blue and a dark, deep-sea turquoise. The teal came out the most monochromatic, probably because it was the same color as the darkest color already in the yarn. The royal blue swatch had subtle darker shades in it where the blue covered the teal, but it was mostly one color. The turquoise swatch had the most variations in it, but they were still so subtle that it just looked like it was a trick of the light. It seemed to almost glow.

Well, I decided to ask my trusty assistant, PH, to give me his opinion.

PH: Yeah, so what do you want me to do with these things?

Me: I just want you to give me your opinion. What color would you dye this shawl if it were yours?

PH: Look at me. I'm short, hairy and orange. In case you haven't noticed, I'm a cat. And, besides that, I'm a guy.

Me: I'll give you canned food.

PH: (SWIPE!) I like these two. Let's make a deal. Throw in some cat treats and I'll narrow it down to one.

In the end, we both decided on the same color. So, back to the laboratory....

That little enamel pot that I did the test swatches in was a great find. I found it in the camping section of Wall-eye World. It's a great size for small batches.

I tried to do some fancy calculations to try to get the same result with the much larger shawl that I did with the little swatch. It came out a bit lighter, so I let it cool a bit and took it out and mixed up another batch of dye. But, as I spread the shawl out and started looking at it in the sunlight, I started to really like it the way it was. The stripey variegation was gone and you could really see the lace pattern, but there was still some color variation. Very peacock. Well, have a look for yourself!

The photos still seem a bit light, but if you click on them and make them big, you can get an idea. When you see it in person, it looks like light playing over irridescent bird feathers. Only it's yarn! Heh. I like it. It's purdy. Oh, and, by the way, PH and I decided on turquoise.

Tomorrow, I'll post a picture of the roving I dyed with the second batch of dye that I didn't use. You know, I don't think I've ever posted about spinning on this blog. Well, I guess that'll have to change. Spinning, coming up sometime this week!

Success!

The dye.
The complicated, scientific, heating apparatus.

The swatches.

I waited so long to post, now I'm too sleepy. It was a good day. More on these tomorrow and better pictures, too. I ran out of sunlight, you see.