i'm here, i'm here!

yes, i’m here, and i’ve been a busy bee. 

the news:

i went to a brand new yarn shop in plainfield, IN yesterday and left with the most devine kettle dyed merino on earth!  mae wants me to make her some mittens with the yellow she chose and hubs picked some army green heathered wool for a hat.  the owner is a sweetie, she has spinning wheels and roving, and she has a group that meets every thursday night.  i’m thinking i’ll go one night with my mother-in-law.  it’s close to her house, and she’s really struggling to get back into the swing of knitting.

we’re fostering a little chinese crested pooch for a while and he’s been fun to hang out with.  i knitted a quick sweater for him on saturday since he’s a baldie and it’s getting chilly around here.  the girls love him, but the early morning jumping on your head routine is getting old fast.

i have tons of ideas right now and i’ve been writing patterns like crazy.  the bonnet i was commissioned to make for the Sydney Opera House is about half way there, too!  writing the pattern for it wasn’t too bad and i’m zipping through the stitching.  tons and tons of pics are on their way… SWEAR

left to be done:

get some yarns dyed!  i’m really getting the itch to try my hand at it…  i picked up some procion dye for the sweater i tried dyeing last week so i need to do that too.

Update on Monday, September 27, 2010 at 7:55PM by pinkbrutus

the pics!

yarn yarn yarn… mitten pics coming soon

lou the dog!

dye day

it’s been a terribly gloomy, gray day today.  rain showers came and went but the sun didn’t made it out of the clouds until almost 5pm.  it was actually perfect for cleaning, doing laundry, and DYING!!!!  LOL

i had three horribly stained tops from some mysterious laundry mishap last week.  with two children in the house we have the occasional crayon in the dryer.  i’m not sure what made it in this time, but three - yes, only three of my shirts got huge hot pink blotches all over them.  nothing else was touched.

i thought it was a good opportunity to try my hand at dying since if it was a huge failure, i’d be throwing the garments into the trash anyhow (or at least into the scrap fabric pile).  i only had acid dyes which aren’t exactly a perfect match for cotton/cotton blends but i gave it a go.

i mixed one jar of pure silver gray, one jar of pure purple, and one jar equal parts of both.

they all look…. exactly the same.

in goes the sage green top that i had done a bleach bath with.  the bleach removed most of the pink blotches, and lightened the green to a pale sage.  i think the pink stain and bleach created a pink haze all over the whole thing so i thought throwing it into a pot of just the gray would maybe at least neutralize it.

next was the once white button down shirt dress.  i did this in only silver gray, too after a bleach bath.  i was very disappointed that the bleach removed so little staining.  boo.  one of mae’s white dress had some horrible staining and the bleach bath did the trick in a jiff!

here i’m rinsing the garment in sythrapol. 

and my favorite ecru cardigan.  what a shame…. i decided on 1 part purple to 3 parts gray for this one hoping for a pale grayish lavender… the scene in the pot was a little unnerving.

after the final wash and dry…. hmmm.

the bright white shirt dress is definitely a silver gray, but GUESS WHAT???  apparently there were pit stains or something ‘cause the pits are a full two shades darker than the rest of it!  HA  that was unexpected!

the green turned out beautifully.  i have no complaints, but what the heck is going on with that cardigan????  that’s going to be a re-do with procion dyes.  no matter how long i kept it on the stove, it wouldn’t take the dye.  after washing it,  it almost looks like the green one did before i dyed it.  it has this bad pinkish thing going on.  oh well! live and learn!

the very best part of the day was nate coming home and mae running to him saying, “daddy!  mommy is cookin’ our clothes!”  she had asked me if i was going to eat them, if i had burned them, and proudly assured me that she had kept an eye on them while i ran upstairs for another basket of laundry.

once all the experimental clothing cooking was over, we decided to treat ourselves to a couple pickles our friend doug had made.  i’m not sure what type of cukes they are, but we enjoyed them immensely!