Stress + School = Knitted Purse

So, 2nd tri finals are finally here. Add a little stress to the mix of things and this is what you get:

Yarn: Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted (2) M115 Oatmeal & (1) M185 Aubergine
Pattern: Damask by Berroco
Needles: US 10 Circulars 29"

After 2 finals last Friday and being pretty stressed, I needed to something, so I decided to knit. My current cast-ons, however, require too much thinking. I scrounged around in my stash and decided upon Damask. I bought the yarn a long time ago (I don't even remember exactly - looking back, it seems like 2007, wow) at Lakeside Fibers in Madison, WI. I casted on and am nearly half way done with the knitting portion. It is working out pretty well. I am a little worried though because I don't think that I will have enough yarn. On ravelry, people have used Lamb's Pride Worsted and one person used 3 skeins of the main color and another person got by with 2. Currently I'm a little over eight inches with a mini size bouncy ball's worth of yarn of the first skein. I'm hoping that my next skein will last until the project is finished, all 18" of it. Unfortunately, I don't think that getting another Oatmeal color would be a good option because the dye lot would be a few years different. I guess if I run out early with the oatmeal I could potentially do a border with the burgundy color - that could work. I'll have to see though where I end up with the chart.

I often wondered why the name Damask, and now I know.




I've started to pack for home already and my knitting bin is ready to go:

Bib for Emma

Cheryl, from school is having a baby girl (Emma) and I felt like making something for her. Originally my mom was going to just make something, but I wanted to contribute too. I found some cotton yarn in my stash last week and a pattern that worked out nicely. What was nice about this project was that I was able to finish it while watching TV. I hope she likes it.

Yarn: 1 (2 oz) ball Peaches n' Cream from Pisgah Yarn & Dying Co., Inc (Pink Lilacs 159 & Winter Berry 170)
Pattern: Baby Bib o' Love from MasonDixon Knitting
Needles: US 6
Buttons: 7/8 in.

Happy End of 2nd Tri Yarn

Yes, yes... more yarn. I've decided to treat myself at the end of each tri for the accomplishments that I've completed during the past four treacherous months with yarn - hey, better than food. Remember now, one can never have enough yarn, even though most of it is considered "stash/hibernating" - at least I have a purpose for all of the yarn that I have. Here you have it:

Yarn: Crystal Palace Yarns Mini Mochi 107 Autumn Harvest
Pattern: Mini Mochi Fair Isle Hat & Mittens

Tortellini Soup

I have today off, which is really nice and I got a chance to make something so I have lunches this week. I found this recipe awhile back and have been meaning to make it, but never got the chance until now. I made Tortellini Soup; it is really good and super easy. Really though, there isn't much to the recipe, so I wouldn't even call it a recipe.

Here is is:

Low-fat Cheese tortellini
30 oz chicken broth
4 oz chopped frozen spinach, thawed
garlic, browned
stewed tomatoes

I'm one of those people who boils any type of pasta/potato and drains it before adding it to anything, because I like to remove the starch. This recipe called for cooking the tortellini in the chicken broth, which I didn't do - I resorted to my starch removal method. It really isn't worth while writing the instructions because it's a soup, and soups really just consist of adding your ingredients and enjoying your creation. I suppose though I should write something however: cook tortellini, brown garlic in same saucepan, add ingredients, cook, eat. There. Enjoy!

I knitted this weekend to releave some stress

Last week was a bit stressful (Tuesdays Spinal exam) and worry-some in regards to Thursday's events, so I ended up staying in on Friday, instead of going out. I watched movies and I knitted. In the eyes of the non-knitter, that may be a bit sad, but to me it's not. I would rather knit than go out in any stressful situation. I must admit, I'm a bit of a homebody, so that sort of adds to the wanting to stay home and knit sort of thing. Obviously, I'm beyond the gusset. I've continued on with the size 2 needles and tried to loosen up my tension, but unfortunately it wasn't working very well. As Elizabeth Zimmermann said in "The Knitting Workshop," your tension depends on what kind of mood you are in - or something along those lines if I recall correctly. I think that being a little stressed affected my knitting, just a bit. Hopefully after blocking, it will get better.

Stocking

I finally finished my Apartment Christmas Stocking. It's lined and everything, although I cannot take credit for lining it. I will probably keep it up for the month of January and enjoy it, since I wasn't able to enjoy it entirely before Christmas. Here it is:

Blocking

Completed Stocking

Dyed Socks

Happy New Year!

This past Tuesday, I went to Olbrich Gardens to see their poinsettia and train display in Madison with my mother, Vicki, and Mark. To my surprise, I got a sock kit where I could dye the yarn from Vicki and Mark. I was really excited and thrilled. The kit is called Spiral Socks Kit from Knit One Crochet Too and I got the Fawn color.

I sort of deviated from the directions as to how to dye my yarn (where to place the dye color) and followed a Knitting Daily TV by Interweave Knits way of dyeing yarn to get a variegated pattern, instead of a striping effect.

I mixed my dye accordingly as to what the directions stated, although for my project, I used about a cup per skein, except for the strawberry mixture, I used two cups per skein:
Color 1: water, rose, vinegar
Color 2: water, lime + rose, vinegar
Color 3: water, strawberry + lime, vinegar

So this is how it went:

Unwinding the balls of yarn. I also tied the yarn up in two places. This yarn does have 1% spandex and surprisingly, it stretches quite a bit. With that in mind, follow what Elizabeth Zimmermann would say (from the Knitting Workshop) and be careful not to stretch your yarn when winding it and for this case as well, unwinding it. When push comes to shove, if you wound your ball up too tight, it will effect the tension when knitting, so you want to wind it up loosely, so it won't be too tight. Elizabeth Zimmermann could explain it better. I ended up watching her DVD's during my fall break and got them from my library.

Soaking the yarn in warm water for 30 minutes

Mixing the dye. Note - for this part on wear crappy clothes and gloves.

Dyeing the yarn. I ended up going in order from Color 1-3 when doing this. So I first went around and used color 1, and then did color 2, etc. I also used an old turkey baster for this since I didn't have any squeeze bottles and I think it worked out nicely. It is also a nice cheap method. After I was done with a color, I just rinsed the turkey baster out a few times with clean water to remove some of the excess dye that may have lingered inside.

It's important to blot after dyeing each portion so the dye doesn't run down the plastic wrap and effect the rest of the yarn that wasn't dyed yet. You can see on the right, dye started to run down and dye the portion of the yarn where I didn't dye it yet.


I ended up squeezing excess water out before microwaving it, otherwise it's so saturated with water.

Microwaved yarn for 5 minutes vs non-microwaved yarn

Yarn cooling after it's been microwaved

Yarn after it's dried on a drying rack for a night.

What it looks like in a hank:

And, finally, all balled up.

So I have two balls of Soxx Appeal in a "Sunset" colorway. Note, I started off with Fawn, and looking on the Knit One, Crochet Too website, my yarn sort of looks like the Raspberry Sundae note on the sort of.