dyeing

a bit of knit and purl

It’s been a nice weekend. Staying in, doing some knitting, watching tv (the Tudors and just starting True Blood), eating.

socktastic!

I started a pair of plain socks out of Lorna’s Laces (colour: Cedar) and they’re going astonishingly fast! Well on the way to becoming the fastest pair of socks I’ve ever knit, actually. I started on Thursday night and was totally done one sock Saturday afternoon.

one to go

So today I started the second one and knit a couple of inches – the leg is pretty long on these, about 8 inches, and I got five inches done! They’re just top-down, gusset heel, 68 sts on 2mm double points. Mmm, comfort knitting.

But then the sock took a bit of a break because I started something else – a cowl out of leftover Malabrigo!

malabrigo cowl

It’s just a really simple one, alternating bands of knit and purl. I need to write up a “master cowl” pattern for a class, it’ll have a couple different fits and then cast on numbers for different yarn weights. So I needed a bit of a practice cowl! It’s actually done now, but photos shall have to wait another day.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to eat some super sexy chocolate cake!

sexy chocolate cake

P.S. I’ve got a brand new, super cute wallet that I want to send to a loving home – click here if you need something new! Sold!

a new adventure

Megan (and her husband James) have been hard at work transforming the basement apartment of the store into a swish dye studio!

dye studio

I’ve been down there dyeing yarns for the store for awhile now, but over the last couple weeks it’s really been transformed – it was a touch sketchy before, also, orange. And there was a fridge.

lots o' pots

Why the new space? Why, workshops of course! I’ll be teaching dye workshops in wool/protein fibres and cotton/plant fibres all fall, pretty much every weekend (except Rhinebeck weekend – speaking of which, anyone need company?). Each class except for the handpainting cotton workshop is one session, three hours long. We’ll cover everything – safety, math, and different dyeing techniques.

stove and counter

It’s definitely a cozy space, so each class is limited to three people, at least for the time being. Once you’ve taken a class, you can even sign up for studio time and use our facilities to do your own thing!

The class schedule isn’t up on the website yet, but keep an eye out and it will be shortly. If you’re itching to find out more, email me and I’ll forward you the full schedule and details!

warning: blurry photos ahead.

Gahhhhh. Normally I use an old Olympus digital camera – 2.1 MP, no manual features, sloooow. But the photos come out fine, generally pretty clear and good colour. I’ve used another camera, a Sony Cybershot (DSC-T1) a few times before and had it be fine too. But lately all I can seem to get with it is shots like this:

It wasn’t even really low light, just not super sunny. I took shot after shot, holding my breath when I took the photo, resting my hands on my chair’s arm, etc. Very irritating. I think I’ll go back to my Olympus, thanks – unless someone can help me with this particular problem? It doesn’t even have a tripod mount.

Grey sleeves – Elann Highland Chunky. Super speedy – the second sleeve is already done (and that photo was taken earlier today). For a cardigan.

Blurry black alpaca starting to look like a sweater. Boring but a good standby knit (not that I really need more things to work on).

Last weekend I went to Goodwill in search of another crockpot – I found this:

But no actual crockpot! I’m being taunted.

Let’s see, what else is up…I desperately want to buy yarn. Dude, it’s not like I need more! Although I keep saying to myself that I don’t have much worsted weight wool at all (really, I only have one sweater’s worth, and it’s got a project attached to it) so I should really get some stuff for design playing. Yeah, that’s it.

I’ve also been thinking about the whole holiday pressie situation, and I think I know what I want to do (just a few bigger things). Buy the yarn now? That might lead to adding a few more skeins for myself…thus breaking the yarn diet. Hmmmm. Will have to think about this more.