Yarn Tales

Certain projects just grab my attention. These little Felted Trees from Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines did just that. And they helped use up some of the recycled reindeer sweater yarn that really doesn't want to be in my stash anymore. It's a bit scratchy, not very lovely, and not superwash.

Somehow it popped into my head that I could overdye brown yarn and give it a new life. My less-than-careful attempt gave me two skeins of a bright green, but the dyebath wasn't spent. The next two skeins came out more blue-green, without any additional dye but a bit more vinegar. My last several dye experiments were with painted wool that just needed to be steamed, not stirred and watched. The finished trees are still plain after an attempt to embellish them. I like their simplicity when plain. The next tree to be felted is to be a dog toy, and that will have an I-cord star on top.

More wool washing: coned thread purchased on sale from Webs, still in the spinning oil. It doesn't smell of lanolin, and is much nicer to knit if washed beforehand. I found that by using my yarn meter (a fishing line counter mounted on wood) and my umbrella swift wound loosely, I can get a decent skein much faster than using a niddy-noddy, and it's easier on my neck. The samples knitted up required two yarns held together for a DK weight, so there is more skeining and washing to come.

Then back to the loom, also with wool yarn. I had wound the warp several months ago for a simple scarf, referring to a pattern in an older Handwoven, and set it aside. Somehow it was two feet too short, but thankfully it had not been cut. All my careful ties at the cross and ends helped it unwind without many tangles, and it has been re-measured and ready for warping.

But you have a sewing machine...

So of course you wouldn't mind doing all of my nasty mending and hemming that has been put off. Does anyone ever do that to you? Someone in my family did, though she did offer to pay me as I wasn't working at the time. Then another family member realized that perhaps I could re-upholster one of his cars. I explained that although I had made outdoor gear (raincoats, bivi bags), my machine was not industrial, and probably wouldn't be suited for sewing naugahyde seat covers.

For a daycare auction, I foolishly donated 10 hours of sewing time. The daycare director bought my services, then asked if I could make her a two-piece rain outfit for bicycling. I recognized that this would be much more than 10 hours, and negotiated a selection of perennial divisions from her yard for the difference (which had been her donation, way way out of my price range).

I really don't mind small mending projects for other people. Once while visiting my Dad, I realized he had tried to convert a hooded sweatshirt to having a short collar...with a stapler. He even had a sewing machine in his house at the time, and I had seen him using it to repair some of his clothes when I was a kid (my Mother was not on speaking terms with the machine). I was glad to take it home and convert it for him, removing all the staples.

Pinnies were made for my Son's soccer team (colored vests to wear when an opposing team had the same color uniforms), and one of the parents recognized my talent and had me rescue a couple pairs of his son's drawstring pants that had lost the drawstrings. I did actually stitch the new drawstrings in place in the center back so they wouldn't pull out again.

Early on in my longarm quilting career, I received a phone call inquiring if I could quilt Kevlar. The caller was from South Carolina, and I directed him to try and find an industrial sewing shop closer to his home, and my machine could NOT quilt Kevlar. He was not questioned as to what he wanted quilted, as I didn't want to know!

Old Stuff, New Stuff

This was actually finished before Halloween - and gifted to a friend who had admired it at the retreat. She has a black cat, and wondered if her ginger cat might get jealous now!

Four quilt tops were turned in to Pacific Fabrics for Project Linus, along with six caps and a scarf for their Handmade Hat and Scarf drive. I've since finished another scarf for charity and started a third - several local yarn stores collect them.

The four "Boo the Bat" were finished before Halloween too, one delivered in person and the three others via my brother for his grandsons. I was very tempted to buy some orange yarn to make one for myself after seeing all the cute versions on Ravelry. The designer asked if she could link my picture to her gallery. http://mochimochiland.com/

In other knitting, The Daily Sweater from Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines has been making slow progress. It was re-started once as the cast-on was too loose - the neck fit loosely over 2 turtlenecks! Went down a size (but kept the same needle size), the 2nd try is going much better. Also finally asked very specific questions on the MDK group at Ravelry of people who had finished the sweater. The chart is a bit intimidating, but the conversations about it (hints on how to make sense of it) have encouraged several other people to start one. It was curious before I started to see how few people had started it, compared to some other patterns in the book.

This is a before and after look at yarn recycling. This well-aged wool yarn was once a reindeer sweater (well twice if you count that I ripped

the sleeve caps back and re-knit the reindeer trying to make it fit). Didn't understand gauge at the time, had been told that I was a tight knitter (only a tight cast-on, as it turned out) and the only other knitters I knew at the time thought I had a very strange technique (continental).

Anyway, the sad brown yarn had been sitting around for many years, when suddenly I realized that it could be overdyed! The two bright skeins on the left were the first two dyed, but there was still much dye left in the pot, so the second two were soaked in hot water and added. My dyeing technique is still rather experimental. It looked like more lanolin washed out of the paler yarn, since the first two were soaked in cold water, since they were added to a cold dye pot. I've already started a Felted Tree from MDK 2 and can't wait to play with some carrying yarn and miscellaneous buttons, sequins and threads to embellish them.

Retreat

I was lucky enough to attend a sewing retreat almost two weeks ago, sponsored by the American Sewing Guild. There are other retreats offered by groups that I belong to, though often the retreats are full before I know about them, or there is a scheduling conflict. There was some prep work done in the week before, which ranged from cutting hundreds of squares and triangles for the Large Christmas Quilt (stacked neatly in a plastic box) to stuffing likely scrap strips for a string quilt into a bag.

I started with simple projects: two quilts that needed bindings - a small Christmas tabletopper or throw and the Woven quilt. My usual technique is to sew the binding to the top, then pin excessively, and sew the back side down by machine as well.

Next I started a stash quilt, using a dark navy sea-life print in the center of each block and green and orange accent fabrics. Unusual colors, but they were pulled from colors in the print and had patterns reminded me of waves, snails and coral.

Then another stash quilt, using six blocks from a Halloween panel. I kept it simple, with a sash and cornerstone around each block, and a stronger print for the border. The panel had been stored longer than I care to guess, and when packing for the retreat the original sash and border fabrics were jettisoned for the ones that made the final top. Late Saturday night I started on a String quilt for charity, using tracing paper as the foundation rather than muslin as on the last one. It was finished up Sunday morning.

A couple of simple projects (new napkins, cloth shopping bags) were left at home, which forced me to start on the Large Christmas Quilt. Usually if I look at a quilt pattern carefully, and count that a single block has 49 pieces, I find a similar, but simpler block and substitute. However, when the fabric was purchased four years ago, it was for the amounts the pattern suggested, and I just went with it.

First I made one complete block, to assure myself that I could make accurate half-square triangle and quarter square triangle blocks. The sub sections were pressed in the direction that made sense to me, and the pattern didn't specify. And it worked very well, with just a reference note on pressing the hourglass blocks in a specific way. All of the sub-sections (20 per block, plus 5 plain squares for a 5 x 5 layout) were completed at the retreat, much more than I expected. And I still love the fabrics! I had been thinking about giving this quilt to a friend when completed, but I delivered the Woven quilt to her yesterday, so will just wait and see how I feel when the quilt is finished.

Moving Towards Journaling

I am a list maker. Long lists, short lists, tiny diagrams with notes. Part of it has to do with having a visual memory. I can remember something I saw in a magazine by the position on the page, and usually which side of the page it was on. Writing something down gives me that visual memory connection, and usually I don't have to look at the list again to remember things. However, I have stocked my purse, sewing box and portable project bags with small notebooks for creative reinforcement.

My library queue has The Artists Way by Julia Cameron on it, which I've read before, and probably should just buy the book. Ideas come to me at any time, and don't always get recorded or acted upon. Last week while quilting a dense but pretty climbing daisy pattern, I realized the design would work well as an applique pattern. In the continuous quilting pattern, the vine, leaves and flowers are all connected, but it would work well with the leaves and flowers floating or just slightly overlapping the vine. Journaling would pull up some of these flashes of inspiration, and help me develop them further.

My project list is mostly sewing/quilting related, and it should probably be integrated with my Ravelry knitting/crochet queue, just for a reality check. Unless I'm working on a specific project with a deadline (for a gift), I let my projects that are worked on guide me, and I'm OK with several things in progress at a time. Usually.

Working on projects that aren't coming out well usually cause a flurry of new project starts. I started a Corded bag last week, which isn't a happy project. I kept telling myself it was almost done, but after a small sample of crochet using the same yarn (Noro Daria which is more of a cord than a yarn), I started a sample with some CotLin yarn, and then purchased Boo the Bat from Mochimochi Land and actually completed all of the parts in one evening. It's my way of putting off ripping out the Corded. Boo is coming out great, so in a way it is encouraging me to make a better finished product with the Daria yarn.

My creative process is often a start in one direction, then turning a different way for an outcome that wasn't expected, but better than the original idea. Journaling will help me make those changes more freely.

Yarn in My Head

In my haste to get a photo of these charity hats before taking them to my quilt group, they were left behind, rather than delivered to my friend who volunteers for Fred Hutchinson. They were free of cat hair and all were on the table (not chewed by dogs) when I returned.

Most are crocheted, the one at top knitted with two strands of the mystery yarn from a recycled sweater. There is enought yarn in the leftover bag for one more hat, so they'll all get donated together.

The Wisteria sweater at Twist Collective is still enticing me to purchase just the right color of woodsy green yarn. Most the the possibilities are machine washable, part-cotton blends. Cascade Sierra is looking very likely right now. My yarn stash wants to grow faster than knitwear can be finished, and using up oddballs and repurposing some of the impulse buys makes logical sense.

I tried to get myself back to sleep early this morning working out color combinations for baby afghans. The Circles to Squares Afghan from Lion Brand kept coming back with colors of yarn that are currently not IN the stash, so perhaps a visual perusal is needed to find colors to complement existing yarn.

Bag Lady Challenge

I took part in a Bag Lady Swap hosted by Cindy in one of my small online groups. She assigned partners, and we sent off a sealed (not taped shut) 1-gallon zip-lock bag of fabric and/or blocks. We had several months to complete the challenge. The packet that came for me contained fat quarters - some from the same line of fabric, some very different in color and style. We were allowed to add up to 2 yards of our own fabric. As some ideas were forming, I checked with Cindy to see if we had to use all of the fabric we received, and was relieved that we didn't. Some of the darker fabrics were just too far away from the colorway for my comford. This is the top I completed, using pieced hexagons.

A few days ago I received the top that my partner made for me--and I am thrilled with it! I had sent her some of the small blocks that I had won in a raffle (along with the instructions in case she wanted to make more). I love how some of the blocks are used in the outer border.

Well, Stanley,

this is another fine mess you've gotten us into! The 9-patch swap sounded so sweet and innocent. There was a red and white group that had me reconsidering my vow not to take part. Then the chatter began about a blue and white group, and impulsively I shot my hand up to give them enough people to form a group. A decision was made to make all of the swap groups make 6" blocks. And then I joined the red and white group too! Total commitment: 12 blocks per month. At the end of the year, I'll have enough scrappy blocks to make two quilts, large ones if I make alternate blocks or extra 9-patches. I hope there will be some discussion about the "white" fabric allowing shirtings or other small prints for more interest.

The recycled-sweater-into-hats project came to an abrupt end. Two hats came out fine--one crocheted, one knitted with double strands. The third hat was on the third try, and the mystery yarn just didn't come undone without breaking. I salvaged a nice little coaster-sized circle from the center, and the rest went away.

Moving On / Moving Over

The last few weeks have been the continuation of organizing and cleaning of fabrics, batting, and yarn stash. The bag of random washable yarn is now 4 completed crochet hats for charity. The box of miscellaneous fabric odds and ends is a string quilt top (with a second set of foundations and center strips cut and ready to roll). The accumulation of leftover batting pieces were pieced and quilted into three finished tops (still need to be bound).

And this post is my first attempt at a new host for blogging. My frustration level with each post at the previous site kept me from posting, especially with pictures. And hey!--this first picture went right where I told it to. These are the boys, Max and Jake. I did a photo shoot after my son left for college...and found it harder to say goodbye to the boys than to me. He got this photo as a 10 x 12 picture for his birthday, one week after school started.