Finished Projects

In light of the recent posts concerning incomplete projects I thought I would share a photographic list of finished projects from this year, in order of completion:

A slip cover for Robin's archos using the leftover yarn from his Yule socks. Made it up sans pattern.

An indecisive ribbed scarf with vertical and horizontal stripes. mine. I was asked to share this technique last year so wrote up a tutorial.

My first shawl of the year. My own design to use some dreamy mocha-pink handspun yarn I bought locally (before I started spinning!) Bought the complimentary pink silk-blend to go with it.

A Carcassone hat for a friend's birthday. My design.

A Decepticon slouchy hat. Chart is not mine, but the colouring is. And I hand-dyed the yarn for the gradient effect. This was a special request from Candace.

Some socks for mom using a simple slipped stitch pattern to break up the variegated yarn.

A crocheted Festival shawl as a surprise for a friend who had surprised me with this yarn as a gift. This was my first beaded shawl. I also knit myself a lacy cardigan with the yarn last year.

Abi's pink and blue scarf using yarn she dyed and plain white. Knit with double garter.

A Fibonacci Sequence toque for dad.

An Ethereal shawl for a friend.

Another crochet shawl using up yarn from my stash. I kept this one, although I'd assumed I would gift it.

Rhombus socks for mom in a Raven-way yarn from Blue Moon Fibrearts.

A Traveling woman shawl for a friend with yarn that Abi dyed.

A strip for a collaborative gift blanket using yarn that Abi and Isaac dyed.

A spring shawl (Summer Flies) for Abi using up more yarns that Abi dyed - and a little of my handspun yarn too! I haven't bothered to block it, but I can to make it grow with her.

A Hatchling Dragon shawl for my sister. My design and the yarn had been gifted to me by another friend who doesn't like bamboo yarns - which she discovered after buying some lovely bamboo.

My Battle-Weary Dragon shawl. My baby. My design. Many beads.

A Windermere/Tigers Eye stole for mom. The never-ending thing. ( Not as never-ending as my Evenstar. Or the afghan for Veronica we shall not speak of.)

A quick Lotus hat for me from my stash.

My green Sweet Embrace stole. Nupp-ilicious and I adore this yarn from Waterloo Wools. Same as the Battle-Weary. There's another skein in my stash...

A bucket hat for me using old cotton I've had since I started knitting again.

A quick crocheted Geoui shawl using up stash yarn that pooled terribly when knit. I think the pooling works in the crochet design. This one was gifted to a friend.

My rainbow-licious Antonia shawl. I could not resist when I saw this single skein of rainbow lace yarn.... Then I cursed myself for buying a yarn nearly impossible to match to a pattern. This worked. I love it. mine!

An Indigenous shawl using up the yarn I bought many years ago while in Saskatoon with mom for a conference.

A sweater for Abi in the pink (of course) yarn she chose from a local yarn store closing sale. A simple raglan I made up as I went with a diamond lace motif.

Another strip for another collaborative piece.

The mystery knit along shawl from June.

The Undercover blanket Abi and I made

An Echo Flowers shawl in my favourite yarn - Waterloo Wools Montague. (Same as Green Embrace and Battle-Weary Dragon above - different colours of course).

The End - for this moment less than half-way through the year...

Burgundy, Teal, Copper

What an exciting morning of colour fun we've had.  I had three hanks of yarn that needed to be dyed for a special project.  I wanted one to be handpainted, one solid, and the other to be solid or semi-solid (but changed my mind after using this dye).
Given that my blue food colouring (in the little drop shaped bottles from the grocery store) is leaking and I'm low on food dyes, I decided we'd try out the Wiltons paste dyes today.
First things first, I started the three hanks soaking in vinegar water this morning.
After Abi woke we all headed out to Bulk Barn to choose some colours.
Our friend Maxwell who was helping us dye chose the colours. Burgundy, teal, and copper.  We all know what the special project is and that helped guide our decision.

At home we started by mixing up teal in the slow cooker to leave one hank cooking while we moved on to hank number two.
This was the fun hank! Hand-painted in all three colours!

After painting we wrapped it up in the plastic wrap and have left it to cook in the hot sun.

Meanwhile, the teal was setting nicely and ready to be rinsed, rolled in a towel and stepped on, and laid out to dry.

The teal and the hand-painted will be held together double to form the main body of the project.

There was still a fair bit of blue in the pot, so I freshened it up (by this point the kids were too hot to help as was the pot) and decided to immerse half of the third hank.  I noticed that the paste colourings were being absorbed as a solid colour and since the third hank will create a border, I didn't want just a solid colour.  This yarn will be held double using both ends.

And that's where we are by 1pm.  Here are  a couple of sneak peeks at the hand-painted while it's cooking in the sun.

Edited in the evening next morning (when the blogger uploader was finally working) to show the final yarns drying:

More Green Dye

Look what Abi made today.  3 skeins of green yarn for a special project.

Last night I finished the mystery shawl.  Clue was released at 4:30pm and by 6:30 it was finished, soaked, blocked, dry, and ready to wear. tee hee. Not that I wore it because I still don't know if I want to keep it or gift it. But I was able to bring it to show off to the Uptown Knit Mob.  The longest part was probably pinning it for blocking. Well, besides the waiting parts (wait to soak, wait to dry).