Undyed sock blanks and Jellybean Dyeing

Back in 2013 I bought a bag of 10 x 100g undyed sock yarn. So I opened up the bag and was going to do some sock blanks and see if I could sell them. 10 is a lot. Then I got side tracked with jellybean dyeing.

I bought a $2 bag of jelly beans from Reject Shop. I already did the sock blanks, 2 ends, T10 on the KX. 80 sts, with a dropped stitch in the centre. and off I went to jellybean dye them.

For both I put down a towel and put a long strip of plastic wrap down to lay the blank on it. I wanted to do stripes. and on the other side I did random plonked on.

Don't use the natural coloured ones, The cheap ones are best.

First batch was a but underdone I squeezed out too much water and didn't sort out the colours first so I didn't realise that there was a dark pink and a red, so they got mixed up,

I started at the red end and used the towel to start the roll up all the way to the end. I didn't want the colours bleeding into the top, so there's layer of plastic all the way through. 

I microwaved for 4 mins on high and took it out straight away. Unwrapped and splashed the vinegar around, rinsed, 
washed and it came out with the colours not through all the layers. Here they are, all wrapped up, before and after.

The unwrapped first experiment

For the next one, I sorted out all the colours first, then cut all the jelly beans into two and put them cut side up, in stripes, both sides, just like the first one. I put the cut black ones right along both the edges. I also chopped up three or four pinks and sprinkled them on the dropped bit. I was pleased with that idea too.

I left the blank a lot wetter and pritzed the jelly beans with some more water before I wrapped them up, same as before.. I microwaved for 2 mins then turned it over. had a cup of coffee and did another 2 mins. I could have done 2 more I think, next time.

Here's the second batch halfway through, with a much better saturation of both ends and the unwrapped blank, after it's vinegar bath, followed by a eucalyptus wash.  

Over on Ravelry we have a whole thread on playing around with this in the Sock Blank Artists Group. And here's the second sock, and the tiny bit left over. And here's the second one, with the colours much more vivid. I like both.

Little bit on Hand Tooling Lace

I've just finished two jumpers with the same panel but one with 3 and the other with 4 repeats of the panel.

Humboldt Raglan - minus the raglan!

 First I make a template of the pattern I'm repeating, here I've marked the edges and centres of each panel by putting a piece of cardboard onto the needle bed and putting in the pencil marks on it.

Another really good idea is to mark the bed with a waterproof pencil, but I can't find my one and only - so cardboard and pencil it was:

The first three transfers were the same,  so I bring the needles forward that are to be transferred on those first three repeats - transfer, 3 x to the right; 3 x to the left, knit two rows:

Then I do the same for the rest of the pattern, I found bringing the needles out to be transferred to be the quickest and easiest way to get it done. If you have to start second guessing which is this one is the right one, it slows everything down and makes the whole process very tiring. So... put the template down, bring the needles out, (check the line up) transfer, knit.

Here is a nice close up of the lace pattern. For this one, at the end of the pattern is two rows of reverse stocking stitch. I used the put the latch tool two stitches down, pull down, relatch, reattach, pull out to hold, do the next one. Again, working quickly and steadily gets it done, using the machine's settings to help keep track of which has been done - so there's no second guessing and no mental exhaustion from doing that over and over again. That's the real trick. Do the prep, and keep working at a steady pace and take short breaks to refresh the mind and stretch the legs.

What I've Been Doing Over at the Lace Factory

I've been busy making lace over the last couple of months with my SK280+LC2 lace carriage. Lauren suggest I get all the projects done then put the machine away and sew them up - freeing up the clutter in the loungeroom.

My over abundance of Bendigo 4ply Cotton is my focus yarn out of my stash for these projects. I still have too much, but I've made five projects from 12 x 200G at the lace factory, which is a start

So I thought I'd share my experimental successes and failures

I tried out six different ideas.

First was Wild Lavender with a lovely circle lace pattern from the Harmony book. I punched the cards all by myself too!

Lauren's next good idea was - if you make one and you like it, make another - so right on cue - Damask Rose got itself made from a slightly different circular pattern.

Wild Lavender

 

Damask Rose

 Then I tried out the motif bits and pieces to put part of a card on a stripe and relatched the gutter on the next project - Maritime Trellis

Maritime Trellis motif

Progress: not making any

Well that was the first three projects off the machine - then came the next three.

The White Diamonds did not go well, there were a few little piles of white Snow at the back of the machine while I worked out how to stop it dropping stitches on my next project - White Diamonds throw over cardi. But eventually with enough weight, evenly distributed across the needles - Success!

White Diamonds Throwover Cardi

Then there was the upside down punchcard to figure out where and how to copy something I'd seen on someone over at the shops.

first try was with the garter bar - and I didn't quite like it...

Knock off Version 1

Knock off Version 2

 

And here I am sewing it up (I'll get a better photo tomorrow)  It's a lovely colour and looking good.


Which bring me to the sixth project - loved the lace card, thought it was gorgeous, but a little bit too much over the whole garment.

Ah I forgot to say I decided to use my cone of Bramwells Savanah "knits as 4ply" cotton. a little bit thin in my opinion, however... I ran into problems which I had no luck in solving.

I had a few breaks on the large piece but it was an absolute nightmare using motif in the centre of the front. I'd done the back... sigh, but I think there was.. six breaks in the first 100 rows and I decided to give up and do it plain. It is my official fail.

I think five success where I've learnt so much, is not too bad.

So... that's the fun I've been having at the "Lace Factory" over the last couple of months.

Now I have to sew up the Knock off, White Diamonds and the plain black tee. (and Thanks Lauren, my lounge room is clear while I do it).


And I've finished sewing up the last two projects so I'm going to add them here:

Knock Off Lacey tee

Front of White Diamonds

Back of White Diamonds

Shoulder Seams on the Machine

I came across this youtube video for putting in a shoulder seam in two parts. Worth looking at but that's not how I do things.

Finished side straight off the machine: not yet washed, blocked, press or anything.

No. So this is what I did:

Knit my back and took it off with a long circ needle.

knit the front and put the shoulder onto decker combs, (a garter bar would be OK too)

Back goes onto the needles, wrong side faces the machine, public side faces me, BEHIND the latches.

Front goes on to the open latches

Flip the decker to vertical while holding the work so the stitch all roll onto the needle

Add a little weight on both pieces. Pull ALL the needles back so the back stitches are now on the front

just like this

I did bind off around the gate pegs

As with everything, how different people do the same thing always interests me. Depending on how firm the shoulder seam has to be, how stretchy the fabric, will determine as to how to finish off the live stitches, back stitch, make the last row MT+1 or 2 and latching off, lots of scope for what the design dictates. And it was easy with the decker comb and if the back was taken off with a garter bar and flipped, then it would be really quick.

The photo of it finished was very blurry, so I'll take another one and come back and put it in tomorrow. Which I've just done. Here they are straight off the machine, not yet washed, pressed or anything but I think it is a nice tidy and quick seam.

Finished underside

Berets

I've been hand knitting some berets all from Luxury 10ply, I bought with the Murano I needed to finish off some felted slippers.
And here they are

Dreamy inspired by Snow's Beret on Once Upon a Time

A lovely beret - Brambles - a pattern on knitty.com the colour is correct in Dreamy

And lastly a big disappointment - don't bother with this one, the instructions don't match the model, I did a lot of modification to make it like the photo and when I put the comment that it didn't match on the Rav page for it, it got deleted. So. Can't delete this. Don't bother - if she can't be bothered providing accurate instructions don't bother knitting the dodgy version in the instructions.

My Cable-athon Continues

I've decided to do some of the cable projects I've had ready to go for this year's stash knit down. I'm working on my 2012 stash bag and am trying to knit 50 x 200g of Bendi. I will go over the 40, which is an excellent improvement on the 4.5 x 200g that I managed in 2011.

My next cable cardi, is one from Vague - I know they call themselves "Vogue" but errors abound in so many of their vague patterns, this is normal. This one is from Fall 2008, the Old Penny Cardi or as they have renamed it - #11 Forestry.  And I'm writing about how I'm doing this on the machine. I'm putting a 30st panel into the centre back, as quite a few people have.

The cable pattern is an old one, done over 5 stitches, 1 and 5 are swapped, one goes behind, one in front, and the three in the middle remain in the same place. We've just had Susan Guigliumi visiting, and I'm bringing her bridging ideas into the mix.

I'm using the hold and part levers to put in some extra slack so I can do the four cables. On the row before I'm due to cross the cables,  I pinch the RS levers into the centre - hold and part. and hold on

bring all the pattern needles to hold and knit +1 or +2 MT

the left, then the 30 needles covering the centre panel are pulled out to hold.

Knit up to the held needles, disengage the row counter, then back up, and put the left side lever into part, take off the hold, and +1MT on the stitch dial, in this case, up to T5 then knit the 30 centre needles, back up, bring all the remaining needles all the way out to hold, reduce the stitch dial to MT (T4) and knit them. Re-engage the row counter.

Bring needles to be crossed out all other to UWP so none can unravel during cabling

bring the middle 3 to UWP, one stitch goes behind, one goes in front

Here the stitch going in front is being collected with the latch tool

Here, the stitch at the back is hanging on its correct needle and the front stitch is being teased into position by the latch tool

the infront stitch is on the needle and the back stitch is going onto it's new needle

Here they are done

and this is really how I collect the front stitch, but it's not much of a photos. Park the stitch going back onto it's prong, remove the front stitch and put it onto the latch tool and hold it, then move the back stitch into the new position, then pop the front on on it's new needle.

There is a bit of pulling

but putting them all back into UWP helps the machine knit them off

And there they are knitted. All to do now is latch back the two purl stitches