Dyed in the Wool

I mentioned earlier I have some Super Top Secret Happenings happening. Well, some of those things are still staying Super Top Secret until some other Super Top Secret things Happen (am I confusing and repetitive yet? Good.), but in the meantime I’ve been receiving some orders from Ye Olde Internette.

I’m working on gathering supplies so that I can start to offer things up in my Etsy store. It has, up until now, remained dormant and empty, woeful and sad because I was always working on projects for myself or dear loved ones rather than the yarn-buying public. As part of my Super Top Secret Happenings, I’ve decided to get off my arse and get my store going. A super excited blog post will happen when the store is live with products, but for now: photo fodder.

This is a whopping order, mostly from Wool2Dye4 and a bit from Paradise Wool. This is 3 bags equaling 30 skeins of un-dyed superwash fingering weight yarn; 1 bag equaling 10 skeins of un-dyed superwash DK (double-knit) weight yarn; 1 pound of Alpaca roving; 1 pound of Blue Faced Leicester roving; and 1 pound of Corriedale roving. Any guesses as to what I’m going to do with it?

That’s right. This is 8 jars of various colors of Jacquard acid dyes. Dyeing is hopefully going to commence this weekend (may the Force of Enamel Pots be with me when I visit Goodwill and Salvation Army), so stay tuned for plenty of adventurous posts chock fulla bright colors, kitchen misadventures and stained fingers.

In the meantime, I’ve been spinning like a crazy spinning spinster lady.

That’s almost 3 full ounces (2.95 if you look closely at the little scale screen) of hand-spun 100% merino roving. The colorway is English Garden and I just love the name. It’s mostly green with bits of blue and purple run throughout, and a random ribbon of yellow tossed in to make me go “Squeee!” (I never thought I would be so easily amused as to be spinning with the same merino roving for a week and get excited EVERY TIME that wee little bit of yellow comes up. I just love seeing how it mixes in and what it looks like with the other colors. What a thrilling life I do lead.) I’ve got another bobbin about half-full and am planning on making this a 3-ply … two plies of the English Garden and one ply of un-dyed Merino and Alpaca roving that I have from my first drop spindle class. I think the colors are going to be lovely and manly together and they will be knit up into a very lovely and manly scarf for Dear. After all, we have cold times in our future … but that’s yet another Super Top Secret Happening that must stay put for another post.

As for now, Happy 4th of July weekend! Have fun and be safe – I still remember stories my mom would tell me when I was young about young’uns blowing their fingers/ eyes/ ears/ hair/ feet off due to irresponsible fire cracker lighting. Did anyone else have to read Follow My Leader every year around this time?

I came ... I felted ... I dyed.

Welcome back, folks! It’s been a while since my last blog post because … well … I felt un-blog-a-riffic. I wasn’t happy with any of my ideas for content because I didn’t HAVE any content. I hadn’t finished any projects, hadn’t taken any photos, didn’t really have anything new to report. So I didn’t.

But now … NOW … I have something. I have been working on something super duper top secret for the past week or so, and I will be dropping hints throughout until details are finalized and I know I won’t get fired from my day job or hunted like the scurvy dog I am for posting it on the internet for every Tom, Dick and Harry to read. But until then … I present:

FINISHED OBJECTS
and other random wooly goodness

This past weekend, I did my first felting project. I forgot to take a photo of it before I started felting (I have issues remembering to photograph various stages of projects … it’s part of my charm), but here it is in the first stage of felting.
Ooooh the Thrills! The Chills!

And here it is on my lovely hat model, Gwyneth.

Say hello, Gwyneth.

Still planning on needle-felting a little something-something onto this, but that will have to wait until I get a couple more finished objects completely finished (almost doesn’t count in this case, as they are gifts).

Also spent some time dyeing my latest hand-spun effort.

Mmmm, my favorite. Purple Kool-Aid Yarn Soup.

The color is a little washed out, but it’s actually a lovely and bright purple.

I love the smell of hot, wet Kool-Aid-y Wool in the morning.

To be plied together with my other hand-spun effort, dyed a maroon color. But that’s another blog post.

Everything else I have that I would like to share – will be shared in later postings. Gotta save my material, you know?

In un-related to knitting news, Dear and I went to a Polo match this weekend – my first! I felt so British! Cheerio, pip pip old chap! We had a great time, even though it was hotter than Hell (I’m going to start saying hotter than Houston. It’s more accurate).

Awww, so cute!

And the horsies looked like they were having some fun.

Pass the Pimm's Cup, please.

Hope everyone who cares is celebrating World Wide Knit in Public Week (June 12 – 19)! I got together at Memorial City Mall on Sunday to scare the Muggles … what did you do?