Stupid Slippers

I joined the Ravelry bandwagon and got the French Press slipper pattern. This is my first attempt:


I made the medium size, I have a size 7.5 foot. Totally turned out too big. Felted for over an hour and now they are in the dryer trying to shrink them down. They are so big that putting them on makes me look like a Xmas elf without the bells on the toes.

So far the pattern was easy, the seaming is a pain in the ass, and I agree with other Ravelers on a few things:

1:7$ is too much for one pattern

2:Not specifying the type of make one that works best is a negative. I used the m1 by lifting the bar below, which caused a hole, which shows on only 1 of the slippers and not the other.

3: The sides are too short. I may try to mod by not decreasing as much for that middle part.

Things I like:

1: Easy peasy pattern.

2: Even if you are a beginner knitter, if you think about the construction of the slipper, you can modify the pattern to fit you better.

3: It uses up scrap-wool stash. Even if using the scrap wool stash is purely an attempt to perfect the $&#! thing.

Yarn dyeing for Easter

We don't celebrate Easter. So today we installed another ceiling fan, put in a new shower head, and I dyed some more yarn.
I soaked the bare yarn in some water and vinegar while we shopped at Home depot, came home and spread out the yarn in the backyard over some plastic and mixed my dyes. Today I used the Neon food colors you can get at the food store. I put the color into separate squeeze bottles and played with the colors.
Here the yarn is soaking up the sun rays in the backyard to heat the color into it:

Here is the yarn before I wrapped it in the saran wrap:

I haven't got the faintest idea if this will work at all or be a miserable failure, but I spent part of the day outside in the lovely sun with a beer and yarn.

That's success any day in my book.

No time to write, must spin, or is it knit?

Two of my favorite events are coming up very sooooooon, so soon in fact I can't spend any time blogging. I have to spin. Knit. spin. knit. spin. or is it knit????
The first is the MN Textile center garage sale in April. I blogged last year. Hence the reason behind the must knit. I always buy toooooo much there. It's not really my fault though. It's the yarn. It calls to me. It just feels so lonely and unloved, it needs a home and friends.
The second is the Shepherd's harvest festival in May. This is a spinners dream, and the first year I went which was 2 years ago was right before I got the wheel from my Mom and I still bought too much. Fiber is way cheaper than yarn, and has so many wonderful possibilities that aren't being held back by being yarn already that it's just way too much fun to buy too much.
So sorry for the short post, but you knitters/spinners understand right? Gotta make room!

Post blocking

This is a DROPS sweater that I made. It took a long time because it is knit and seamed (remind me to modify for in the round next time!) So while this is being blocked because the bottom hem in the back rides up a bit it is on the floor in my sewing room on a towel like this:

And then I put another towel on top of it and a book on top of that to hold it down. I DO NOT WANT Itchy to get his little sharp claws into this and claim it as his own chewy toy.

Thanks Gwen for the comment, yes, it would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

I'm posting a pic of the post blocked bag. the corner is curled up a bit on the flap, and the back has a spot where the yarn is chewed, but it's not so bad. :(

When you block at my house

When you knit a bag and felt it and then try to block it at my house, Itchy claims it as his. He licks it and licks it and growls and bites when you try to get him off it.
The mystery of why things never look as good as they should after blocking is now solved.

Wicked in Malabrigo

I've been working on the sweater "Wicked" from Ravelry for the last few days. I found enough Malabrigo for sale by a fellow Raveler for the sweater, so I had to wait to cast on which actually was a bit painful. I haven't knit anything in Malabrigo for a few months now, so I was itching!

The colorway is "Applewood" I'm on skein #2 and just getting to the bust line. I tried it on with some lifelines, and she actually fits!

Top down seamless sweater to the rescue!

And a hat too!

I had so much fun knitting the mittens that I found a hat pattern that went well with it.

It's the Flora hat from Ravelry, and it's a free pattern. I used the leftovers I had from the mittens, and only used about 1/2 skein of each color.

If you look close the white parts are small leaves coming off of a small vine. The vine isn't "popping" quite like it should, but I can't find anything to block the stupid thing on other than my head. And I don't want to wear a wet hat around blocking it until it dries. Any volunteers?