Look! A bandwagon!

I need to join EVERYTHING. Just HAVE to. No self control. Everyone is knitting socks? I must also. Wiked KAL? I'm in! Oh, and a Hemlock Ring Blanket KAL too? OK, count me in! For about 5 seconds I was working on one project at a time.... It was nice while it lasted, but I guess it's just not my style!




So, some pix!





Rob's mittens:
I still need to weave in the ends on the mittens. I have them all just tucked inside for now.


The beginnings of George's socks:

I'm thinking two more cable twists then I'll be ready for the heel. I guess I should look up how to do a short row heel, huh? Oh, and I'm loving those short sock needles!

And some yarn I dyed for Juli:

The subtle color variations don't show up as good in the pic as they are for real. This was supposed to be green, but it's yellow and green. I know it looks purely yellow in the pic, but trust me, there's green in there too!

Purple Yarn & Rhinebeck

As promised the results of the Purple Yarn Experiment are in, and I'm happy to say that they are much better than the Fall Colors Yarn :-)

This was a lot of fun to make! I don't think the range of colors come through very well in the pictures. It ranges from very light lavander to dark blue/purple. It did speckle a bit, as I thought it would, but I really don't mind those spots. Yeah for successful dying!! Even if I am the only one who sees this as success I'm still happy!! LOL! I want to get some Jacquard dyes now & some Bare Knit Picks yarn & play around with those :-) The two yarns I've dyed are both sock yarns, and being that I don't knit socks I may have to gift them to Juli :-P I really wanted to make a lacy scarf (thinking Branching Out??) with the Fall Colors yarn, but I'm still undecided about the colors.

Next weekend is Rhinebeck! WooHoo!!!! Juli & I are playing Blogger Bingo :-) We're both squares (Catch us ifyou can!!) and I decided like yesterday that I want to be a player too. I got my card like 6 minutes ago & I have to find some printer paper so I can print it out.... Time to start stalking blogs to see what my targets look like!

Also, I've been pimping our podcast and I'm pretty excited to say that several people have atually downloaded it!! Hopefully they found us interesting enough to come back for Episode two, which we plan on recording on Friday. Juli will be in town for Rhinebeck on Saturday then Mama Mia on Sunday (I *heart* ABBA!!!) to celebrate my Gma's 80th Birthday, so we'll all get together at my house to record. Our first recording was pretty craptacular since we just pressed *record* and blathered on, but next time we'll organize an outline & try to stay on topic for more than 3 seconds at a time!

One final picture: my Lil Man playing Football this weekend. He's #95 (second from the left in the red).... notice his size compared to the other team :-X

They don't have to submit birth certificates in the 5 & 6 year old division, so I'm 99.9% sure the kids on the other team were NOT 5 & 6!!!! They were freaking HUGE!!!! I know my kid is small (he's 42 pounds & will be 6 in 2 weeks) but REALLY!!!!! The kids you see in the picture were the smallest from the other team. Their *A* team was twice the size. We had about 10 kids on our team & they had about 26. We have more kids in this age group, but they got split into two teams so the kids get to play more. Apparently the other team was more concerned with winning than anything else. Lil G sat on the sideline most of the game, which was fine by me.... not only were these guys huge but they were playing dirty too!! The coach said he was afraid to put G in against these kids. I can't wait for wrestling to start back up, at least then I know he's matched up with someone his own size! This game was a few miles from my Grandparents, which I didn't realize until I got off the Expressway at their exit, so I called them & they came to the game then took us out for pizza. We then went back to their place & hung out for a bit. It was nice to spend some time with them.

Here's what I cooked up, and shiny things

I wanted Fall colors. I had limited success. The green speckled pretty bad. I think it's just the way the dye is made, but I'm really not thrilled with the blotches of color. I have some purple yarn in the crock pot right now, and it seems to be doing the same thing. Perhaps I'll get another brand of dye at Rhinebeck and see how it turns out.... This is without the flash and is a bit more accurate on my screen And the flip side. I haven't decided if I'm gunna keep this as is or if I'll be dying it a solid brown. Maybe I'll swatch before I decide.
And a few sets of stich markers. I made sets of six with one slightly different to mark the beginning of the row when knitting in the round. I like them a lot! Here they're on a size nine needle, but I think they'll fit up to an 11. I would really like to try to sell these in a LYS, but I'm not sure if I have the nerve to walk in and ask if they would like to sell them!
Stay tuned for the results of the Purple Dye.....

Yarney Goodness

I dyed yarn this weekend :-) Here are the two color ways:
This one is really girlie, but I'm not sure if it will self stripe the way I intended it to, since I don't think I made the hank long enough:

And this one will definitely self stripe. It's destined to become a pair of leg warmers for Devin, since she can't stand the feel of the SWS leg warmers I made her over the winter. These colors remind me of Strawberry Shortcake!

Baby t-shirts I dyed and stamped for Daniella's shower this weekend. I know the stamps are crooked, it gives the shirts character, ok?

And the shirts opened up so you can see the colors better:

And that's all from me for now. Time to get the sewing machine out of the basement so I can get the quilt finished in time for the shower!!

More crafty stuff

I dyed some cotton yarn in yellow & brown. This is what it looked like after it dried:
And in a cute little skein:

Which I then re-skeined to see what the colors would look like mixed together:

George wearing one of the shirts I made him Father's Day (Doesn't he look like he LOVES it??? LOL!)

And Georgie's black eye, obtained in a struggle over a water gun with his cousin yesterday:

More to follow eventually. I've got tons of pix of the kids, but they'll most likely come through Snapfish!