Kool Aid Dyeing

Last weekend, a friend's little girls, Anya, Kaia and Lily, came over and spent the weekend with us. While they were here, we did some Kool Aid Dyeing. Unfortunately, our kitchen is way too small for all three of them to dye at once, so we took turns. I had a hard time choosing which of the super cute pictures to use--I apologize for using so many. Couldn't be helped, though.

This is Anya:


Kaia:


And Lily:


(By the way, the gloves didn't get that blue from the Kool Aid--those are the gloves that I use to dye my hair.)

Here are the yarns hanging up to dry--from left to right they are Kaia's, Lily's and Anya's:

And here are the girls with their yarns all wound up in balls:



They did such a good job with the dyeing, especially for their first time--the colors didn't get muddy at all. I hope to try this again with them sometime when we have more space and can all work together.

Nightswimming

I listed a new colorway in my Etsy shop last week--Nightswimming.


This is a lace weight yarn, but it can be dyed on any of my base yarns. However, I am in the process of getting a new fingering weight base yarn and will be discontinuing all of my other fingering weight yarns. I will not be ordering any more of them, so what I have is it. The new base yarn is a superwash fingering weight merino. I hope to eventually add at least a superwash/nylon fingering weight yarn, but for now, I will only have the one.

Free Pattern for Amigurumi Mushroom

A while back, I posted a picture of a crocheted mushroom I gave to my mom for Christmas. I had so much fun making it that I made a few more and now I've written up a pattern in case someone else wants to make one. This is my very first written pattern (usually I just make notes for myself) so I hope I did okay. Please let me know if you find any mistakes. And I'd love to see pictures if anyone makes one. :)


Amigurumi Mushroom

Materials:
worsted weight yarn in one or two colors
G hook (or any hook that gives you a tight gauge)
stitch marker
fiberfill
yarn needle
contrasting color yarn (optional)

Gauge:
not important, but should be crocheted tightly

Pattern note:
This pattern is worked in spirals--do not join at the end of each round. Use a stitch marker to indicate the beginning of rounds and move it after finishing each round.

Two color mushroom:
Color A - tan worsted weight merino wool
Color B - red worsted weight merino wool

Stem

Rnd 1: Using color A, make 6 sc into magic adjustable ring.
Rnd 2: 2 Sc in each sc around. (12 sc)
Rnds 3-9: Sc in each sc around. (12 sc)
Cut yarn and fasten off.

Cap

Rnd 1: Using color B, make 6 sc into magic adjustable ring.
Rnd 2: 2 sc in each sc around. (12 sc)
Rnd 3: *Sc in next sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (18 sc)
Rnds 4-5: Sc in each sc around. (18 sc)
Rnd 6: *Sc in next 2 sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (24 sc)
Rnd 7: *Sc in next 3 sc, 2 sc in next sc: repeat from * around. (30 sc)
Rnd 8: *Sc in next 4 sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (36 sc)
Rnd 9: *Sc in next 5 sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (42 sc)
Rnd 10: *Sc in next 6 sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (48 sc)
Rnd 11: *Sc in next 7 sc, 2 sc in next sc; repeat from * around. (54 sc)
Rnd 12: *Sc in next 7 sc, sc2tog over next 2 sc; repeat from * around. (48 sc)
Rnd 13: *Sc in next 4 sc, sc2tog over next 2 sc; repeat from * around. (40 sc)
Rnd 14: *Sc in next 3 sc, sc2tog over next 2 sc; repeat from * around. (32 sc)
Rnd 15: Sc2tog around. (16 sc)
Rnd 16: *Sc in next 2 sc; sc2tog over next 2 sc; repeat from * around. (12 sc)
Cut yarn and fasten off.

If you would like a face on your mushroom, embroider it now with the contrasting yarn.
Stuff cap and stem with fiberfill and whip stitch together.

Two New Colorways On Etsy

I've listed two new colorways on Etsy in the past week.

Honah Lee:

and Superhoney:

These can be done on any of my base yarns just like all my other colorways, so if you want something in a different yarn, please just let me know. I am currently trying to decide on new yarn bases, so these will be changing shortly. And I think I'm going to pare down to only 3 or 4 different ones--for now at least.

In vaguely related info, I recently bought Photoshop Elements to try to make my pictures better. I have been using iPhoto, which has worked fairly well, but I'm starting to feel like it's not quite good enough. I haven't quite figured out Photoshop Elements, so if anyone has any advice for me, I'd really appreciate it. My main problem is that the colors on my photos often don't turn out properly. I am already using a (homemade) lightbox, so the only thing I can think of is to fix the pictures in editing. And even with Elements, that seems to be much harder than I had anticipated.

Sadly Neglected Blog

I have been neglecting this blog as of late and I sincerely apologize to those of you who read it. I have lots to post about, so I will be trying to be a little more regular about it.

For today, I'm just going to give you a photo of a recently finished baby blanket.



I made it for Chris's new nephew, who is due in just a few weeks. It's made from Bernat Cottontots using this pattern. I made a ripple from Cottontots for this baby's brother and wanted to make a similar (but not exactly the same) blanket for him. So this is what I decided to make. I'm pretty happy with it.

More Knitting

I have been doing lots of knitting lately, so I decided it was time to tackle mittens. After a few false starts (I didn't like the way the original yarn was working up and then the mittens were way too small), I managed to make myself a serviceable pair of mittens.



I made them from a pattern I found on Ravelry (how did I ever live before Ravelry?) called Warmest Mittens and my hand dyed yarn. (I added a few rounds to the hand and the thumb to make them longer and now the thumbs are too long--whoops.) When I picked up stitches for the thumb, I made fairly large holes, but I think I sewed them up pretty well. I wouldn't give the mittens as a gift, but they're definitely wearable.

I also discovered while making these that I really like working with double pointed needles. Odd. I had only used them in the past to finish hats worked mostly on circular needles and I thought I hated them. I had been avoiding patterns using them and while I really want to learn to knit socks, I was afraid to try them--mostly because of the DPNs. But now I think I'm ready for socks. We'll see.

I love wearing mittens that I made--I think I'm more excited about these than I have been about anything I've made so far. I'm not really sure why that is except that maybe I thought mittens would be too hard for me.

Yoshimi Colorway

Yesterday I listed a new colorway in my Etsy shop. It's called Yoshimi. I think I may make myself something out of it and I don't even like pink. (At least, I didn't used to like pink--I think it may be starting to grow on me again.)