Thermalgal’s Temperate Mumblings

Finished the Dish Cloth

I had to steal this from the sink to get a picture of it, I guess DH likes it!

I also took a picture up against the window so you could see the pattern better…

Next up is to get watercolor paper to test out different colors before I feel up to dyeing the yards of fabric I machine knit for my Ribby Shell.

Oh and other exciting news, I might be going to New Zealand in October. I’m kind of afraid to say much about it in case it falls through. I’ll hopefully know more next month.

Jupiter Abstract

I worked some more on Jupiter Abstract and I really like how it is coming out. Unfortuntely I don’t have features popping out like other designs (look a head, a wing, etc), instead I get look another blob. So, here is yet another blob…

I also worked on the gaudy dish cloth. I started on Thursday and didn’t like the design I picked, so I ripped that out and started another one. That one is going much better. Here is a picture from Saturday morning (or was that Friday night?).

I don’t remember if I mentioned here that I dyed this wrong. My idea was to end up with a rainbow washcloth. Instead I dyed it the wrong direction and got rainbow varigated yarn. Oh well, it will still wash dishes. I got another ten or so rows done this morning while I was waiting in line for my yearly car inspection.

And on the Machine Knitting to Dye for front, I measure out over 700 yards of this cotton for the Ribby Shell and knit it up into the blank on Saturday. I think the blank will sit for a time while I play with smaller blanks to get the colors right.

Setting my plan into motion

I wasn’t able to dye the dishcloth blank until last night. DH was kind enough to buy plastic measure spoons and cups on Monday but didn’t get home until late because of Kendo. Tuesday I have band practice, so last night was my first opportunity. I used some Procion MX dyes that I got at AC Moore and the other bits came from a warp painting kit I bought. I followed the directions I found on Dharma Trading for hand painted cotton yarn. And I turned the fabric blank seen here into this…

I let it sit over night and rinsed it this morning. Since it was cotton and this dishcloth will be going through the laundry, I shoved it into the dryer after I had rinsed out all the dye. I’m going to cast on at lunch today for DH’s new dishcloth!

This is just a test run for my first *real* project. Next step is to measure out close to 700 yards from the big cone of cotton!

Pictures and ProgressPictures and Progress

I got to see my youngest niece in her chicken dress yesterday. But I forgot my camera! Luckily my sister had hers, so we were able to snap this picture of my sister and her baby. I’m very happy because not only did the dress fit perfectly but it passed the “crawl test”.

I also spend some quality time with my knitting machine this weekend. Early Saturday morning, we came to an understanding. I think sleeping on the floor made the EZ Knittr want to mend its ways. In the end, DH helped me set up a table in the basement. It is quite funny to see. We took a folding table, put a big heavy piece of wood on it to give a bigger worktop (and something better to clamp to). It was extremely woobly so we put DH’s throwing dummy on it. But I did manage to create a small blank that I’m going to use to test the procedure. Tonight I’m hoping to dye the blank a rainbow and then I’ll knit a dishcloth from it.

I worked some more on Jupiter Abstract by Character Creations.

Well, the EZ Knittr arrived yesterday

And I didn’t notice until this morning when I started to play with it that it was broken. It is supposed to come with two needle beds that are then bolted together. The box had two needle beds when I opened it. Well, it turns out that it wasn’t actually two pieces unbolted, but actually three pieces two of which were bolted together. Or unbolted, it looked like this…

I’ve written to the seller since it was sold in Used condition and ready to knit (some assembly required). I’m going to buy some good glue tonight and see if I can fix it. I don’t want to return this for a refund, it was only $20 plus shipping. But I am pissed that the fact that it was broken and useless wasn’t noted in the Ebay listing.

Okay, maybe not exactly useless… I did manage to figure out how it works and knitted for a little bit. But it was annoying since I only had one clamp on the left side.

But now I stink like cigarette smoke from the thing.