Dyeing for Vacation Bible School

Earlier this summer, our church had a wonderful (as usual) Vacation Bible School with the theme of Nazereth.  For the second year in a row, I have been asked to be in charge of one of the booths and it's craft.  Last year our theme was Egypt and my booth was the embalming booth.  We talked about the job of making a mummy and we talked about the scarab which was placed over the heart during the wrapping process.  Each child then got to make a polymer clay scarab using molds that I made.  This year my booth's theme was natural dyeing and our craft was to let each child dye a small muslin bag.  Embalming and dyeing.  I wondering what they will have me doing next year.

I really enjoyed researching natural dyeing processes.  I dyed some knitting wool a few years ago using natural dyes and I also have a good bit of experience dying wools with acid dyes, Kool Aid and Easter Egg Dyes.  But we were going to be dyeing 100% cotton.  I really wanted the children to be able to dye with natural dyes but after making some samples, I realized that in most cases, the fibers have to sit in the dye bath for at least an hour or longer.  But there was one natural dye that worked perfectly and I loved working with it - Indigo!  I found an Indigo Dye Kit at JoAnn's and gave it a try.  It has a long history and indigo dyed fabric has even been found in some Egyptian tombs so I know that it would have been available in Nazareth during the time of Jesus.  The best part about using the indigo is that the dye chemically bonds to the fibers as soon as it is lifted from the water with no long soaking times.

 My daughter and I dyed some long pieces of muslin for our costumes and we tye-dyed as many different white shirts as we could find in our closets. 

Tye-dyed shirts fresh from the indigo vat.

Natural dyes (left to right):  Turmeric, coffee, red cabbage, yellow and red onion skins.  Also, an Indgo plant (in green pot)

 

 We needed a few more colors for our dye booth and had to resort to some synthetic dyes (fiber reactive dyes) from a tye-dye kit that I had.  These fiber reactive dyes gave instant results but I had to wait several hours before rinsing them.  So I took the bags home with me, rinsed them in soapy water the next morning and let them dry before returning them to the children the next night at VBS.

Different Lines, Cicadas and Bullfrogs

We've been very busy with the end of the school year for my children, swim team practices and meets, summer camps, helping with Vacation Bible School and now we are getting ready to head out to church camp where I will be in charge of a couple of great camp crafts. 

Of course I have been knitting when ever I have any spare time.

I finished a beautiful and unusual shawl called Different Lines.  I saw it a few weeks back on the Ravelry "New and Popular" section and got sucked in.  I love looking at this section to see what other people are knitting and I find myself quite often starting a new project that I didn't know I needed to do.  I love the contrasting stripes and the unusual construction (with short rows) of this shawl.  I looked in my stash and found two very different yarns that I would have never put together (Araucania Lonco and Schafer's Susan).  But they were both 100% cotton and it turns out that they look great together.  I love the feel and drape of the cotton.  I hope to use it a lot this summer in the too cold, air conditioned buildings.

My mom's birthday was a couple of weeks ago and I knitted her some oven mitts and dish clothes. 

I have a set of these oven mitts and just love them.  They are from Mason Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines and are called Toto the Extremely Useful and Cute Potholder.  The Ball Band dishcloths are also from Mason Dixon and the striped dishcloth is Grandmother's Favorite.  You can never have too many dishcloths!

And I made some great polymer clay teacher's gifts for my children's teachers.  

And now for some wild life.  Cicadas!

 We have been experiencing the 13 year Cicada's in our area.  I somehow missed these growing up, even though I grew up in this area.  So this was my first real experience with them.  They lasted about a month and really made a lot of noise. They weren't too bad at our house but we found them in abundance all around the area.

And here is what they look like as they emerge from their exoskeletons.  Really creepy and really cool all at the same time!

And this is the little frog that my daughter raised from a tadpole.  He's a bullfrog and we bought him from our local fish store.  Both of my children have 10 gallon tanks so they each got one and my sons promptly died but we really enjoyed watching this little guy slowly grow his back legs and then very quickly grow his front legs and begin swimming to the top of the tank for air.  The whole process took several months.  We moved him to a smaller habitat and his little tail shrank in just a couple of days. 

We let him go in our neighborhood pond - all covered with duck weed.

And I'm sure he will live a long and happy life.

High Meadow Alpaca Farm

My daughter and I had a wonderful visit to High Meadow Alpaca Farm last Saturday. 

They were having an open house and I jumped at the chance to visit.  I first learned about this local farm at the Franklin Farmer's Market a couple of years ago when I bought some yarn from their small booth.  I knitted the two precious skeins of creamy white and silky smooth alpaca into a cowl but decided that it wasn't a good enough use of the yarn.  So, I'm still waiting to find the perfect project to do it justice.

After my daughter's last soccer game of the season, we drove a few miles through the beautiful countryside to the farm.  We came around a bend in the very bendy road and there they were in the most idealistic setting possible.

The farm has about 400 alpaca divided amongst several fields.  And the fields were covered with tiny yellow flowers just adding to the beautiful seen.  The animals were sheared recently and it was nearing the end of "lambing" season, which I'm sure is not the correct word for alpaca.  But it gets the meaning across.  In fact there were two babies born just before they opened which was perfect timing for the lucky visitors.

This little guy looked just like Bambi.  The mothers were so calm and they sat there making the most lovely humming sound. 

We walked into the field that held the many mammas and their babies.  They didn't seem to mind all of the strangers but didn't let us get close enough to pet them either.  One of the curious babies did come up to me and nibble at my pant leg and sniff the bag of alpaca roving that I bought.

This little girl appears to be named "Nicole Kidman".  How funny is that.  I didn't even notice it until I looked at my pictures.  And then I realized that the real Nicole is probably a close neighbor of theirs.  This idealic little hamlet is a favorite location for country music stars.  I heard one of the farm hands telling someone that Tim McGraw's farm is nearby.  In fact, my daughter's 4th grade class (two years ago) did a two day 28 mile walk along the Natchez Trace and we started our walk near Tim's farm.  One of my friends is a long time band member and was on the walk with his son so that's how we knew it was Tim's farm. 

 We had such a great visit.

Well, I have started two new shawls.  The first is a triangle shawl out of Rowan Denim and Elann's Den-M-Nit indigo dyed cotton yarns.  I love this yarn and gathered up all of my bits and pieces and I hope to use it all for this shawl.  I made a similar shawl last year and just loved it but a friend talked me out of it.  She traded me some beautiful polymer clay jewelry that she made so it was a good trade.  But I knew I needed to make another one for myself.

And this shawl is called Different Lines.  I saw it on the "New and Popular" list on Ravelry and got sucked in (which happens to me quite often).  I bought the pattern, searched through my stash and found two very unlikely skeins of cotton that turned out to work great together (Araucania Lonco Multy and Schaffer Yarn Company's Susan).

I love the unusual shape, and the short-row stripes.  And the cotton yarns feel so good and drapey and I know this will be a perfect summer wrap.

And last week was my son's 10th birthday.  So happy birthday Ethan!

Log Cabin and Shetland Shorty

I finished my Lob Cabin blanket. 

It turned out great. 

Details:

Pattern:  Log Cabin Blanket inspired by Mason Dixon Knitting
Yarn: Plymouth Yarn Fantasy Naturale (100% Cotton)
Needles:  size 8
Size: 7 inch squares.  4 x 6 = 24 squares.    28 x 42 inches
Edging: 5 stitch applied I-cord

The recipient will be my 80 year old Mother-in-law who always seems to be cold.  And how lucky for me that Mother's Day is this Sunday.  So, this will make a wonderful Mother's Day gift for her.  My mother was visiting recently and I showed her the almost finished blanket and explained who it was for and why.  Her response was "Well, I get cold too."  So we will have to remedy that!


I also recently finished a pretty little cover up for my 12 year old daughter. 

It is the Shetland Shorty from Knitty.com.  I used some beautiful yarn from Knit Picks.  I love their yarns and needles.  This will be a great cover up and should hopefully fit her for many years to come. 


And I just cast on for the last of 24 squares for my Barn Raising blanket.  So, I will start sewing them together soon.  This is an early Christmas present and I never get gifts done this early so that makes me happy.

Happy Easter

I happen to know that these cute little Chubby Chirps are planning on sneaking into my children's Easter baskets tomorrow morning.  They turned out so cute and were quick to knit.  I used sock yarn so that they would be small.  In fact I'd say they are Easter egg sized.  I filled them with lentils (and topped them off with fiber fill) to give them some weight and help them stand on their own. 

I used some of the polymer clay button eyes that I made last week for my "Oink".  I especially love the blue eyes.  They look so real and are perfect for this little guy.
I made the polymer clay covered eggs several years ago and I just love them.  A few are even made by my children.  The silver and green one under the blue eyed chirp was made by my daughter from metallic clay just squashed onto the egg and smoothed (and then sanded and buffed by me).  The mica in the clay gives it wonderful color shifts in the light.  These are made over blown out hen eggs.  Polymer Clay Daily had a post this week about some of the most beautiful clay eggs I have ever seen! 

And these eggs are perfect for darning socks!

I finished knitting my log cabin squares!  I decided to do 4 x 6 = 24 squares.  Each one took a little over 1 1/2 hours to complete.  I've started to sew them together and decided to use mattress stitch which is working great.  I can use any color to seam them and it doesn't show.  I plan to do an applied I-cord edging in white.

We have two soccer games this morning and then a neighborhood Easter egg hunt this afternoon.  My daughter's Sunday school class is having a flash light Easter egg hunt tomorrow night.  Sounds like fun! 

Have a great Easter. 

Oink

I just finished a cute new toy pattern called "Oink".

It is a free pattern from Spud & Chloe written by Susan B. Anderson.  I have knitted several of Susan's patterns and just love them so I knew right away that I needed to make this one.  He turned out so cute.  He has a "Pinky" high bounce ball in his tummy so that adds some nice weight to him and some bounce if he gets tossed.  I was able to knit him in just a couple of hours while watching a movie with my family.  Embroidering the face always intimidates me.  I'm not sure why because it always turns out OK but the eyes really give an animal it's character.  I guess I don't want to make my sweet little creation look angry or sad.  So, as I do quite often, I decided to make polymer clay button eyes.

I used tiny little button shank blanks (the three little silver things in the center of the tile) and added clay.  White for the back ground (thin white circles are wrapped over the edges to the back of the shank) and two thin slices of a pink bulls eye cane for the eye.  I added a tiny black ball of clay for the center.  The finished "Oink" eyes are in the lower left corner of the tile.  It looked so great that I decided to go ahead and make up a few more pairs of eyes to have on hand for future projects.  I looked through my huge collection of canes and found some great choices. 

I really like the spirals.  They give a little bit of a dizzy appearance.  The blue pair on the top row is from an eye cane so they should look the most realistic.  The flowers will work well too. I used a pair like the orange flowers on my Tiny Turkey I knitted last November (another Susan B. Anderson pattern).

And I am still knitting away on various squares. 

After finishing my first Mitered Crosses square using Noro Silk Garden Sock for the cross and Knit Picks Bare Sock yarn as the back ground, I decided that the finer Knit Picks yarn would make the whole blanket a little too stretchy between the crosses of a finished blanket.  I had a tiny little ball of Silk Garden Sock in the neutral color so I used that on my second square and of course, I just love it.  So, I decided to go ahead and place an order for more.  So, while I'm waiting for that to arrive in the mail, I'm concentrating on my log cabin squares right now.

The current count for the Barn Raising squares is 14.  And the count for the Log Cabin squares is 13.

I helped to proctor for TCAP testing (Tennessee Comprehensive Achievement Program) this week in my children's school so I had at least six hours of uninterrupted knitting time to work on my log cabin squares.  It was great!  Add in a softball game yesterday afternoon and soccer practice this evening and I should make some good progress.  I'm aiming for 18 log cabin squares and then I'll see if that will be big enough for a lap blanket.

More Squares

I've been working away on my log cabin squares.

I decided to continue with the Barn Raising squares too because I really liked them and they are a little more portable then the log cabin squares - 1 skein of yarn vs. 6 skeins of yarn in my knitting bag.  The Barn Raising squares really are addicting.  So much so that I have made twice as many of them then the log cabin squares which I need to finish first.  I have decided that the perfect time to give this to my Mother-in-law is for my husband's birthday on May 5.  After all, he would not be celebrating a birthday if it were not for the labors of his mother! So I really need to start spending more time with those log cabins.

But the Mitered Crosses Blanket gets in the way again. 

Ann (over at Mason Dixon Knitting) has tripped me up with a contest.  They have now sold nearly 2000 copies of their Mitered Crosses Blanket Pattern.  And to encourage more knitters to start their blankets, Ann has put up a wonderful bag of goodies that she actually won from Bliss Yarns which is her local yarn shop.  It is also my local yarn shop so it would be great fun to win!  So I looked through my meager collection of Noro leftovers and found a skein and a half of Noro Silk Garden Sock for the center crosses.  I also had a skein of Knit Picks sock yarn in Bare for the back ground color.  So I have almost finished my first block and it really is a great, fun pattern.  I have uploaded my photo to Ravelry so I am officially entered into the contest. 

My daughter has a softball game after school followed by a soccer practice and then I'm spending the evening attending a Stroke and Turn clinic for the upcoming swim team season.  So that means lots of knitting time!