Almost too successful, part 2

I passed around a sign-up sheet for a rigid heddle weaving study group at both the spinning guild and the weaving guild, plus at the fiber club. Sixteen people signed up. That is a lot. Now I have to organize everyone and everything and find a venue. My vision is the more experienced weavers will help the noobs, but we'll see how that works out.

Knitting: In the homestretch on the second pair of anklets.
Sewing: Finished the weaving class tote, finally.
Spinning: Not quite done with the Polish merino.
Weaving: Stymied by the tension issues on the houndstooth towels. I needed something to demo at the Jay County Fiber Arts and Artisans Fair, so I warped up a houndstooth scarf.

I came down with another cold this past week, but it seems to have departed prematurely (except for feelings of fatigue). I made it to the fair for a couple of hours. I'm glad I went, as I overheard the spinning guild VP mention to a passerby that we were going to be Zooming the meetings. Huh? I had started working on that myself. I am happy she took the initiative, but it would have been nice to be informed about it since I am the president.

At this week's weaving guild, I brought up a couple of things we can do to attract more members, then dropped them in the other members' laps. It would be easy for them to just let me do it all, but I want some buy-in from the rest of the gang. Fortunately, a couple of them stepped up. We have several new members, so that helps demonstrate what I doing as the "outreach coordinator".

Almost too successful

Today's FW Fiber Arts Club was packed with twenty-five attendees. The program was "gathering dye materials for natural dyeing", which may have been part of the draw, but many present were from the local embroidery guild. Everyone listened to what the speakers had to say and asked questions, then afterwards chatted up a storm amongst themselves. On their way out, several thanked me for organizing the group. If the meetings get any larger, we may need to find an alternative place to meet.

Two books I think my library needs:
This past week my SO and I attended an artist talk at a local gallery. The speaker is a member of the weaving guild, but her fiber career has taken off and we rarely see her anymore. One of her areas of expertise is ice dyeing fabric and yarn. (Now I find myself wondering if there is a way to marry ice dyeing and natural dyeing. Something to meditate on.)

Knitting: Turned the heels on the latest anklets.
Sewing: The practice bag is finished.
Spinning: In the homestretch spinning the Polish merino.
Weaving: Tension problems mount on the houndstooth towels, which may become one towel and a placemat.

Something new for you weavers: a tutorial on how to do Italian hemstitch. I haven't tried this yet, but it is on my fiber bucket list.

This past week I met with the doctor who is going to perform cataract surgery on my tired old eyes later this month. It's not critical, but it would be nice to knit black or navy yarn without wearing a headlamp.

Top-down anklets

Sometimes after a day of wearing handknit wool socks, my lower calves itch. Yet I like to wear wool socks to bed in the winter. My solution to this dilemma is to knit some anklets.

Pattern: Short-Row Toe and Heel Basic Socks, by Wendy D. Johnson
Yarn: Some kind of sock yarn I must have dyed at a dyeing workshop of some kind
Needles: US1
Modifications: Knit top-down

Ordinarily, I knit socks toe-up, but for some reason I just could not get this pair going that way. So I knit them top-down. The heels are still short-row, but the toes are simple decreases, ending with the Kitchener stitch.

Since there was no way to make them match, I knit each one from a different end of the yarn cake. For some reason, they are loose, even the ribbing at the top, so they don't stay on very well. But they suffice for their intended use. If I were to try again (and I am), I would knit toe-up and make the tops longer, especially the ribbing.

Dyeing with amaranth

Amaranth is a good news/bad news kind of dye plant. It's easy to grow, but it will reseed itself rampantly. It can dye beautifully, but the color is reputed to be fugitvie. I tried dyeing with it once before, but I could not help giving it another go.

Inspired by this blog post, I used the cold water method again but this time used just the seed heads, leaves, and twigs (no stalkes), soaked in three gallons of undiluted household vinegar. That was on a Sunday.

I let that steep until the following Tuesday, when I strained the liquor and added unmordanted yarn (one skein of Cascade 220). That soaked for two days, I believe. When I rinsed it, not much color bled out.

Another unmordanted skein of Cascade 220 went into the "exhaust" for two days. Not much difference in color.

Then I dyed a skein of Cascade 220 mordanted with rhubarb leaf and a mini-skein of Cascade 220 mordanted with alum in the second exhaust bath. The rhubarb leaf mordanted skein looks a bit dull compared to the others...

... while the alum mordanted one appears brighter.

These colors are all simply luscious! Worried that they might fade, I am storing them in black cloth bags that I keep inside an opaque plastic bin. I have yet to set up a test for colorfastness.

The instructions for a warm water method using alum may be found at this site. If the amaranth reappears this summer, I may give it a try as well.

A fiber-ish week

One of my ideas for gaining new weaving guild members is to demonstrate weaving at the local yarn stores. As I mentioned before, one is closing (and I still think it would make a great fiber club). I visited another one yesterday, Simply Socks, but Allison wasn't there. I eyeballed the space, and quite frankly, there isn't much room for setting up a loom, even a small one. The place is simply full of yarn (minus four skeins that followed me home).

Above are two skeins of Cascade Cotton Sox I plan to weave into a summer-weight shawl. Below is some Madelinetosh Tosh Merino Light + Copper.

If you look closely, you can see the copper glitter. I'm not sure what I will do with this but probably weave it into something. I bought two skeins, so that shoud be enough for something, right?

Knitting: I planned to do about two hours of knitting during an online natural dyeing presentation, but it was canceled at the last minute. Oh, well.
Sewing: Stymied by the tote made from handwoven cloth, I decided the best thing to do would be make a practice one out of regular cloth. This helped me get the directions straight in my head. Neither bag is finished, but I feel more confident going forward.
Spinning: Deligently spinning the Polish merino (at least, I think that is what it is).
Weaving: Still slaving away at the houndstooth towels; one is done. The practice bag needed a handle, so I wove one on the inkle loom, lickety split.

While I was complaining to my SO about the missing supported spindle, I said something like, "I even bought silk roving to spin on it" - and a light bulb went off. I knew *exactly* where the spindle was - with that fiber. And I was right. End of mystery.

Headband in blues

Last summer a vendor at a farmers market was selling (among other things) handknit headbands. They looked like they were knit from worsted (or maybe handspun) yarn and seemed bulky to me. So I went home and started knitting one from some leftover sock yarn.

Pattern: None
Yarn: Unknown sock yarn from an estate sale
Needles: US1

I started with 3-stitch i-cord. After about 9 inches of that, I increased the stitch count at either end of the row using kfb, purling back. Once there were 24 stitches, I switched to knitting in the round. When the middle bit seemed long enough, it was back to flat knitting, decreasing the stitches (k2tog at one end, ssk at the other) every other row, purling back. With only 3 stitches remaining, more i-cord to match the beginning.

The end result is a bit stretchy, so I probably could have made the whole thing shorter. This was an experiment that may or may not be repeated. We'll see if I feel the urge for more.

Melt the ICE hat

I bought the pattern on Ravelry and figured that was what was important, as the money goes to charity. Since I have SABLE (Stash Accumulation Beyond Life Expectancy), I did not want to buy red yarn just for this hat. But when I checked the stash, I found some red yarn. So I knit the hat.

Pattern: Melt the ICE Hat, by Paul S. Neary
Yarn: Cascade 220 Superwash in 893 Ruby
Needles: US8
Modifications: Increased the ribbing from 6 inches to 7

Once I was beyond the 1x1 ribbing, the instructions puzzled me. Instead of decreasing at four places like a beanie, the decreases were in only two places, creating a different shape. I double checked this anomoly with a fiber friend who has knit several of these.

An alternative to the braided tassel could be a fat i-cord, but I like the braid because it is different. Were I to knit this hat again with this yarn, I would shift down a needle size, as it feels a bit loose on me (and I have a big head).