Put a Cork in it (and other learning experiences!)

Hubby left a bowlful of these on the level. (long story, but basically collecting for bro who uses to keep kebabs in place on his Spanek- then he doesn't use them!). I got my kool aid-alike dyes out to finally have a play and they were there, staring (metaphorically) me in the face.

Guess what I did?

Well, I had to see if it worked...



I started a little cautiously, but they seemed to be making interesting marks...

...So I got a bit bolder...



...And ended up with something like this x hours later! The skein at the front (and middle, and back) is the longest ever skein which I had planned to do flame colours for Fawkes socks...before I got carried away cork printing!

It was fun, though, I started with the ballwound Angora that's been waiting to be dyed for months. I squirted dye neat thru the middle then spooned colours round the edges, wrapping them up and leaving for the dye to permeate a while before steaming. You can see one skein in the pic below.

Of course, the flipside of ball dyeing is the soggy skeinwinding in order for it all to dry properly which takes a good hour and a half!



Here are some skeins drying in the shade ( I was too lazy to put them out this morning!) You can still see the cork roundels which I really like and the fact that the colour intensity changes, a paler version on the back. I'm keen to see what this knits up like but lord knows when I'll get the time!

The lesson comes from the longest ever skein which, being clever, I carefully measured and tied at metre length intervals. WRONG!!! Great for marking, but crap for keeping put, out of the soak water it'd tangled up into itself so badly I had a hell of a job seperating it out to dye, an interesting time seperating it again to dry and a longer than average time to ballwind once dry.

That's something I won't do twice!

Still, it's now skeined to an acceptable length, been washed to remove any last dye residue and I will post a pic once it's dry so you can see the difference in colour.

On the knitting front



This is the back of the Blur Sweater, I've just cast on for the front so will get past the hard bits before Group tomorrow. I'm liking the colours, though they aren't my usual thing, but you know what a sucker for variegated yarns I am!



The Fresco top is growing though more slowly. Actually, it's mind-numbingly boring to knit (after the column rib I added to flatten out the bottom), if a stitch slips off the needle it can drop a few rows without a second thought which is a pain BUT it's so simple you can knit it in a darkened cinema ( yup, I finally got to see Harry Potter!), at least until you drop a stitch!

Some of the problem is that it knits up slowly on 4mm needles so you're never as far on as you think- black hole knitting?



I managed to snap this one of Floppy in his "other bed". He dragged a blanket from one of the beds and arranged it on the top stair, well, it was probably uncomfortable to lie on the wood after he chewed that square of carpet...twice. We will recarpet eventually, once we know he's well out of the chewing phase!