FO Friday: And they're off!

I may or may not have mentioned that I'm participating in a Fiber Arts Show up in OH.  Well, my hand knits are participating since we had to cancel our trip because of our move.

The Fiber Arts show is being held at the Main Street Gallery in Toronto, OH.  I was introduced to the shop by a fellow knitter friend, who's boyfriend owns the gallery.  Lish grew up with my husband and she found out through my MIL's husband that I am a knitter and the rest is history!  The last several times we've visited OH, I've planned a meet up with her.  We've gone to a yarn store and then last time we did a knit meet up at the gallery!  It was awesome!  She's amazingly creative and doesn't really give herself enough credit for her talent.  I've been pushing her to expand her comfort zone since I met her.  Wish we lived closer so we could hang out more.

When we first started planning this Fiber Art Show, I was planning to be up there for the opening party and the weekend.  As you all know, we found a house and are moving this weekend and need to be out of our house by next Saturday at the very latest.  We also need to be saving every penny for the down payment on the house and all renovations we have planned once we own it.  That meant that any and all unnecessary expenses had to be cancelled and stopped.  The trip was the first thing that got cancelled as much as we were looking forward to seeing family and being at the show.

Back to the topic of FOs, I had a hard time deciding what I wanted to send to display and what I wanted to knit to sell.  At first I was actually contemplating selling a couple of the finished objects I had already knit for myself but then I ended up having a hard time letting them go.  I did look through my stash of handspun and found some amazing things I've spun and decided that I would knit them up into things I could sell.  The picture below shows the items I'm sending to sell.  The top 2 are seed stitch infinity scarfs.  The bottom left is a drop-stitch infinity scarf that was inspired by one of Tinyants FOs.  The bottom left also inspired by tinyant is a buttoned cowl.  These four items will be for sale at the show.

The items that will be on display are the wedding shawl that I knit for my SIL.  I don't have any great pictures of it but here is what I do have.

Then I also sent my wedding shawl(bottom right), a pair of Bellatrix socks I recently finished, and my Spectra scarf(top right)!

My handspun, hand dyed, hand knit Calligraphy Cardigan...The most prized item that I'm sending is only being sent because Lish sort of pressured me into sending it. (She was right to do so) I think this was the hardest to let go even though I'll only be away from it for about a month or 2 it was still sad to put it in the box to ship.  I'm not sure if I have expressed how much I LOVE this thing!  It's the first large item that I have done start to finish!  Before I took it home to wash, block, and ship, I had been wearing it EVERY day at work with occasional trips home for a wash.  Didn't matter if it matched or not, I was wearing it. :)  Lish promised to guard it carefully and also to get it back to me safely.  What is so funny is that I asked her if she had tried it on and she said it was the first thing she did when she opened the box!  She asked me how did I know and I said it would have been the first thing I would have done! :) hehe!

 So, the box has already been shipped and arrived safely to Lish's house.  I'm looking forward to seeing pictures of how it all looks in the gallery and hearing how the show goes!  Hopefully this will be the first of many shows at the gallery and that I get to send more stuff to display.  Lish has also been hoping it inspires more people to learn to knit up there.

If you live near Toronto, OH, please stop by the gallery next weekend to check out my stuff and some of Lish's awesome knits as well!  I know there will be several other artists submitting items to display and sell.  Details of the show can be found on their facebook page.

Happy Knitting!! 

FO: Calligraphy Cardigan

My Calligraphy cardigan has been completed...and worn practically every day possible since!!  And I do not exaggerate that I can't stop wearing this!  It's super comfortable and I feel goes with EVERYTHING...even though it really doesn't but who cares I LOVE IT!   If you are friends with me on most social network sites, you will have already seen these pictures but I wanted to post to my blog as well. 

Pattern: Calligraphy Cardigan by Hannah Fettig
Yarn: Hand spun and hand dyed by me from wool that I purchased from Warren in WI and sent to be processed.

Yes, me and my girl are very silly!! :)

The hand spun yarn was a bit thicker than the called for gauge so with the help of Jasmin from the Knitmore Girls Podcast, I was able to change the numbers proportionally to fit what my gauge was and the fit I feel is perfect!!  I'm not sure I can explain exactly what we did but if anyone wants to know I can do a post about it. Thank you Jasmin for all your help and Congrats again to your family on your beautiful addition G!!

Happy Knitting!!!

My OWL is complete!!!

My Transfiguration OWL is complete!  I spun 1516 yards of DK weight and dyed it all up in 3 months! YAY! I'm so proud of myself!  This is the most yarn I have spun in one go and most I've dyed up.  The spinning isn't perfect and neither is the dyeing but I did it and I can't be more happy with how it came out!  I can't WAIT to cast on the cardigan and wear my handspun, hand dyed, hand knit cardi!

started out as fiber in a box

Turned into lots of yarn

Lots of yarn!

cooling after heat setting the dye

And here it all is!  All pretty and dyed up!

LOVE IT!

I'm so happy with it and I now don't feel so intimidated by spinning for big projects that I might just have to start another project like this because I have other cardigans that need handspun yarn! :)

It has been turned in to the House Cup group and just waiting for it to dry so I can cast on!  However, probably won't cast on until after I finish these socks I'm working on for Carmen and maybe one more gift but it's going to be very hard to resist!!!

Happy Spinning and House Cup!!

Dyeing update, Dish Rag Tag Begins, and the start of a KAL.

So, after some rinsing and drying I really like this fiber. :) It still pretty brown but it came out lovely!! What do you think? I need a name for the color too.
Today for lunch I came home and I had a package waiting for me!!
The Dish Rag Tag began! I am the team captain of the Purls n Paws so I got the box first. The box comes from Emily and she sent some really cute coasters and some candy!
I cast on the dishcloth on the way back to work at a stop light and am about half way done. I better get back to knitting...just have been a bit distracted! I have the box already packed and ready to go out in the morning. I just have to finish up the cloth!

Tomorrow is the first of September and since I've been eyeing this lovely shawl pattern and beautiful Hazel Knits yarn I have in my stash I decided to start a September Shawl KAL! So, here is my stuff all ready to cast on tomorrow!! I couldn't get the camera to work right so your getting two pictures of the same thing. :) The yarn color is better in the first but the rest is better in the 2nd. :)


If you want to join us come over to the Barknknit Podcast Ravelry group and join in the Sept Shawl KAL! You just have to cast on or have already cast on and promise to finish the shawl by Sept 30th!

ok..off to finish the dishcloth! Happy Knitting!

Sunday at Manda's...knitting, spinning, and dyeing oh my!

This weekend has been nice. Saturday, I met up with two of my friends and their kids for breakfast at my favorite place. The food was yummy and the company was nice. The afternoon was spend with Special K. We cleaned the house mostly but we did watch Cobb together.

Today was another fun day. I went over to Manda's for another Fiber Fun day! We had a good time sitting around and spinning and knitting together. We also got some dyeing in. Here are some pictures from Monica's camera of the fibery fun day!

A new friend came to our knit group and joined our Fiber Fun day today. Her name is Shannon and she's from New Jersey. She had never spun before so here I'm trying to giver her a lesson. Bless her heart that she actually learned from me! By the end there she was doing great! I need to learn more how to teach spinning. I'm just glad she seemed like she was having a great time!
Later we dyed some. I brought some BFL to dye up. The colors didn't come out as I was hoping but I like it!! It's a bit camo but I'm thinking if I ply it up with a different color it might look really cool! Even plying it up on its self will be nice too! Here I am preparing the dye.
I did a hot pour dyeing style..which Manda taught me! It's a lot of fun. I picked three colors, olive, brown and something else I can't remember. I think I put to much brown and not enough of the other colors or the other colors were too muted along with the brown that the whole roving kind of looks brown with little spots of other colors. Here's me pouring the dye.Here is my lovely roving! I actually like it a lot more now that I've rinsed it and it's drying. At first I was a bit disappointed but not anymore! ;) I think dyeing is fun because you never know what you're gonna get! Like Chocolate! hahaha
Here's our new friend Shannon...with her two skeins of worsted weight yarn.and here she is dyeing up her yarn in blue, black and red. She did a different style of dying. It was fun too! This is closer to what I first learned.
Well..hope you enjoyed the pictures. This week is going to be a bit hectic but I'm looking forward to it! My dad and step mom get her on Tuesday!! I am very excited to see my dad!

Hope you have a great week!!
Happy Dyeing and Fiber Fun day!

Fun with Dye Night!

Last night after work, I swung by home and let the pups out, fed them and then went over to my sister house. She is having surgery this summer and she wanted us all over for her only to tell us all once. We have a big family so sometimes when big things happen in our lives we end up having to tell the story like a hundred times. I'm with her on this decision to tell us all at once. :) So, we went over and she told us what they are planning to do. She's not sure when the surgery will be but it will hopefully be within the next month.

After her announcement, she decided to make spaghetti and meatballs for the family. My nephew just had his braces tightened so I took him, my niece and cousin's son to Tropical Smoothie to get them a smoothie. We then all ate together sans a couple brother in laws and I headed home.

When I got home I decided I wanted to dye some of the fiber that I cleaned last weekend. Sunday, I'll be heading over to my friend Manda's house and taking over her drum carder for the afternoon. :) I wanted to dye the fiber before I carded this time...so last night I figured was a good night since the fiber would be able to dry before Sunday.

So I first separated the 1.5lbs of fiber into four batches of about 6 oz each.

I then soaked the batches in warm water for a bit while the pots were warming up and I was adding the dyes.

Next I drained the water and rung them out and dropped a batch into each pot. I only have two pots designated for dyeing so I did two batches at a time. My first round I tried to do a purple but put too much blue.I did a red but it came out more pink than red. I like it though.

The second batch I tried two more purples but for some reason the tips of the fiber was dying more reddish and other ends more purple-blue. Here is one sample of the batch. I actually carded this bit even though it was damp and it came out awesome! I'm excited actually!Here are the four batches drying so I can card them up on Sunday!! The first two are on the right and then the purples are on the left. I'll take better pictures on Sunday of them.
I'm so excited to play with them. I can't wait to test out different ways of carding them. I'll probably start with batts of just one color each and then start blending! So much fun! Hope no one else expects to use Manda's drum carder sunday because I'll be using it all afternoon! heheeh :)

Tomorrow I was supposed to be going to the WWKIP day in Tampa but my FIL asked if I wanted to go fishing and since I haven't gone in a really long time...I changed my plans. I hate canceling on people but sometimes it happens.

Happy Friday!!!

edit:I just linked this post to Fiber Arts Blog Carnival. Go check out other posts!

Our first Dyeing experiment!!

So, Sheryl (knitidiot) came over today and we had our first dyeing experiment. We managed to do this all in my kitchen and not make a mess or dye anything but the yarn and fiber!! Yeah!!

So, this past week I've been spinning a bit with my new spindle and I spun up all of this certain color fiber I had. I wasn't a big fan of the color so I figured I'd just over dye it this weekend. The original color was this.

I decided I wanted to over-dye it a nice maroon so I used red, a tad of black and tad of blue. This was the results. I really like it. I did however learned that I need to tie it up a little loser for the dye to get in those spots.

We also kettle dyed some Domestic Wool that I had bought from a friend. I think this came out awesome!! We learned here that we need to make sure the colors get completely mixed before putting in the fiber.

So, this Saturday I woke up to my dogs having pretty much ransacked my poor office, which I usually close when we sleep. And they got into some of the fiber I had bought to dye so we decided we'd use it to play around. It isn't that pretty but the colors came out ok. :) Also a learning experience. :)

In our opinion, we think our first dye job was a success. We have learned and that is what matters. :) You'll have to see where we go from here.

Well, I'm tired now and off to knit and maybe take a nap. Hope you are all well on this weekend.

Happy Knitting, Dyeing, Spinning, and Dog walking!!

Gnat