A Kitty Dream Come True

During a recent attempt to reorganize my stash (we'll talk about that soon), I covered our queen-size bed in yarn, then wandered off, as I'm prone to do.



I came back to find our little Iggy beside himself with glee, relaxing on a bed of yarn.



Smokey joined him later, and the two of them spent many blissful hours living the dream.



Not surprisingly, they honed right in on the very dearest part of my stash, concentrating themselves among the sock yarn and laceweight. These cats have good taste.

(More photos in Eric's Flickr set of cats)

Practically knitting

Lately I have been all about the KALs and fun projects: Sockdowns, Sexy Knitters Club, Knitting 19th Century Novels, Summer of Socks... and then for my own diversions, scarves, design projects, and lots of frivolity.

While these are a great time and I really enjoy the process, I'm not sure that what I'm producing is as, well, practical, as it could be. I should say that I don't think knitting has to be practical, nor that it should. However, I have some goals that I set for myself this year, and to this end, I'm not reaching them.

For example, I want to seriously reduce my stash. We're going to be moving at the end of the summer, and my mother has offered to refinish a gorgeous glass-doored secretary desk that I want to use for yarn, needle, and pattern storage. Unfortunately at this point, my stash couldn't possibly fit, and it's more than a little unwieldy.

I decided that primarily I want to knit up the acrylic portion of my stash, and I have made some progress with that, but really nowhere near enough. If all I'm casting on lately are luxurious socks and little lacy items, I'm never going to get to those big hunks of Caron One Pound lurking in a suitcase.

The other thing is that my wardrobe is in serious need of certain basic items. I know that I could just buy them and spend all my knitting time on other projects, but part of why I started knitting is so that I could make exactly what I want, the way I want it, to my measurements.

So from this point onward, I am trying to be realistic and casting on sensible projects as much as I can. They're not going to be boring and utilitarian - rather, still fun and exciting - but they're going to use up my stash, fill gaps in my wardrobe, and be worn more than once.

I'm going to continue with the KALs I have in progress, but I'm going to try for more practical, wearable knits within these contexts.

Phew. I guess I just had to put that out there for myself.

I've got this thing for green...

I have jokingly said before that this blog could more accurately be called "Vickilicious Knits Green Socks," and umm, I'm doing little to change that fact.



These are Brigit socks (Ravelry link) by the late Gigi Silva, aka Momma Monkey. I'm going to rearrange the motifs to be centered on the foot.

Because I'm a little worn out on cabling, though, I also cast on Eleanor socks (Ravelry link), also by Gigi Silva, in Dream in Color Smooshy, Good Luck Jade.



This yarn is absolutely heavenly, and the subtle modulations in color are fantastic.



I'm knitting them toe-up, and I'm planning to make the eyelets mirror images of one another on each foot. I have a feeling these are going to become very well loved socks.

But wait! I don't just knit green socks!



Heh, I knit green tops too.

FO - Spring Twists Socks

This afternoon I finished my Spring Twists socks.



I'm more than a little charmed.



Pattern: Spring Twists (Ravelry link) by Jeanie Townsend, through the Townsend Socks KnitAlong Group on Yahoo
Size: lady's size 9 with 9-inch foot circumference and 9.5-inch foot length
Yarn: Jaeger Siena 4-ply fingering weight, color 431 Sage, 100% mercerized cotton; I used two 50-gram balls and 26 grams of a third, totaling approximately 126 grams/4.4 oz or 386 yards/353 meters.
Needles: Knit Picks 6" nickel-plated double-pointed needles, set of 5 size 2 (2.75 mm)
Modifications: Worked toe-up, with short row heel

Started: April 3, 2008*
Finished: May 23, 2008

* - I actually started these with a different yarn on bamboo needles, then restarted on metal needles on April 24th, then a third time with the current yarn and needle configuration on April 25th.



Confession: In my haste to catch the afternoon sunlight, I may not have woven in my ends. These will look a lot neater at the top once I've done so.



I'm really glad I decided to switch yarns. My original yarn, while delectable and beautiful, just wasn't holding the stitches strongly enough to make it worthwhile. While they may look complex, these socks are essentially 1x2 ribbing, with 4-stitch cables every fourth row.



This was my first time cabling in socks, and I must admit, it wasn't exactly love at first twist. It involved a lot of grumbling, dropped needles, and expletives.

You start with four stitches in a row on the left needle, which we'll call ABCD, with A and D being knit stitches and B and C purls. You manuever them in such a way that once they've been worked, they "read" DBCA on the right-hand needle.



The instructions for the twist involved slipping them onto a cable needle, then moving them back one at a time to be worked. I found the cables became infinitely more bearable once I started rearranging the stitches on a DPN all at once, then purling and knitting straight across. It achieved the same result, but faster and a lot more easily, which made me much happier.

My boyfriend Eric helped me make this video to demonstrate what I'm describing:




(The song is an Aphex Twin remix of Nav Katze "Change.")

Yes, I really do knit that slowly. I got a little clumsy while transferring the purl stitches, but I hope you can get the gist of it.

Here, you move the first three stitches to the DPN, knit the last stitch (A), transfer the first knit stitch (D) from one end of the DPN, spin it around, and transfer stitches C and B from the other end. Then you purl B, C, and knit D. I have to say, I really enjoyed the propeller-like twirling of my DPN in the back of the stitches.



This yarn is not generally used for socks, rather for fine-gauge summer garments and accessories. It is highly inelastic and hurt my hands if I did too many cables or pulled too tightly. When knit at a tight, sock-appropriate gauge, the yarn is thick and durable, while still nice to use.

The comfort of the finished socks is out of this world. They breathe fantastically and feel wonderful on my feet. These socks do have a slight tendency to slouch if you dance around in them (as I was doing), but I think that could be controlled by choice of pattern and cuff length. I would say this is a gamble that paid off, and I'm glad for that as I have three other colors of this yarn in my stash, all intended for socks.



Cotton socks seem to be thicker than their wool counterparts, and I imagine the same qualities which give great stitch and cable definition also make them firmer and denser than a stretchier fiber.



The pattern as written is clear and easy to understand. I modified it to work these socks toe-up with a figure-8 cast-on, increased to 64 stitches around. I carried the pattern up the foot, turned upside-down, such that I worked three rows of ribbing, then a twist row.



I used a short-row heel from my standard formula. In this case, my heels were worked over 32 stitches, and I worked the short rows until I had 10 stitches on each side and 12 in the middle. Because I started my heel at a logical break in the pattern (just after the fourth twist on the second double-twist motif), it was easy to resume the ribbing and twists straight out of the heel.



I was pleasantly surprised by the lozenges that formed between the twists when I stretched the sock over my foot for the first time. When I was selecting this sock for the Sock Knitters Anonymous Sockdown, I didn't have a lot of finished socks for comparison, and there were none that showed the sock on the feet. I think I would have been disappointed if they came out the way I was expecting, as I seriously love the organic movement of these swooping curves which travel into twists.



I would recommend this pattern for patient, somewhat experienced sock knitters. There is nothing particularly difficult about it, but the amount of the socks which are purled, combined with the possible complexities of cabling, make it slightly more difficult than your average stockinette-based sock.

As for me, I am onto something simpler, I think, for my next project...

Previous Entries on this Project:
- Switcheroo
- More Socks on the Needles

FO - Kaffe Fassett Toe-Up Socks

I decided it was time to finish my toe-up Kaffe Fassett socks.



I am so, so happy I did.



Pattern: Universal Toe-Up Sock Formula by Amy Swenson in the summer 2006 Knitty
Size: custom fit to a lady's size 9 with 9-inch foot circumference and 9.5-inch foot length
Yarn: Regia Design Line Kaffe Fassett 4-ply fingering weight, color 4261 Landscape Caribbean, 75% wool 25% polyamide; I used every inch of two 50 g/1.76 oz skeins, totaling approximately 460 yd/420 m.
Needles: Knit Picks 6" nickel-plated double-pointed needles, set of 5 size 1.5 (2.5 mm)
Modifications: None, as they were custom fit to my feet.

Started: December 3, 2007*
Finished: May 8, 2008

* - I put these socks on hold several times. I finished the first sock January 2, 2008, but did not cast on the second until March 8, 2008.



These were the third pair of socks I started, but they've become the sixth pair I've finished. I can actually see some differences in technique between the two, especially in the heels. It feels really good to know I've become so much more comfortable with sock-knitting in just a few months.



My speed also picked up dramatically. I knit the second sock from about an inch before the heel upward in two evenings. When I think how long I spent slowly eking out rows on the first sock, this is really gratifying.



I've raved about how much I love this pattern before, and I still highly recommend it. I now prefer a figure-8 cast-on to the short-row toe in this pattern, though it's not the short rows themselves. My issue is purely to do with unpicking the provisional cast-on, which I never seem to do quickly or efficiently.

The condensed technical details for these socks were:

A = gauge of 8 stitches/inch
B = 8.5 inch long cuff
C = 72 stitches around
D = 36 stitches for the toes and heels
E = 14 stitches in the middle of the short rows (11 stitches at each side)

These socks are really all about the yarn, which I adore beyond sense or reason. The colors are so intensely saturated and vibrant, with such interesting combinations of hues and spacing in the stripe pattern. Kaffe Fassett is truly a genius with color, and this self-striping yarn showcases his talents in a streamlined, effortless way.



I decided a plain stockinette sock was the only way I'd be happy. I switched to 2x2 ribbing where my calves needed more room, and I kept on knitting until I had about two inches of yarn left on the first sock. While I'm glad I used every last inch of this yarn, it did cause some problems in trying to match the second sock up to the first.



I am, admittedly, more than a little obsessive about my stripes matching, but I think I can live with the ribbing not matching. I cobbled together scraps to recreate the stripe pattern up to that point, but I ran out of yarn and had to finish with a completely different yarn. I think that unless you're really closely examining these socks (or I just told you all about it), this isn't the kind of thing anyone would notice, and it doesn't really spoil the effect for me. In a way it's kind of nice because I will always know which sock is my right and which is my left.

(I also know that up to that point, they are perfectly, row-for-row matched.)



This was a very satisfying, meditative project, mostly worked while reading or on public transit, but it remained interesting and fun because I loved watching the stripes change and new color combinations appear.



I definitely want to try other colors of this yarn. I think it makes just plain spectacular-looking socks.

Previous Entries on this Project:
- More Socks on the Needles

Summer of Socks? Yes please!

A few years ago my mother and I were talking about how we each have rather embarrassingly large shoe collections. Neither of us go shopping very often (since I started grad school, I'd amend this to hardly ever), and we're not big fashionistas in any appreciable sense of the word. But we both just have this thing for shoes. Shoes of all shapes and styles, multiple colors of the same model, closets full of shoes.

We reasoned that shoes always make us feel good because our feet don't change sizes if we're stressed or retaining water. Our feet don't bulge or gap buttons if we're wearing the wrong undergarments. And our feet are (if I dare say so myself) rather attractive.



It follows, then, that my love of shoes should also be reflected in the recent emphasis (obsession?) I've placed on sock-knitting. I do have a huge amount of sweaters, blouses, and other projects in my queue, which I do plan to continue, but I am consistently, thoroughly satisfied by sock-knitting, and it tends to feel like the perfect project, all the time.



When I came across mentions of the Summer of Socks over at Zarzuela Knits and Crochets, of course I had to sign up.



I know I am going to knit at least a pair of socks every month for my personal goals and Sock Knitters Anonymous Sockdowns. I also have some sock projects planned for other KALs which I hope to cast on soon.

And while I neglected to take any knitting with me to Italy last summer (what was I thinking?!), socks are portable enough that I'm sure I can bring them on my travels this year. Summer of socks, here we go!

Natural Dyeing

If you didn't guess from my previous hints, this weekend I ventured into yarn dyeing, more specifically dyeing from natural sources.



This semester I was taking a class called the Chemistry of Artists' Materials, Techniques & Conservation, where we studied historical methods and materials, as well as the chemical and conservation issues they present. In a unit to do with organic materials in art, we learned about the chemistry of dyes and inks, and I was utterly fascinated.

For my final project and paper, I decided to expand on a natural dyeing lab with my own project and additional research (in class, we dyed multifiber strips with madder, weld, cochineal, and had an unsuccessful attempt with indigo, then compared alum, iron, and no mordant for shifts in color - you can see photos and brief notes from that here).

I decided on a standard method, since this was a chemistry project, but on hindsight I do wish I'd tailored my recipes to the particular dyes used. I documented the process in perhaps excruciating detail, as I really wanted my results to be unambiguous and repeatable. All of these pictures enlarge considerably.



I began with two 100-gram skeins of 4-ply fingering weight undyed 100% Merino wool (Knit Picks Bare). I split this into four 25-gram skeins by weight.



I used the legs of an old piano bench to wind my yarn into skeins, then sectioned and tied them each in four places using figure-8 loops.



They were really cute all dressed up and ready for dyeing.



I thoroughly washed the skeins in a mild dish detergent. After scrubbing, I let them soak for 20 minutes to ensure that they were completely wetted and cleansed. I then rinsed completely.



I prepared a mordant from a recipe by Ida Grae in her book Nature's Colors: Dyes from Plants. I mixed enough to mordant four skeins at a time:

• 1 gallon water
• 1 ounce (28.4 grams) alum
• 1/4 ounce (7.1 grams) cream of tartar

I simmered the yarn and mordant together for two hours at a temperature just below boiling. I kept thinking to myself "Mmm, yarn soup." I allowed the yarn to cool in the mordant bath and soak overnight, at least 12 hours.



Meanwhile, I got to work preparing the dye liquors. For this project the dyestuffs I used were:

• black tea
• spinach mixed with dandelions
• alkanet
• Osage orange
• annatto
• kamala
• sandalwood
• cutch

Part of my research included the backgrounds, history of use, and chemistry of each substance. Specifically, I was interested in OH end groups that allowed for covalent bonding between an alum mordant and the fabric (I have diagrams and all kinds of nerdy stuff on this, which I may post in the future). Apart from the black tea and spinach-dandelion concoction, all of these dyestuffs were purchased through Dharma Trading.

I used equal weights of dyestuff to the amount of yarn being dyed, in this case 25 grams of each product. I simmered each dyestuff with 1 quart (32 oz) water in individual dye pots for one hour.

Here you see the beautiful, colorful brews.


Black tea / Spinach & Dandelions


Alkanet / Osage orange (cooled)


Annatto / Kamala


Sandalwood / Cutch

I let these mixtures cool and sit together overnight, at least 12 hours, to ensure maximum extraction of dye.



I filtered each dye using coffee filters and a kitchen strainer. I saved the remaining pieces on filter paper, with paper toweling and wax paper underneath, set on my windowsill to dry. Supposedly, you can reuse some dyestuffs for weaker, though often still successful dye extractions.

Once I had my clean dye liquors, I was ready to finally get dyeing!

I put one skein of yarn in each dye liquor and made sure it was completely covered in the pot. Here I patted myself on the back for the forethought to measure ahead, as I knew how much dye liquor I'd need to cover a skein of yarn. I got an amazing thrill out of looking at the yarns in their little enamel pots, trying to predict what colors I would get.


Black tea / Spinach & Dandelions


Alkanet / Osage orange


Annatto / Kamala


Sandalwood / Cutch

I simmered the yarns in the dye liquors for one hour at a temperature just below boiling. I let the yarn cool in the dye baths, then steeped the whole situation overnight, in this case eight hours.


(Yarn soup for sale).

I prepared a rinse for each yarn using about a gallon of water and 2-3 ounces of white vinegar. I did all this with a plastic bin in my bathtub, with a plastic tablecloth covering the floor and the door closed to avert cat or boyfriend-related disaster. I wrung out the excess dye from each skein and re-sealed the dye liquor container, again with the intention of reusing the seemingly not-yet-exhausted dyes.



I first did a thorough vinegar rinse in a plastic tub (wearing gloves), squeezing, pressing, and gently agitating the yarn. Once the initial dye bleed seemed to subside, I rinsed the yarns with cool water from the shower, squeezing them and examining the rinse water. I continued rinsing until they ceased bleeding completely, which I hoped meant that the dyes were adequately set and will not bleed in the future.



I hung each skein to air dry with acrylic waste yarn from my towel rack. Once they were completely dry, I was thrilled with the results.

I reskeined each yarn and got to work comparing the colors I achieved with samples from books and wrote the conclusion to my chemistry paper.



I learned so much in my research, and I'd really like to spout on and on about it, but for now let's say I mostly got the results that I expected, with a few pleasant surprises. My Osage orange and annatto were much brighter and more vibrant than I expected, and I think my favorite was the beautiful warm rosy pink from sandalwood.

This yarn was definitely a labor of love, but it was a fascinating project and I hope I did well with the chemistry part of it.

Now, for some gratuitous yarn photos:

BLACK TEA




SPINACH & DANDELIONS



ALKANET



OSAGE ORANGE



ANNATTO



KAMALA



SANDALWOOD



CUTCH




If you may be interested in natural dyeing, in addition to the Ida Grae book I mentioned above (which can be hard to come by if you don't have access to a good library), I would highly recommend the very useful and inspiring book Natural Dyeing by Jackie Crook.

Now that I have the supplies, the method, and an intense curiosity, I think there will be much more dyeing in my future. As for these yarns, well yes, I have a plan for them too...