Knitting Iris

"We come from the mountain, we come from the mountain. Go back to the mountain, turn the world around." -Bill Harley

This is the pair of socks that I knit during the trip to Alaska from the extra skeins of my Dye-o-rama sock yarn.  They were meant to be for a friend's birthday in August except I may have made them too big.  I think the pattern is the Blueberry Waffle Socks since, without having the pattern along with me, I winged it.  Yes, now reading that pattern over, I see that it is.  I spent much of the flight time knitting and since the pattern was simple, I was able to knit in the car and still see the scenery.  They would not have been finished so quickly if we hadn't come across the sign above when we reached the trailhead from where we were planning to hike one day.  It read:

caution: recent bear sightings in area.  7/8 Black Bear.  7/9 AGAIN VERY AGRESSIVE BLACK BEAR - STALKING GROUP OF SIX - MULTIPLE CHARGES!  DON'T GO!!  NOT KIDDING

We were there reading this on 7/10.  After already a few hours of driving to see the cabin that C's friend is building in Chickaloon, we were looking forward to getting out and stretching our legs, so it was disappointing to find this sign.

If we had gone on the hike, however, we would not have driven further up the road to this beautiful mountain valley where you can still find remnants of the Archangel Mine (click to see the tiny shack dwarfed by this expansive valley).  I can barely imagine the hardiness of the people who lived here and worked that mine.  This was the place I wrote about the other day as being almost too much to experience without aching just for being there, one where I had to grit my jaw just to keep the tears from coming, even when I think of it now.  The flowers and the lichen covered boulders and sharp mountain ridges were like nothing I can remember seeing before, and yet this kind of landscape is one that speaks to me like no other.  This was similar to the kinds of rugged places my parents brought us to as children, including Princess Louisa Inlet in Canada, Glacier National Park, only about 20 miles as the bird flies from where I live now, and the glacial valley of Jostedalen where my grandmother was born and raised, the landscape of my Nordic anscestors.  When I left Seattle the first time, I headed straight for a 9,000 foot valley up in the mountains of Colorado.  These places live thick in my blood, my experiences, my memories.

I could have stayed there all day and all night just watching the shadows and the light change as the clouds blew by and the sun dipped out of the sky for just the short time that it did there at night this time of year.  I regret not getting to hike deeper into those mountians but, like I said, I wouldn't have gotten as much knitting time in if we had gone on that hike and besides, we wanted to return alive to those two little boys back home.

And thank goodness I finished up those socks because I found the motherlode of sock yarn waiting for me when we returned back home!  I had actually forgotten this was coming until I saw it in the mailbox and read the label on the package.  It was ordered from Shelley at Fun Knits on Quadra Island in British Columbia, not really all that far from Princess Louisa Inlet, by the way.  The shipping cost are quite low and the prices are good, especially if you shop her ebay auctions.  The Lorna's Laces at the top is in the Fun Knits colorway, the other three are Opal Prisma #1197 and Regia Canadian Collection #4732 Toronto and #4733 Ottawa.   She threw in one of these little 10 gram balls of Opal yarn with my order (see the July 5th post of her blog). After the second Trekking pair I'm working on right now for the Trek Along, the orange Opal will be knit up next, a pair of socks requested by my mother for the friend she went skiing and hiking with in Yellowstone this winter and spring.

Shannon's Wedding Yarn

What do you use as a bow on a wedding present for a person who, on her wedding website, describes herself first and foremost as a knitter?  Hand-dyed sock yarn in her wedding colors of course!  Greens and browns.  The boys and I drove up into the woods the other day to collect some evergreen boughs for them to decorate with, too.  I've been planning this for awhile but of course I waited until the very last night before the wedding to start dyeing this yarn with some of the leftovers from my Dye-o-rama Swap dyes:  Pro Chemical Washfast Acid Dyes in Evergreen, Moss, Golden Pear, and Mocha Chino on Elann Sock-It-To-Me Essential 4 ply, 75% Superwash Wool/25% Polyamide.   Luckily it's hot enough now for it to have dried overnight!

Shannon, I guess you've found someone to Heart even more than yarn. I wish you and S all the best together!  We are so lucky to have you two and your family in our lives!  We've had a great time this week finally meeting some of your friends, your brother, and the rest of your extended families.  Thank you for including us in all the fun.

Dye-o-rama Drama

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It was getting down to the wire for the Dye-o-rama Swap.  They're due in the mail by June 12th.  The rain had stopped for the moment.  The yarn was skeined.  The dyes had arrived.  Last night was the time.  I changed into and old shirt and overalls.  Who needs a fancy apron when you've got (apparently now out of fashion) a pair of bibs? 

Setting everything up outside, I started the water to boil on the Coleman stove and then went upstairs to read to E before bedtime.  Next thing I knew, C was waking me up saying, "Uh.  You have something cooking on the stove outside."  Bleary, I dragged myself downstairs and out the door.  It was after 9:oo pm but still light outside.  I mixed about a teaspoon and a half of each dye with a teaspoon of synthrapol, 3 teaspoons of citric acid crystals, and a little over 1 cup of boiling water.  Working quickly and without much of a plan,  I started dropping dyes on different sections of each skein, pushing the dye into the skein with my gloved hand, making sure it saturated all through the skein.  By the time I got to the second skein, it was now quite dark and although not ideal, I could just see well enough to work.   

Moving the dyepot inside to the kitchen stove so I could see what was going on, I left the doors open for ventilation, wrapped each skein in Glad Wrap and steamed each one separately for about an hour.  When I first unwrapped them, I had thought that all the colors had run together into a dark purplish hue.  I let them cool in the sink and then rinsed and washed each one.  Only the smalles amount of red washed out in the water.  The lighting in the house was only so-so too but they looked at least a bit better by the time I hung them to dry.  I thought for certain that I'd be starting all over again tonight after the boys were in bed again. 

This morning they were still damp so I hung them up in the shade outside to dry.  It wasn't long before the skeins dried and brightened up.  The pictures above are close but a slightly brighter than the true colors.  They're still a bit oversaturated, I'd say, but they actually follow the preferences of my Dye-o-rama pal fairly well.  They remind me a bit lighter version of Mountain Colors which, afterall, is a Montana company.   Too bad I don't live close enough or maybe I could get a job.  Just think how much I'd learn about dyeing!  After they were fully dry, I wound each 100 gram skein back into the two 50 gram balls that they originally were, then reskeined each 50 gram ball into it's own skein.  WHY DON'T I HAVE A BALL WINDER YET?  Luckily, a friend of ours' thirteen year old daughter who is staying here with her dad for the summer asked to come spend the day with us, so the boys were fully entertained. 

I still am not entirely comfortable with using these chemical dyes around the house, or at all for that matter, but I've got quite a bit of dye left.  I can see myself dyeing up some more skeins with the leftovers to give to knitting friends or to knit up into socks for gifts.  Maybe I'll move the operation over to the shop next time, where there already are chemical finishes in use and so that I'm not directly in our living space.

I am really quite surprised at how well these turned out, considering my doubts along the way.  Oh.  The dyes were Washfast Acid Dyes Kits from ProChemical.  I used all the colors from the Winter Holiday sampler, except I substituted the "Turkey Red" from the Autumn sampler for the "Bright Red".