Ravellenic Games 2014 Report: Day 5

Wednesday I was home from work and determined to 1. get some quick Ravellenic Games projects done and 2. watch a lot of Olympic coverage.

Well check and check.

First I tackled this sweater:

It's cotton and a really great bright kelly green colour (in case that's not apparent). I think it will be great for some kids items. Long story short:

That's 334 grams/1,530 meters of potential right there.

While I was doing that (and watching Canadian/US womens hockey), I got the next project going. I took this ball of wool/angora mix (the same stuff I used for my Elephant Socks):

and put it on my niddy noddy so that I would have a nice big hank to work with.

I tied it in lots of places (like six) and made sure to not do them too tight this time so that the dye would be able to get to the yarn there. Then a good soak to get the fibers ready for dyeing.

While it was soaking (20 minutes will do it), I mixed the Koolaid colour. I was going for a shamrock green. Looking at the webpage on dyeyouryarn.com (coolest website ever for cataloging all those Koolaid combinations!) I decided I needed a lot of Lemon Lime and a little of blue or orange. I ended up not being able to get the right blue at my local store, so I went with orange.

Here are two jars with three packs of Lemon Lime each:

The one on the left also has one pack of orange. What a difference! And just in case you think it is a trick of the light (which I thought it might be), here they are in reverse positions:

I added the second pack of orange to the left jar before adding it to the yarn. I shake the Koolaid in these jars first so the powder is dissolved and the colour won't clump when it hits the yarn. I wanted a consistent and even colour.

Once the yarn had soaked long enough, it was time to add the colour:

I stirred it around so that it was well distributed, and then brought the pot onto the heat,

In this case, the oil heat stove we run in the kitchen. I added the thermometer because I was curious how hot it was going to get and to be able to tell if it was getting close to boiling territory. After partially felting one of the last batches, I did not want to do that again. (And angora will felt if you look at it wrong, so I wanted to play it careful.)

While it was heating, I did occasionally stir it to make sure that no unevenness developed. (I also switched to a stainless steel spoon to stir because no matter how smooth a wooden spoon feels, it will catch your yarn!) You can see that the above pictures is in the early stages because the yarn still looks pretty white and the water is very green. But by the end the wool is all green and the water is clear:

That's how you know you are done! (Although I did let it simmer about 10 more minutes to "make sure" that the colour was set. Was this necessary? I don't know. Did it hurt? No.) Then I took it off the heat and let it cool on its own. Then dump it out, squeeze out the water, roll it in a towel and squeeze some more and then hang to dry. (I did get to do that "thwacking" thing against the side of the tub again to straighten out the yarn. Very fun.)

When it's dry, you have this:

53 grams of green wool for a future project. (Sorry, no hints!)

Oh let's have one more picture, just because I am enjoying this yarn:

I think I can see a hint of the orange coming through when I look at it. But I don't think it needs an overdye.

While that was finishing up I switched to the Canada/Russia mens curling game and set to work on this:

Once again, long story short:

That's 450 grams/1,470 meters of delightful mustard yellow cotton. ("Tumeric" Troy yells from the other room.) Also good for kids stuff, I think.

Can I tell you how much I love having a "half weekend" in the middle of the week? A lot!!

Games Update, Wednesday, Feb 12:
1. Rainbow Cowl DONE!
2. Rainbow Hat DONE!
3. & 4. Ravel Sweater 1 and Sweater 2 DONE!
5. Dye Green Yarn DONE!
6. Spinning DONE!
7. Woven Band
8. Baby Bib (shower now postponed until Mar 2 from Feb 15, so not quite as urgent)

My list is getting short! Looks like I'll be setting up my woven band on Saturday. Meanwhile, I'm going to get back to watching the women's downhill.