05.21.07
Counting, Cruising and Color
The count down (once again) has begun. This weekend is the Azalea Festival in Brookings Oregon and Connected by a Thread will be vending with the Web Foot Weavers in the VA Hall accross from the High School. It has only been 3 weeks since our last venue and I should be knitting socks and dying yarn instead of posting a blog.
This weekend was productive though. I received my Mother’s Day/Birthday/Anniversary gift and spend Sunday getting to know the ins and outs of a flat bed knitter. I purchased this piece of equipment to speed up my dying methods. Here is a couple of my first attempts at dying in the same colorway.
The theory here is to knit a flat piece of fabric, wet it and either paint a Impressionist type painting 
on it or dye it by slowly (over 5 minute increments) lower the fabric into the dye pot. What you get is a wave of color starting with the darkest to lightest.
Another trick I learned is to knit together two strands of yarn so after the fabric is dyed your socks will perfectly match. The only problem now is I have to un-knit this fabric and wind it onto a ball winder to then re-wind it onto a cone to knit socks. Sounds easy enough but I only have one ball winder…I may have to wait until my 9 year old ball winder, aka. KT, comes home from school so she can help me.
I’m excited about this method and think the knitter will pay for itself in time. Besides that fact, it is just too darn fun! I think it will help make flat felt very quickly also.
The count down has also started for our vacation in 2008. Yes I did type 2008. My husband’s job requires signing up for vacation 1 year in advance and sometimes this creates problems. Having to decide what you’re going to be doing next year can be a puzzle. But next year we are going to cruise to Mexico. I always wanted to cruise but have been putting it off until the kids get older. I had a reality check this week when I found out a long time friend has been diagnosed with cancer. What does this have to do with a crusie for us? She had always wanted to travel and when they moved out of the area that came a priority in their lives. They’ve been loads of places and it occured to me I need to just dive in and book that cruise while my health allows it. We will be taking a Disney cruise, 7 days to Mexico as I said but there are several things that have to happen first.
1. What is the best time to cruise to Mexico? We are not hot weather folks and I need temperatures in the 80’s.
2. I need to start working on my stamina and physical fitness. I guess that means I’m back to the gym 3 days a week. I refuse to wear a ‘formal’ dress for the captains dinner and look like a sack of potatoes. Don’t even mention a bathing suit.
3. Taning….I will have to start taning 3 months before we go mostly because I look like a boiled chicken. Put me in the sun and I will fry.
5. Budgeting - It has been nice not to worry about a budget, just spending money and not actually keeping track of our budget. But we’ll need about $10,000 for this adventure to do it right so I guess it’s time to get out that spread sheet.
6. The kids have to become much better at swimming….they will need to take lots of swimming lessons. No, I’m not thinking the ship will sink, I want them to be able to learn how to snorkle.
All of the above are very do-able and we’ll start to work toward the cruise in June. Until then it’s strawberry short cake and fries for me!
P.S. Don’t tell JK about this cruise, he is already jealous of his two younger siblings….”we never got to do stuff like that when we were their age!” My answer “We’re retirement age and enjoying our later years, deal with it!”
Pam said,
May 21, 2007 at 9:16 am
I’m glad to hear you’re booking a cruise Lynette! Cruising is awesome and there is so much to do - or NOT do - depending on your mood that particular day.
We all hear that we never know when our lives will change on a dime - reality checks are tough but I’m glad it gave you a jump start to enjoying some of the things you’ve always wanted to do.
Pam
TracyKM said,
June 15, 2007 at 4:44 pm
I like that idea of knitting the blank with two strands, until you mention the issue with having only one ball winder (which is what I think most of us have). I would also worry, with painting on the dye, that it might not soak evenly into both strands. What I read about is to knit two blanks, and dye them side by side. If you want clearer separation of colour, you can divide the knitting by knitting some (at least 10) rows of acrylic yarn, which won’t take the dye. I really want a CSM!