As usual I'm playing catch up

Things have finally settled down around here and I am no longer feeling the pain of saying goodbye to our beloved sitter. The baby is now in childcare twice a week for a total of 6 hours. I have also had the husband help me clear out the garage and now I can officially say I have a studio! It was so much fun moving everything out of the kitchen and into the garage. The biggest perk is that I now have a new microwave and kettle!

My first dye project was Koi Pond, along with other vivid girly colors. I also dyed Princess Buttercup, Wildflowers, Full Bloom, and Spring Delight. I must have hit the spot with these colorways as most sold out within minutes of stocking!


Knitting wise I am an effort to only knit up with my own yarns. So I used Rogue on Licorice Twist to make a super cute pair of overalls.

Weekend update

With so much going on and with me back to dyeing strong I don't even know where to begin.

Last week I stocked a series of sock yarns on MainStreet.


After a nice holiday break I went on a dyeing spree. Here is 'Woodhaven' (it does not actually contain any red). Lots of browns, golds and green. This one is done on a superwash DK yarn and should be stocked sometime next week.


I have probably a gazillion (not really) more colorways coming. I just need to get them all photographed and edited.

On the business side of things there has been much progress done.

• I have been putting together a sample package to take to local yarn stores.
• The Charlotte and Vagabond patterns are now being tested.
• The Wildwood pattern is almost ready for release.
• A third romper pattern is in the works (eventually the patterns will be released together as an e-book).
• A cardigan idea has been born
• I have a new wool supplier of amazing 2 and 3 ply USA grown and spun yarns. They take dye like a dream and are incredibly soft
• I ordered a professional book on size grading for men, women and children. I hope it comes with baby grading too. It cost me a pretty penny but I think its really going to make a huge difference in the way I design patterns.

I feel like I am at a point where I need to "go back to work" one day a week. or a few half or even third days. Right now I am working _all the time_ I try to be efficient with my time. So when I'm playing with the boys I'm knitting, when the boys are asleep I'm dyeing, and when I get "mommy time" I work on patterns.

Happy New Year!

Well its certainly has been a while since my last entry. The holidays came at me with full swing and sadly I had no time to dye, though I did get some knitting in.

I got two large scrappy rompers done. I thought they were going to be the end of me! Its been a long time since I had to weave in so many loose ends. But all the hard work was worth it, they came out super adorable.

Size 6M, Tessa Ann buttons, lots of scraps!



Wildwood romper pattern!

Cascade

In the turmoil of the last week I have forgotten to post the big news: a pattern of mine has been released by the Petite Purls magazine.

Beach Knits

Had a wonderful time at the coast with the family last week. Didn't get as much knitting done as I was hoping, but I did manage to finish a sweater for Mr. Elliot :)
Its a new pattern I'm working on, very easy top down with a lovely cable work down the chest. Hopefully I can publish it in the coming weeks.

It was my second time knitting with Eos superwash merino. The two ply yarn is thick and soft with a great twist to it. I was concerned that the sweater would pill on my active kiddo, but so far its holding up amazingly well with practically no piling.

Yarn on the House

How could I have missed mentioning this in my blog before! I was featured in Veronika's blog AND we did a video interview together. I haven't watched the video yet, but everyone says I did great!

http://yarnonthehouse.blogspot.com/2010/11/giveaway-43.html

There are still a few days before the drawing. I am giving away lots of yarn and the Julian Vest pattern.

Ruffled Sunhat Pattern

Before packaging up the romper and hat to be shipped off this afternoon I just had to do a quick photoshoot with Reid in the hat. I'm going to hang on to these until his senior yearbook >:) Doesn't he look just darling.

I also wrote up the pattern for the hat and its now up for sale on Ravelry

Reid's Romper in the Pheobe Colorway

Gosh I just love how this colorway has knit up. I always like knitting my own colorways as it gives me good insight into my color placement and repeat.

The hat is a top down pattern I made up, maybe one day I will write it out. Its super easy. The hat is going to be a surprise. I had a bunch of yarn left over and I just thought it would look totally adorable on the little girl.


Top down view of the hat

New and Exciting

The last few weeks have been a complete whirlwind. I finished knitting two versions of the Charlotte Collection; a tunic and a sweater. I wrote up the pattern for said collection and have sent out copies for testers to work on.

For the sweater option I went with a 50/50 silk merino blend dyed in shades of lilac. The yarn has incredible sheen and drape and is baby soft. Perfect for a holiday dress. I think the satin ribbon ties the look together.


For the tunic I went with the same yarn base but in a different color. The emerald green is absolutely stunning.


I hope that the testers can get through the pattern in the coming few weeks and then the pattern will be up for sale on Ravelry. I have also began working on two additional patterns. One is a modification to the romper, and another is a quick and easy cabled sweater.

New Colorway!

I'm so excited how this colorway turned it, I envisioned something bright bold and beautiful and I got exactly that! I'm calling it 'Electric Rainbow' and its fantastic.


I have so many ideas and so many things in the works. I wish I had more time and more hands to get it all done.
The dress pattern is coming along nicely. I have sent it off to my testers this week. I imagine that there will be many revisions in the coming weeks. I still need to finish the sweater option, but sadly I cannot find my size 5DPNs and magic looping is not working well with the teeny sleeves. So hopefully today I can pickup some new needles for myself.

Weekend Knits

What a busy and fun filled weekend we had.

Saturday we ran from a birthday party to a lantern walk at Elliot's preschool. I managed to finish one glove on Friday day, then the next glove was done on Saturday. To my dismay I realized that the gauge on my second glove was much tighter than on my first, so I had to redo the first glove to make it snugger.
Then on Sunday we went hiking and I cast on for the lacy Julian hat. I got most of the hat done during the drive to and from the hike and then finished it off Sunday night.


The yarn was absolutely amazing to knit with and has reignited my love for handspun yarn. Last week I also made a matching feather and fan cowl/scarf but haven't had a chance to photograph it yet.

Chickadee Overalls

Here is another pattern I have been asked about over and over again and so I finally decided to write up the instructions.
These overalls are knit in a top-down fashion, starting with the chest panel/bib, when the panel is finished additional stitches are cast on for the body of the overalls.
The pattern features back straps, buttonholes, a pocket option, and a gathered area in the back.
Perfect for all times of year, just change the inseam and you can go from shorts to long pants.

The body features ample short rows to accommodate diaper bulk.

A wide range of sizes from newborn to 2T makes this a versatile and great fitting pattern.

Here comes another coffee infused post from yours truly

I'm having a lot of fun photographing yarn. Here is what I'm putting up this week for the Wonderland congo. Its really too bad that calendars are becoming obsolete, I would love to do a yarnie calendar.


I've been putting a lot of effort into the Chickadee Overalls pattern. In fact just as I felt it was finished up I made a major design change and now will need to have the pattern tested again.
I've also knit two samples now, using the same traveling stitch design as the Julian vest. Hopefully during our Seattle getaway this week I can write up the instructions. Here I am modeling the hat. I really wish I had used a different yarn, something I could actually wear. But I'm a total snob and find plain wool to be too scratchy. And red, I am not a fan of red!

Apple Orchard

I tried a new dyeing technique and I am very pleased with the results. I love the control hand painting gives me, but dyeing yarn in repetitive sections can cause pooling in stacking. Of course the best way to create random repeats is to use the kettle dyeing methodology. The downside to kettle dyeing is that it can lead to unintended color mixes and is very difficult to control the final results. So I've been working on a scatter dyeing technique which blends kettle dyeing with hand painting to give myself the control I need while still maintaining random color repeats.

As busy as ever and new colorways!

The Julian vest pattern comes out tomorrow. I'm crazy busy getting ready for the release. I still need to review the pattern one last time and then publish it on Ravelry. I was going to wait until tomorrow morning, but with us having to leave for preschool in the morning I really should have everything ready to go.

I had a very busy day and then I still managed to dye up some yarn after the kids were in bed. I did a new "apple orchard" kettle dyed colorway, a fairly solid "cinnamon" and the ever popular "full bloom". Too bad I won't have time to dry and photograph the yarns for tomorrow's stocking. I seem to do a lot of mini stockings rather than bigger ones. Maybe my new goal will be to wait until I have a whole bunch of stuff saved up.

I have worked with all of the new bases now and I am really enjoying the process of learning how different yarns take up dye. I do have some new things coming up tomorrow, "bewitched" "Esmeralda" and "Phoebe".

Playing catch up

Naughty me forgot to take my laptop along this Monday and so I missed my regularly scheduled Monday morning blog updates.

I've have been knee deep in pattern design and yarn dyeing. I had a really fun time doing a custom job for my auction winner. She settled on bright red, turquoise, brown, orange, pink and white. I did a shorter than normal color repeat to help reduce pooling. I really hope she likes it!


But because of the custom work and other little things (such as horrible tangled skeins that took hours to untangle) I did not get a chance to dye up as much yarn as I was hoping to for tomorrow's stocking. Plus the battery on my scale ran out of juice and I couldn't prep any more yarn.
I must have been in a very green mood as I've realized that 3/4 of the stuff I have listed has some form of green in it!

I am especially fond of my silk skeins. I actually carry the yarn around and pat it every once in a while. I might be addicted to luxury yarns.

'Emerald City'

Rainbow Overalls

I did a super fun trade with a customer. She sent me a box full of really nice kid clothes and I knit a pair of overalls for her!

The Life of a WAHM

Its minutes before the store goes live and I have a few last changes to make. But the baby is fussing and I simply cannot get anything accomplished. I've been up since 6am and coffee is still an hour away and I want to squeeze in a shower.
The three year old is bouncing off the wall, insisting on aggravating the baby over and over again despite my desperate pleas for him to be gentle with his baby brother.
Yes its one of those mornings.... And did I mention I'm trying to get a pattern out?

Finally, 8:50am and I hear a knock on the door. I breathe a deep breath and let the sitter in. Today she's my saving grace and I escape the chaos. Three hours of peace. I sit and sip my coffee. Finishing up patterns and updating the blog. I hear a screaming child at the coffee shop and for once I smile.

Pattern Release Party

So Reid's Romper is ready to be released. I have gone over it with a fine tooth comb, over and over again. I think its ready. Monday is the big day and I'm really excited. I decided to post a last minute $3 off yarn coupon for that day too, plus an auction for a custom dye job, and two pattern giveaways. I admit its kind of fun to watch the store traffic spike.

I'm slowly starting to dye up the new bases. I tried the Dolce BFL first, and dyed "Full Bloom" which is a really gorgeous colorway everyone seems to like. I also tried dyeing twice as much yarn, probably shouldn't experiment so much all at once in the future. But it worked out fine. I changed the color repeat a bit though, and so it has less brown than usual.

Also the new image reflect the change in my yarn photography. I'm really enjoying taking the round bowl shots.



Next I dyed 3 skeins of Eos Merino for my husband's vest gift. He doesn't follow the blog (though he should :P) its going to be his holiday gift. I'm going to attempt at reworking the Julian vest pattern to fit adults. It was my first time working with Eos and wow it did not disappoint. The yarn is as soft as clouds. I kettle dyed it with shades of moss green, going all the way from very dark to very light and some silver. Hopefully I will have some pictures to show soon.

Julian Vest Debut

This vest is a debut of a new pattern I have been working on. This vest is knit in a bottom-up fashion; starting with a rib stitch detail on the bottom and a lovely "V" design down the front. The vest also features a V-neck, and a two button closure across the left shoulder (which makes it really easy to get the vest over a baby's head).

The yarn used is a semi-solid teal colorway dyed by me on Mountain Meadow Rambouillet.

A new project bag

I've been ogling and drooling over project bags for quite some time now. I just never could make the commitment and get one. Well last week I just couldn't take it anymore and decided to get one for myself.
I searched and searched on Hyenacart and finally stumbled upon a bag from "Made by Maria"
The fabric was beautiful and so I went for it.

This is what the packaging looked like when I took it out of the protective plastic bag.


And an action shot


I have to say I am really impressed with the craftsmanship of the bag. The stitches are perfect, the straps are double stitched, and just overall the bag is very professionally done.

I feel like I'm going to become a crazy project bag lady, I could have one bag for each project I am knitting. Oh that would be marvelous.

Yarnie Heaven

I opened a new wholesale account. I just about had a heart attack as I was sorting through all of the available bases. I picked five new bases to add to my offerings, I am still drooling over the cashmere blend base but the pocketbook just couldn't handle it.

- Dolce BFL (available in Aran, DK, sock)
- Aura Merino (Worsted, DK, sock)
- Sol Merino Superwash (Worsted, DK, sock)
- Rhea 50/50 Merino Silk blend (Worsted, DK, sock)
- Eos Merino (Worsted, DK, sock)

Amazing News

Just heard back from the Petite Purls magazine, they have accepted my pattern proposal for their 2010/2011 winter edition.
I am thrilled!!!

Coastal Susnet Hat

Elliot was in love with this hat. So I promised him I will make him one just like it. I have two more customs coming up, but after that I hope to make something for my sweetie. I'm thinking I will make him a scrappy hat.
Knit with Mosaic Moon's Coastal Sunset on Mountain Meadow Rambouillet. YUM!

Gotta love his undies!

Black Rainbow Custom Longies

I am really excited about these longies. They are 100% me from beginning to end. I dyed the yarn and then knit it up!
The colorway is a custom request, a customer requested a black rainbow with black trim. I have done a similar colorway before called 'Pink Floyd' but in that case I muted the colors to give them all a slightly gray feel.

I can't wait to see some action shots!