Yarn and knit socks because it is still Winter at our House!

It is still cold and wintery looking at our house so I reskeined a couple of the skeins I dyed yesterday, it is funny how different the colours look when the yarn is reskeined.

The skeins I reskeined are in the center of the skeins as they came out of the dye pot. I think my friend will be happy with the colours, she knits mitts that look like the stained glass mitts with the colour showing through on the plain colours, have to take a picture of a pair so you see what I mean, the bright colours will be great for ladies mitts and the muted shades men might like.

Here are the St. Patrick socks all finished! Love this yarn, the different colours in the yarn knit up making a great design with the different colors. Will start another pair tomorrow. Time is going so fast and it will soon be time to get out in the yard so am trying to get as much knitting as I can done now. Am also still sorting fibre to get to the mill plus wash and card up some alpaca making into roving for the summer sales. I said I would never process dog hair for anyone......but my niece sent out some of her dogs hair wanted it made into yarn...so ok will give it a try. The dog hair is so short so mixed some alpaca fibre with it, carded it together and spun a skein for her...and for got to take a picture of the skein before I sent it to her, I said to knit it up into fingerless mitts and wear them and see if the dog hair would shed out. She knit the mitts up and has been wearing them and they have shed a bit and really look fuzzy. I am going to mix some wool with the dog hair and alpaca hoping that the wool might hold the dog hair in the yarn better. no sense in spinning it all up into a yarn that does not work, so will experiment with some different combinations first. Got my garden seeds in the mail the other day so should get some seeds started under the lights. These are all heritage seeds and I want to save some of the seeds in the fall for next year, they had a booklet on how to save the seeds......I have been reading it....am not going to complain about the cost of seeds again after reading what you have to go through to get seeds off some of the vegetables, I did not realize plants like carrots are biennials and you have to keep them over so they bloom the second year for you to get any seeds......plus how you have to plant some seeds far enough apart so they do not cross pollinate. Really.....do I really need this in my head...all I think about now is what I would have to do to save seeds from plants...along with trying to fix problems on my computer...spent all day today trying to download a program...either working on the computer or thinking about it while I did other things, trying to solve the problem. and I finally did get it solved!! If I thought it would not have killed me I would have done a cartwheel!! I did a cartwheel in my mind...safer that way.....well tomorrow is another day...right!!

Well.....Do I have to mention Snow again!!! But I did dye today.........

Well here we were again...and it snowed all day. But it was not bad here as compared to north of us, highway turned into ice instantly and what a mess, cars and trucks and semi's out of control...major pile up. So can not complain at what we got.....(but you know I want to...)

I know it looks like the same picture as I posted before...have to take snow pictures out of different windows.... The good thing was I finally got the dye pots out! It has been a year (I think) since I have dyed more than just a couple of skeins, last summer I had pulled all the muscles over my ribs on my right side so could not lift the dye pots.

I soaked three skeins of what I thought was merino wool but found there was one skein that was a mix of merino and mohair in warm water with a bit of soap, then put them in the dye pot with water, vinegar and a bit of salt, on a rack with a large jar of water in the centre to try to keep the dye separate, I used three colors Red with a bit of magenta, blue with a bit of turquoise and lemon yellow.

I let the pot simmer for about thirty minutes, then let it cool down, soaked the skeins with a bit of soap then rinsed them and here they are, they were still wet when I took the picture, I have them hanging to dry right now.

Will take better pictures when they are dry but there are some beautiful colours in the mixture. Then I put another pot on, I had soaked three more skeins of what I thought was merino and ended up with one skein of merino/mohair, I did not separate them with the jar of water and I only used the two colours Red with a bit of magenta and blue with a bit of turquoise and let the pot simmer for about thirty minutes and it looked like a disaster!! I let it cool down then washed the skeins with a bit of soap in the water then rinsed them......and they turned out not too bad!

I am always stressing out when I see a pot like this, trying to calm myself down saying to myself...I can always redye the skeins black....I can always use more black.......There are some beautiful burgundy colours. Will take pictures when they have dried. I will not be dyeing them black...........

Not a very productive day But this little Viola blooming for the First Day of Spring Made me Smile!

Just love Violas! They are some of the first plants to start flowering through the snow! All you need is one plant and let it go to seed. my front garden was so full of violas I actually had to thin them out. this year I have actually found people who do not have any violas.....so am going to pot some up and gift them!! Not much new to write about, dying yarn was on the menu but we have had a small leak under the kitchen sink and today was the day RH decided it had to be fixed, so everything was moved out from under the sink and the next thing I knew he had everything apart and needed some silicone to seal a piece of the pipe so then had to go to the store, I could not use any water etc.etc.etc.......the leak is gone but everything is all over the kitchen right now. Kept thinking I did not get much accomplished.....but I did a few loads of laundry...redid some items on my website........which took some time as I could not remember how to do anything as it has been a few years, there were still pictures and directions to the farm in the hills and we had moved to a small acreage a few years ago so it was time I got it straightened out. and the St. Patrick sock is finished except for closing the toe...which I could have had done except I just had too much cat help, my poor old girls thought they both needed sit on me, they are fifteen years old so are so needy. They do not have teeth anymore so we have to buy soft food and only the little cans that they like so HB always seems to be buying cat food....I said to him don't keep buying it from the same store all the time or we will be getting a visit from the health department thinking we are poor seniors eating cat food.....

Snow gone! Mud appears! And the Calendar says it is the first day of Spring! Mother Nature...Take Notice!!

The snow has pretty well disappeared again and I could not believe what happened under the snow.....my plants started shooting up, I just looked at the flower beds not even a week ago and nothing was coming up! I am always excited to discover the little green leaves coming up in the spring!

My large poppies....is spring really here you silly things, hopefully we do not have freezing weather before it really warms up!

And finally the leaves of the tulips have appeared! The calendar says that it is the first day of spring but sometimes Mother Nature does not agree but hope she is in agreement this year and we do not get anymore cold snowy weather.

Here is the progress on the the St. Patrick sock, got carried away so have to rip back a couple rows so I can start the toe. This time I started knitting from the other end of the ball and I think that is the answer with this yarn as the last pair of socks the yarn was untwisting as I knit. Have to get some yarn dyed, my knitting friend called and needs some more rainbow dyed yarn for her mittens she knits, got the dyes all mixed up and ready to go so hopefully tomorrow I can get at least one pot of yarn dyed.

Another hit of winter so will deal with my Sock problems!

We went from this......

To this in a matter of days, with horrid wind for a day and a half between Sun and Snow! But was so glad to see the moisture whether it was rain or snow as wind stopped and we so needed the moisture. So no new animal pictures. Decided to change from fingerless mitt knitting to go back to sock knitting, had a pair of red socks almost finished, had set them aside when a special order came in so they had been sitting for a bit, only needed the toe on the one sock to be finished and was worried about remembering what I had done on the first sock but they match thank-goodness! Why would I leave off knitting when I only had a toe to finish!! I went to the bin where my sock yarn was stashed and just reached in and grabbed a skein and started knitting.....another lesson learned...make sure you have a matching skein before you knit a large size sock!! I picked the only colour that I only had one skein of....so of course ran out of yarn...o.k.....now that pair will be set aside until I can order a skein that hopefully matches and if it does not match...guess I have another pair of socks for myself...Had a terrible time with the yarn for this pair of socks as the twist was so loose so will try knitting from the other end of the skein and see if it makes a difference on the next pair.

Here are the red socks ready to be washed and blocked! Love the red!

Here are the poor socks that are causing all the fuss!I had not finished off the toe because if I was close to finishing the other sock I could have riped back a bit to finish the other one. I found one little left over ball from another pair I made but it will not be enough so have ordered another skein, the good thing is when I get another skein of the same colour, the yarn left over will make a small pair of socks!

And this is the yarn I am started another pair of socks with.....because it is St. Paticks Day!! Can you tell I am trying to be a better blogger??.....Plus I just got my new cell phone so am trying out the camera on it!

Could this be Spring?

Our snow has disappeared and it is warm and so dry, it makes us feel like we have spring already but winter will probably hit us at least once before it is gone. The little violas are stating to poke their heads up, love them, all you need is one plant to go tossed and you will have them forever. Have been out in the paddock taking pictures....or trying to take pictures of the llamas and alpacas..they have found sprigs of green grass growing and you can hardly get them to lift their heads from the ground. But did get a few good ones.

This is little Thistle growing up on the left and Princess who was gifted to us last year with her mother, Princess is such a beautiful large girl. She stands so proud.

And I caught Taffy my little Alpaca gelding just sitting back enjoying the sunshine, chewing his cud, he takes the funniest pictures but is so cute! Will go out again tomorrow and see if I can intice them to lift their heads up from the new green grass and get some more pictures. Will soon be time to shear again and I am still sorting fibre from last year. I will never catch up!!

Summer Rain is growing up!

Here is hoping my blog will get back to normal and I can post again. Last post which was ages ago announcing that I had a new computer and could finally post again......well that did not last long...my new computer locked me out!! actually it was iCloud that locked me out so had to wait until could get back to the store and get them to help me get into my computer which was not easy but finally we used their computer to make amends with iCloud and I could finally use my computer again.......but then my blog was hacked and when people went into my blog all they got was an advertisement for a company. Awesome grandson finally got it removed for me and now hopefully that is the end of my blog problems!! Was out the other day taking pictures of the llamas and finally got a good one of Summer Rain, she does not like getting her picture taken so it was run around the feeder but she finally stopped and stood for a minute. Her mother has some llama in her and her Dad is full Alpaca and we won't really know until spring when she is sheared but right now it looks like her fleece will be more on the llama side, she has two half sisters that produce Alpaca fibre but love her beautiful colour.

Will have to get some new pictures of the babies from the year before, they have really grown and are not really babies anymore....but I still call them my babies. Well am off to bed.....am totally knit out these days trying to get orders out to people plus knitting gifts for Christmas...will I get it done?....will I get it done?.....said I was not taking any new knitting orders until after Christmas.....then a phone call came and a lady needs a pair of modified fingerless mitts with a flap for a special needs young man in a wheel chair....can not say no to that...so will cast on tomorrow to knit those mitts....in between some baking...trying to get gifts ready for sending to family. Then back to gift knitting...might be wrapping up balls of yarn to gift then take back and knit after christmas when things slow down.....it has been done before........