Bonnie’s Granny Square Flower
🙂 Chain 5, join with slip stitch in 1st chain to make circle.
:confused:Chain 3, * 3 double crochets in circle. Chain 3, turn.
:doze:1 double crochet in each of next 2 double crochets and make 1 double crochet
in top of turning chain.
:O Reach around behind the double crochets, and do 1 double crochet into
original circle, behind 1st set, so it is actually as if it was done 1st.
😀 Repeat from * seven times for a total of 8 petals.

If you keep all your petals turning in the same direction this turns out just like it should. When you reach from the right side of the petal to the left side to work the dc back into the chain circle, the left corner of the petal will come forward. It makes a nice little flower. The rest of this block came from a pattern on-line http://members.aol.com/gandal195/irishivyrose.html by a lady whose name is also Bonnie. I don’t know if it’s the same one, tho! I can’t seem to get the knack of the bullion stitch but this granny flower works well and is nicer looking than my feeble bullions! :laugh:

I put the panel on holders at this point and started a second one. This should be just about half my yarn and long enough for the vest panel. The second one wil be slightly different as I am starting from opposite ends so that it now starts with the pale yellow and the dark purple. When I get it going I’ll post another photo. I like the general idea but am learning quite a bit about color runs, for instance, I think these are really too long and don’t blend nearly enough though the changes. It’s been an interesting experiment.

I saw one crocus this morning but this afternoon when I finally got outside… lo and behold! Primroses, too! I said I was going to get out today and rake but I never made it. I guess I’d better do it tomorrow. The poor things are tyring so hard to get though all last years litter. I see some ferns edging their little fiddle heads up, too. I don’t think we have any tulips left, they don’t go on forever and the critters munch then, too. But I bought a pot of blooming tulips at the grocery yesterday. Yes, I know, but they were so pretty, so I spent a little bit of the grocery money on Beauty. That’s better than chocolate, isn’t it?! :crazy: Well… isn’t it?!! :laugh:

This is the yarn you see me dying as knitted fabric a couple of photo’s down this page. I’ve started from the opposite ends of the balls which are pretty much alike. I’m copying a panel I saw on this blog, where we got the idea for dying and reknitting. Thank you for the inspiration, Sara. 😀 http://saralamb.blogspot.com/2005/02/more-dyeing-fun.html
This is as far as I’ve gotten this evening. I sized it to be the front panel for a vest. The rest will be a dark grey, if I’m remembering what I have in stash.:rolleyes:

:satisfied: This is for those of you who have bought Walmarts 69cent easter egg dye. It is a bargain, depending on the results you are after. Starting from the bottom, here are the color I got using 2 tablets, and a cup of white vinegar in a two quart bowl of water, micro-waved for 4 minutes. I put in enough damp, clean, bright white cormo wool to be covered by the water, weighted with a saucer. The batts are each one “batch”.
Neon pink; a nice orange; Bright Yellow; pale green; pale teal (it’s the only blue); and assorted purples. I did three batches of the purple, the middle one I tried to over-dye with blue. My advice is to avoid the purple, go with Kool-aid. It also separates at times but not as badly as this. I had neon pink and neon blue which I blended by hand cards and drum carder and, as you can see, it was a bit too much blending and is starting to form some neps which I’ll have to pick out when I spin. I think I will pull roving and run it though the drum carder one more time using the three to try to come up with one shade of lavender/purple.
I bought 12 packages of this dye and intend to do at least one more batch, but I think I’ll also buy some of the more expensive Paas dye, if I can find the plain kind.

Here’s my latest hat. Woven and felted. These are all handspun yarns wool yarns and it’s woven on the Tiny Weaver Set. I’m quite pleased with it and have made another version using Noro yarns.

Here’s the scarf I’m knitting from some of the knitted dying we did. This one is alpaca and something… silk? tensel? … dunno but it’s nice. It runs from purple which is almost black (The Walmart grape ‘koolaid’) though very bight red to a duller red on the other end which I haven’t gotten to yet. This pattern is great! Even I can remember it! :laugh: And it looks a little different in different yarns, I did a couple of swatches.
Pattern: CO 30: k2 *yo, p1, p2 tog, k1* I’m using a #9 circ. You can use what ever size needle looks good with your yarn. Gonna wear this to the Red Hat Pajama Breakfast with my new “dress/gown” from Lane Braynt. It looks just like the knit shirts I wear to bed but has red hats on it and is a bit longer. I’m not going to breakfast anywhere with my uh-huh hanging out! There’s still too much of that to share! lol
I have a new hat for it, too. That one I made on the looms and will be featured in the video if we ever get that done…?! 😉

Here I am dying away. One of us found a web site showing knitted swatches being dyed and then frogged and reknit. Light bulbs flashing all over! lol This is two lengths that I wanted to make into a pair of socks, but as Rosy pointed out, at the width I made my color changes, I’d have to knit knee socks to get all the colors in and that wasn’t quite what I had in mind, but I have other ideas for using this really cool yarn! Rosy used her facny dyes and I used my kool-aid. It was great fun.
She also helped me sort my new cormo fleece and get it ready to wash. We even got one batch washed. It is sooooo nice! I stopped at the dollar store on the way home and bought laundry bags to wash it in. No felted fleece for me this time, by gosh!

Here’s a close up of my dying project. I got a little whimsical but I think it’s going to be fun to reknit! I’m already buzzing with ideas! I have a bit of what I think is either angora or alpaca that is shaded purple to red that I am knitting into a scarf to be the envy of my fellow Red-hatters. Rosy says she’s going to be keeping my knitting machine busy! lol 😛

Here’s my sock after going though the washer twice and the dryer once. It’s still just a tad big, but that give it room to be washed again! I’m starting the second one now. The next pair will have some cuff, 10 or so rows of garter stitch probably. These are really more like slippers and will probably be worn that way, but I sure like how they came out. 🙂