WIP Wednesday.

I doubt I'll be doing this every Wednesday. But it's worth a shot.

These are the projects currently on my needles.

These three. I think. Maybe. 

I believe that there are more around here somewhere. I'm sure there are. I still haven't finished a few projects that are on needles. Hmmm... Anyway.

My Two Boyfriends cardigan! Working on the teal sleeve. Slowly finishing this one. I'm pretty sure I would have finished it by now. But... I don't have an excuse.

Deez gloves. Kinda. I don't know. Working with the teal yarn I dyed. It's soft. And I don't really know when I'll finish these.

I wanted to make something for Halloween! I FUCKING LOVE Halloween!! So I want to make sure that this scarf is done by October. This will be my main project until it is done. It shouldn't take me more than 3 days. Then I'll be rocking those Halloween colours.

Uh. I haven't been doing a lot of knitting lately. School work has me going a bit crazy. Working on three different programs at once... ugh. Writing papers for other classes. And painting my nails. I've been doing that a lot. I bought a bunch of nail polish. 

I know that there are other projects, I just have so many that I haven't a clue what I'm currently knitting. I hate that, but sometimes some projects get boring and working on something new is good. But then I completely forget about both and start two other projects. Then... all my needles are in use and I have to finish something. VICIOUS CYCLE!! 

So... Those are what I'm working on now. :D

Dying to Dye.

Just a quick update.

So after a month, let me tell you what happened to my "grand ideas".

I've dyed my own yarn. And it was AMAZING. So much fun. I first tried  to dye yarn with Rite dye. And then I got some Wilton icing colouring. Then I bought some Jacquard dyes from Knit Picks. And now I want more.

Here are some pictures of the yarn I have dyed in the past month. I didn't get to do a lot, because of school, but the ones I've done are pretty awesome.

This one was my first attempt. I didn't like when I first saw it. But as it dried, I noticed the pinks started to lighten. But I used way too much black and it kind of took over everything. You can't really see it in the photo, but the purple came out really bright. And in places I didn't know I had put the purple. I liked how the purple came out. Haven't knitted anything with it yet.

 

This was my second attempt. Meant to be Black, Red, Grey with bits of pink. Purple magically showed up. Looked pretty awesome.  Left picture is re-skeined. I started to knit something with this, but then I misplaced it. Currently looking for it.

This is my third attempt. Green, Light Blue, and black. And it came out so pretty! The blue is really pretty, the green is bright, and the black is... well... black. Except for one area. I tried to hide it in the pictures. But were the green meets the black in one area, it's kind of grey. I don't think I used enough green or black to fad the colours. Still looks pretty and I did make something with this one.

At the bottom, the colours kind of make rows of colour. and you can see the grey that I was talking about earlier. Kind of itchy because it 100% wool. Still pretty damn warm. 

This one I did for a project. Just one colour. But the way I dyed it made the colour dye differently everywhere. I did three skeins, and they each came out differently. Here are the skeins one by one.

I'm currently using this for another project than the one I dyed it for. But I love the colour so much that I have a lot of things I could knit with this. And if I need more, I can just dye some more. I remember how to do it, and I like to do this. I used Jacquard dyes for this one and I love it. I need more Jacquard dyes, the colours that come out are amazing.

I did make another one. But I can't remember what it was.

Oh, I remember. It was a Pink/Blue gradient one. It started as a pink, then fades to a blue. I didn't get any pictures. But when I knit something with it, I'll takes some.

I love dying yarn.

The other "grand idea" of making my yarn hasn't been tried yet. YET. I'm still pretty determined to try that out as well.

Other than that, I've spent the past week working on my Two Boyfriends Cardigan. And something else. I know there is something else... but I just can't remember at the moment.

Oh well.

:D

Grand Ideas

Knowing that I do love knitting pretty things, I have to say that I do love pretty yarn too. And lately, I've had this need to not only knit pretty things, but make and knit with pretty yarn. As awesome as it is to find pretty yarn on the interwebs, they are a bit pricey. But they are oh so pretty.

As I've mentioned before, I have my bouts of insomnia. This time I woke up at 2am and couldn't get back to sleep. During this night of sleeplessness, I looked into hand painting and dyeing and... so much happy. Like mind-asploding happy. I never knew it was so easy. After watching several YouTube videos, and reading articles upon articles on how to do this, I MUST DO THIS RIGHT NAO.

Just thinking about all the pretty things I could make with the pretty yarn that I will one day make... It keeps me up at night.

Of course I will need to start small. Do something simple until I get the hang of it then let my imagination run wild with colours and ideas. My mind has already gone there. It's like the moment I knew I wanted to do this, I knew the types of colours I wanted to work with and what types of yarn I want to make. I started to jot down my ideas and came up with this enormous list. Which I most likely will not be able to knit with it all. But they will be so pretty.

After hours of thinking about what I wanted to dye and paint, and what colours I was going to use, I started thinking about actually making my own yarn. Spinning. I was never so interested in it before. But I open this door to create and now I don't think I can close it. I've spent the past few hours looking into it and realizing that I use to do it when I was younger. That my family actually does it. And that my family has lots and LOTS OF SHEEP. LOTS OF WOOL.  AND THEN!! I remembered... I HAVE SHEEP!

I have my own sheep. Kind of. I have land on the Navajo Rez and all of the family who lives there has sheep. And I have sheep that my Uncle looks after. (I inherited from my mom, who inherited it from my grandpa.) OMG THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS!!!

And that's when I realized that I'm becoming a Fiber Fiend.

I also realized that I could make my own rainbow coloured yarn and knit that noose for my Lover.


Then much later, I starting to think how long will my feelings about this will actually last.

 I should probably try to sleep.

Procrastination and School

I've been doing a lot of school work procrastination. What I have been doing with my time is knitting. It's like knit-therapy. Or maybe just boredom. I haven't quite figured that out yet. Even though I have been procrastinating on my school work, I still have been doing it. Just at the last minute.

I did start a crocheting project. I've never crocheted before. People say that it is easier than knitting, but since I learned to knit years before even touching crochet, I find knitting easier. I found this project from Pintrest. I thought it look adorable and decided it was time to learn to crotchet. So I began the Calm Cowl over the weekend and I liked doing it. I didn't stop until I ran out of yarn.

I haven't gone to get more yarn yet. So that one is just sitting there waiting to get done. I may go and get it this weekend so I can finish it. 

A couple more projects I started was Winter Twilight Mitts. I started it once a while back, but it was way too tight. Now it's more to the gauge that the pattern says and it is fitting better. And the design is looking better too. I should work on these one a bit more.

I did start another project this past week while I had a bit of insomnia. Susie Rogers' Reading Mitts. I finished one side in just a few hours. Then realized the sun had come up and that I needed to get some sleep. The next night I got the other side done. But I ran out of yarn, again. I only had one more row and my thumb to do. So I just used some black yarn. 

I was going to post a picture, but I was having some technical difficulties. 

I finished that one, and now starting on a new sweater. $5 in Paris. That one might take me a while, knowing my history with starting sweaters and cardigans. It's also the first time doing a top down pattern. All my others have been down up. We'll see how this one works. I'm using yarn from another project that I decided to start over with better yarn. 

Oh! And on my Reading Mitts, I was looking for some yarn last night and found another skein of the purple I had been using. So I did have more yarn, I just didn't know I did. It could have been all purple, instead of my random black thumb. Sad face.

Preparing for Winter

Last year, I wanted to knit myself up an arsenal of warmth for the winter. It tried to happen, it really did. My arsenal was anything but. I think I made half a scarf, part of one glove, and maybe an ear flap to a hat. Oh! And two sleeves to a cardigan. That was the extent of my knitting last year. I think.

But this year is different! So far this year I've finished my cardigan, made two hats, bought yarn for some fingerless gloves I've been dying to knit, and currently working on another hat. I also have another pair of gloves lined up after I've finished what I currently have on needles.

Right now, I'm working on a hat pattern I found on Ravelry. It's called Let it Snow! ear flap hat. I've already made one of them and I loved it. It was my first time working with Fair Isle knitting. I found out that I fucking love Fair Isle knitting. I think this may be my new obsession.

Fair Isle knitting

Since it was my first time, my coloured stitches were kind of tight. But it still looks AMAZING. It's really warm too. That could be because I knitted it in 100°+ weather. I really like the colours I chose for it and the way the pattern looks. It did turn out really pretty.

Lots of pink! I like pink.

The one thing I really like is knitting pretty things. And my definition of "pretty things" keeps changing every time I knit something new or learning a new knitting technique. I use to hate anything with cable knitting. Now, I fucking love them! Cardigans were so... ew to me. Now I can't get enough of them. There are a lot of cardigan patterns that I want to try out. 

So now I'm making another hat. With a different main colour. Still going to use the teal and pink, but switch them. It should be done by the end of the day either tomorrow or Tuesday.

Here is what it looks like right now. Ok, so that's a lie. I do have both flaps and about an inch into the actual hat part. I just haven't taken a picture of it yet. I'll do that soon. Can't wait for this one to be done with my new knowledge of fair isle knitting!

First post

Welcome to Knitting Nooses. A good friend of mine suggested this name after I said I was thinking of starting a knitting blog. I liked the name, and apparently it suits me.

This will be a where I blog about all the new and exciting knitting projects I will be doing. I may, from time to time, post about other crafty things. I may also post personal entries, and maybe even rants. Mostly this is where my obsession with knitting will be. Pictures, thoughts, projects I love, projects I hate.

I'll post shortly about my newest project. I may even go back to older projects and kind of talk about them. Where this blog will go, who knows, but there will be pictures of yarn everywhere! Just like my house.

The layout is kind of bleh at the moment. And will be that way until I can design my own. Which might be bit of a process. I am a full time student and spend most of my free time with friends and/or knitting. I have an idea on how I want it to look, I just need to create it.