Thursday, September 3, 2015

show and tell

another week, another beanie...
and this one i'm being super selfish with, it's all mine!

i've known that i wanted to turn the skeins that were dyed up using natural dyes at the 2013 craft sessions into something for a little while... hopefully to wear to this year's event!



the skeins above, from memory, are dyed with soursob, eucalyptus and madder. i believe the skeins were treated with different mordants to get different colours results, and maybe treated with acids/alkalis to achieve different results (no idea why i didn't write these things down!)

my first thought as to what to knit up with these beauties was a hat. and despite the number of hats i have knitted in my life, i don't actually OWN one. seriously.

with only little skeins of each colour, i knew what that would mean... colourwork knitting. a very scary and daunting prospect as i'd never played around too much with it.
oh and i'd need to choose a yarn for the body of the hat...



that was probably the easiest decision to make! shilasdair luxury 4ply in 'fleece cloud' was the perfect accompaniment. the texture and colour were just the best match with the teeny sample skeins i was working with.

i quickly knit up the ribbing of the hat, and then sat with the idea of colourworking for a day or so. is this skill too hard? should i do some research first? should i sketch out exactly what i wanted to knit?
well the answer was a resounding NO! i, as per usual, just jumped in! feet first! and i didn't stop until my colourworking was done!
marathon knitting anyone?



i'm still not 100% sure i love the crown shaping i knitted... it's quite square. but i think i've nailed the crown depth for my teeny head.

what do you think? what have you been making recently? are you heading to the craft sessions this year?

1 comment:

Tammy@T's Daily Treasures said...

Well, I think you did an excellent job. I'm so amazed at what can be made with knitting. The hat is lovely and you put those little skeins to great use.