Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Socktober

In honour of the start of Socktober and because I finished the Bripples yesterday, I give you .... ta da ...
some Swiss Aarlan Arwetta 4ply/fingering that was plain cream when I bought it and 8 of its friends on Ebay a few months ago... it's 75% wool 25% nylon so I thought that it would probably do well in socks.
I like dyeing yarns with a little bit of nylon.
The Landscape dyes that I mainly use are supposed to be ok for nylon as well as protein based fibres but the result is a softer, heathered look compared to pure wool - a 'hand dyed' look if you will.
The colour on this monitor isn't QUITE right... what looks hot pink is more a cyclamen and the cyclamen, more purple. The blue is actually a much darker navy too ... it's currently sitting 25' away, on the arm of the couch, and from that distance all the little variations have blended together and it definitely looks purple, a good dark, saturated, bluey purple. I guess you'll have to take my word for that.
I had several goes at getting a representative colour but as usual the camera insisted on believing it was lighter and brighter than what I was seeing.
So far I've only dyed up the one hank.
It is a little thinner than the Opal and the Casbah that I've used recently, so I swatched and decided to go down to a 3mm needle.
That will result theoretically in a smaller sock for a certain daughter 'o mine who has very slender ankles and elegant thin feet.
The only drawback Nadie, my dear, is that you'll have to hand wash the beggars.

Dave isn't feeling too spiffy and is still in bed, Bear needs to be encouraged to take it easy and nap on the couch, and I'm disinclined to consider either housework or [shock!horror!] working outside, so I'm having a distinctly lazy, couch day and the sock is progressing nicely.

7 comments:

TinkingBell said...

So so so pretty!

Lovely colours and will look gorgeous! I think broad ripples are on my queue already, so I'll just drift over and see! lalalal....

Bells said...

It's yummy. Nice job!

catsmum said...

Tink my sweet
EVERYTHING is on your queue already :]
[ and for those of you that don't know Tink, she has almost 700 items in her 'to do' queue over at Ravelry, whereas I have a MERE 238!! ]

Rose Red said...

Looks fantastic and knits up so well!

(I thought I had a long queue, but I'm in between you two - 405, I think. But unlike Tink, I don't think I have enough yarn to actually knit everything in my queue as well!!)

Alwen said...

Aren't those cameras obstinate, the way they just won't capture the color properly!

Anyway, what is coming up on my monitor is very pretty, even if it's not what you see in person.

Sheepish Annie said...

I think that a lazy day is in order. You need to be available to tend to the menfolk should they need you, after all. And admire the pretty, pretty yarn...

Donna Lee said...

I just finished a pair of socks that are only good for very slender feet and ankles. I'm hoping my 83 year old aunt will be able to wear them. I love the pattern but will have to go up several needle sizes to make them fit my more normal sized ankles.