Friday, July 11, 2008

Recycled wool - part 2



Well, the larger bowl was a little too floppy. (Note to self: alpaca is soft and pretty, but doesn't felt that well...) But the wristlets were kind of fun to make. And they are very soft thanks to the alpaca in the yarn and running through the washer to full them a little. My 15 year old niece is in town for a few days and I'm thinking it might be fun for the two of us to dye these things a more interesting color (like maybe - bright pink?) I found this great tutorial at www.knitty.com on how to use kool aid and a crockpot. We need the method that is: 1) easy, and 2) least likely to produce stains all over the kitchen if you are the mess type (we both are.) This method sounds like the winner. And we can use kool aid, which is non-toxic and I'm guessing will leave the wristlets smelling nice.

Saturday, July 5, 2008

Recycling Wool Sweaters by Unraveling Them


Many thanks to Ashley Martineau for her online recycled yarn tutorial. As usual, I am way behind the curve in trying new things, but this is something I am excited about. I have gotten more and more interested in recycling and upcycling as I find all the creative things that artists do with old and used materials. Just go to etsy.com and search on 'upcycle' to see what I mean. Repurposing all those old sweaters that would end up in landfills seems a very worthy effort indeed. This sweater pictured is a wool/alpaca blend and the yarn is slated to become a bowl (I am going to try a bigger one) and a set of wrist warmers.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Wristlet - final version



I think maybe I got the wrist strap finally worked out. This little extra loop for the wrist strap evens things up.

Pattern available at my Etsy store.