The Healing Power of Koolaid

So why is it that a fruit smell, wet wool and gleeful kids are such a great combo? 

The magic of kool aid dyeing.  Today I volunteered to dye skeins of Knitpicks dye-your-own wool of the Andes.  With about 22 3d graders as the actual dyers.  The price is right, and the wool is actually pretty soft and has a great put-up (220 yds).

All for a good cause:  the PS 75 school auction. Next week. You too can bid on a slew of items here.  Vacations, massages, NYC restaurants, you name it.  Even knitting lessons.  I'm counting on there being a lot of knitters at the school, and that they will want this hand-dyed yarn at the auction.

What fun we had.  The kids worked in teams of 2, with their line partners.  I decided that it would be best to limit the palette, so we had plastic cups of ice blue, lemonade, and cherry or watermelon cherry.  Oh and one of grape too.  Two squirt bottles contained lemonade and blue for that dotted spotted look, and for color changing accents.  Each kid got to pick one primary color to start.  They either poured their color, or spotted it on from the squirt bottle.

To start.  Then creative madness took hold.  Stripes appeared, dots over stripes, and who knew that cherry with that blue and some yellow would look like an icee?

Finally, each skein was zapped in the microwave for 2 minutes, a bit more if they needed to exhaust the dye.  After cooling down, they went to drip dry -- and I do mean drip-- to the PTA office.  Which now smells like koolaid.

Some of the kids in the class had done this with me a few years ago, when they were in first grade.  This was better.  Much less nerve-wracking.

What happened to the yarn we had left over from a few years ago?  It went to make this.

For the first child of the kids' first grade teacher. Who remembered the many fun classes we had, and the many skeins of koolaid hanging from clotheslines strung across the room. Enticing the mice with that fruit smell.   She is not a knitter, but appreciates those who knit.  And dye. Especially her own kids.

It's that circle of life thing.  Very satisfying it is to give back a present whose roots reach back a few years.

This was also my first ever Baby Surprise Jacket.  As much of a fan that I have always been of Elizabeth Zimmerman I can't believe it took me this long to make this pattern.  It was fun.  I would make it again.  Especially in variegated yarn; I think in plain it would be a little boring, for me anyway.  But it really shows off color changes. The pattern is in EZ's Knitting Workshop and I think also in the new Opinionated Knitter.  (One of these days I will stop sighing over Opinionated Knitter and tell myself that yes it's ok to buy it for myself as a present.)

See the little goldfish bowl buttons?  Aren't they cute? They came from Knitty City, the new yarn store on the upper west side. The *other* yarn store.  Say hi to Pearl the owner if you go.

And here's the sweater from the back. You can see that it's gradated in color from bottom to top.  What I did was find the color that all the little balls of yarn had in common.  That was yellow.  Then I organized the color changes to go from the red end of the yellow spectrum to the blue end.

I so lucked out on those buttons though.

The wool was originally LB fisherman's wool, a worsted that takes up dye well.  I've also used it in felted koolaid dyed projects and been pleased with it. The KnitPicks though is just a wee bit softer.  We'll see how it handles when it dries.

So color, wet wool and kids are an excellent tonic for the soul.

Meantime, don't tell anyone but that auction always has some great deals in it.

Comments

[Publicado por: tre erbjudande]

Jag tycker personligen att anmla sig till alla de platser ytterligare efter en mnad eller tv om jag inte gillar den typ av underskningar de skickar mig jag bara cancel.
framkallning gratis
Du kommer att upptcka att mnniskor kommer att terglda din generositet.


Men du kan tjna lite extra inkomst fr att tcka dina dagliga expenses.
"http://thomasbarber.weebly.com/
" - hotell erbjudanden
Du ser alla dessa videor p YouTube, Break, DailyMotion, etc om att f skyldig utan att betala ett re.

[Publicado por: Sahara]

It was so good to see you! I'm glad the kids had a good time, but I hope they don't drink this stuff. It's more fun to dye with.

[Publicado por: Janet]

I'm so glad you're back writing your blog. That sweater is Kool! I had the Opinionated Knitter in hand all ready to pay and then they were so slow at the cash register I put it back......but I have one more day here in Seattle so just might make another trip to Weaving Works to make the purchase.

[Publicado por: betty]

yo lo tengo todo preparado ya para mi primer experimento con Kool-Aid, a ver si me animo después de verte. y la chaqueta te quedó preciosa. :)

por cierto, que parece que volveré a visitar NY la primera semana del mes de Abril. :)

[Publicado por: vanessa]

what fun!