Almost Finished and Finished

I finished the stitching on the Delightful Dragon Scissor Fob. Seems like I'm getting too old for this shit, or that it's about time I'm getting reading glasses. I still managed though sometimes, especially in the evening, I had trouble focusing on all those super tiny stitches.

I need to do the sewing part still.

I also finished knitting the New Wave cardigan in Wollmeise Twin 'Blaue Tinte'. Of course it's now far too hot to wear it...

 Some detail of the collar.

I did recycle the yarn from another project where I was not happy with the outcome. This one, I'm much more happy with.

Blueberries

Not far from where I'm working is a field were you can go and pick your own blueberries.

(for those interested, those are not the wild growing blueberry Vaccinium myrtillus - Wildheidelbeere or Waldheidelbeere - that grows in forests and in the wild, but the American Northern Highbush Blueberry Vaccinium corymbosum - Amerikanische Heidelbeere - that is nowadays cultivated)

Within half an hour I had a small bucket full (a little more than 1 kg), not counting those that somehow never made it to the bucket but ended in my mouth directly.

Though, eventually, the rest will end up in my mouth anyway, as I made blueberry jam.

 

RTFM

In engineering RTFM stands for Read The F***ing Manual, also known as: "if you're trying to do something, it might a good idea to read the instructions first".

The same can be said for cross stitching.
Because, if the instructions say to stitch something over 1 (thread, that is), you shouldn't stitch it over 2 (threads).
Else, you get this:

 If, actually, you should have this:

By the way, this is the same fabric. The motive is just half the size. Which is a good size for a scissor fob. Which the over-2 clearly is not.
Ah, pattern: Teresa Wentzler's 'Delightful Dragon Fob'
And, yes, I know, the over-1 one is not ready yet. Have patience.

Sockblank

What is a sockblank and why would anybody bother?
A sockblank is a rectangular piece of knitting, made with two strands of sockweight yarn held together. You knit one (or buy one) so you can dye it, unravel it and then knit again, this time in the shape of a sock (or a shawl, or a pullover, ....)

Here, the knitted blank, after I soaked it for a couple of hours in water (not a good idea to dye a dry piece of fabric). I spread it out on cling film so the dye won't do funny things to my table.

Using various Kool-Aid packaged I painted the blank in various pattern. The color combination here is a bit wild, I admit, but as those were the only colors/flavors I had left, I didn't have much choice.

Next, I covered the blank with a second layer of cling film, rolled it up like a long sausage and placed in a glass dish. I put it in the microwave for 3 x 2min on full power, letting it set for a few minutes in between. Unlike my first experiment with Kool-Aid, I had no indicator if the colors have really set, but i think it might have been enough.

 Then I unraveled the blank and wound the two threads into skeins. This step is not really nesseccary, as you could knit directly of the blank if you want (doing two socks at the same time), but I wanted to see how the yarn looks, and, damn, it's pretty!

The first sock knitted from it. The pattern is froop loop, an older pattern from knitty. When I saw the skein, it sort of wanted to be that one, so who am I to protest.

As you can see, I started from the left of the blank (the orange section on the cuff) and ended about 2/3 through (before the next section of blue). Next time when I'm dying a blank, I will make less vertical stripes, as they lead to large stretches of just one color.
But over all I love the result. This is a lot of fun to do and I certainly will try again.