Knit Rhapsody

It still hasn't stopped snowing and the numerous jokes about the first days of spring in Sofia are beginning to get old :) All Sunday I was on the edge getting ready for a photosession of my new short skirt, but it simply wouldn't stop snowing - a heavy, wet snow, that initially melted, but gradually began to pile and pack, closing some of the main mountain passes of the country.

So, instead of modeled pictures of my sewing, a few birds on the branches of the plum tree in front of our balcony - and the poor tree was just beginning to bloom :(

And my latest make - a rayon knit Rhapsody. This is my sixth (!!!) Rhapsody blouse, a pattern by Love Notions, and my first, made out of knit fabric. I had to modify the pattern significantly, as the smallest size SX is rather large, and the recommendation for knit fabrics is to go down one size. But what do you do when you have no where lower to go - you improvise.

Made on the overlocker, with a single layer yoke and a simple round neckline, it is more of a fancy comfortable t-shirt, than a dress-up blouse, as my other Rhapsodies. And because of the cold weather this time I chose the full length bishop sleeves - Gaby said enough with 3/4 sleeves :). 

Again, only a few flat shots of the front and the back of the blouse, I hope to have more decent photos of it later, when spring actually comes here.

Cotton Dyes

I finally opened my cotton dyes and did some dyeing. I had two balls of white yarn, about 80 g, unraveled from old projects. I knew the yarn was rayon and probably some acrylic, and because rayon is made out of cellulose I supposed I should be able to dye it with cotton dye, as it is intended for natural cellulose fibers like cotton, linen and hemp. I skeined all of the yarn and dip dyed it in purple dye.

I had thought that all of the yarn was the same, but the dyeing revealed its different origins - one of the balls was from an older purchase and it had larger viscose content, so it took more of the purple color, while the other ball had more acrylic content and it took less of the dye.

Here the difference is quite noticeable:

The two balls wound separately.

And because I had quite a lot of dye in the pot, I decided to overdye a ball of neon blue cotton-acrylic yarn. First I dip dyed it in the remaining purple and then I made a new dye bath of burgundy dye and dip dyed it in it from the other end. I'm quite please with how this cotton-acrylic yarn took the dye - the original color and the new color.

I decided to use the newly dyed yarn to make a mitered square cover for the settee on the balcony. I have plenty of scrap cotton-acrylic yarn and I bought three more colors of cotton dye, so it'll be fun. The only thing I have yet to decide is whether to knit all of the squares separately or to connect them as I go - lots of pros and cons in both directions, but I feel like I'm leaning towards the separate knitting and rearanging them by colors and connecting them when I finish the knitting.

Menemsha

Pattern: Menemsha Pullover by Angela Hahn
Yarn: Lino 25 % linen, 75% viscose, 250 g
Needle: 3.5 mm
Time to knit: quite a lot of time for the yoke, three days for the body

Finally a quick photo session. I feel I said all there was to say about this pattern in my previous post, so just a few more photos of this little summer top. A lucky combination of yarn, color and pattern, which makes it one of my favorites for the summer.