From scratch

This project was made from scratch... really...

I wanted to show Christopher how can one dye wool with Kool Aid.

So we started some australian merino, I bought at the big craft fair.

And we dyed it. I could swear I had pictures from the whole process, but I can't find them now. But the result was this:

Then I spun it up and plyed with my lovely star shaped spindle I got from this seller on Etsy. The shape is so cute and I love that it is big enough to ply two normal spindleful of singles on it.

Then I skeined it. I winded it the legs of a stool...

Then winded in a centerpull ball...

Then I started thinking really hard to figure out what to knit with it. Thanks to my friend, Angela, who's blog have a Ravelry search feature. She pointed out the pattern for 198 yds of heaven. Which was absolutely perfect for me. It is made from smaller amount of yarn (as opposite the 800-1000 meter requiremenet of aregular lace shawl.), it is lace and shows off the yarn pretty well. Also it is modular and can be made bigger or smaller to use every bit of yarn.

So I took my 4 mm straight bamboo needles and set knitting.

Eight (yes, that is 8!!!) hours of knitting later I cast off.

And set blocking. After that:

I did more repeats than in the original pattern, and since I wanted to use every bit of yarn I have I stopped at the end of a repeat (instead of stopping at half repeat as recommended in the pattern), and tinkered with the edging to get it lined up with the pattern and have pointier edges.

Then I asked my son to make a picture of me wearing it!

Thank you my mom, and grandma handing down all those genes.
Thank you Marion for the cool spindle.

Thank you Abby Franquemont for the great videos and wonderful blog full of advice. I don't have anybody to show me things, your stuff is the next best thing.
Thank you Angela for pointing me toward the pattern.
Thank you Christopher for the pictures!