Little miss rainbow

Another little cardigan for little H

Pattern Demoiselle arc-en-ciel

Top down really easy, 

Nicely stripped

I decided to add strippes on the pocket too

Dyed my own yarn, kit only avaible in Europe

Main color was Dharma Sand Dune

Yarn De Rerum Natura Gilliat

Little sunny dress

For my little H

Pattern Sunny Lou dress by Annie Rowden

Yarn Wool2dye4 bfl merino SW sport weight

Color Irish green, Jade Dharma dye

Making recycled yarn new again

Once we get yarn from our sweater, the challenge is to entangle it

I used a steam technique to make the yarn new again

I put each skein in the vegetable basket of my giant pot

Put some water to steam inside the pot

Steam reach the yarn in the basket

Left the yarn there 3 times 20 minutes, letting the steam reaching all area of the yarn

Put yarn to dry around the umbrella to straight it out

Then put back in skein

Yarn is magically untangled and like new again

Dyeing recycled yarn

Got a few samples of the yarn for the 2 sewater, enough to play around with dye

Now I am experimenting with dye not nowing how the yarn will appear after dyeing

With the light grey yarn

With the off white yarn

Well it is interesting colors are not the same as indicated on the label

On the right the original color from label

On the left the color with the grey yarn

On the right the original color from label

On the left the color with the off white yarn

Well now let's untangle the unravelled yarn

2 sweaters into plenty of yarn to unravel, dye and knit again

Went shopping and brough back 2 very large sweaters, none of them I would even wear.

WHAT!!!!

Yes, I don't buy any sweater any more, only if I can reuse the yarn later.

I like to buy sweaters from expensive stores at 80% off and unravel the yarn.

I look for 

- good quality sweaters

- dk weight yarn are my favorite 

- no surger finish, like in this picture otherwise it will be a torture to unravel

- merino blend, 100% is the best but it is hard to find so the highest % is the best

Once you have the right sweater, you just have to find the right threat and pull. 

It will easily separate all parts of the sweater

Once you have your sweater in a few pieces, you can star to unravel

Note thar you usually start to unravel at the top of each pieces not at the ribbing

Little by little make it into a ball

And soon you will a few balls of great yarn

Next we will see how to color, untangle and finally knit it in a new project...

Dec 31, along Pacific Coast Highway...

Time to drive back home, leaving San Diego and taking route 1 from Laguna beach to Oxnard

First stop, a dream comes true, one of my favorite yarn store from NYC 

and I don't have to fly to go there

I couldn't leave without some Liberty!!

Last Christmas gift of 2015

Laguna beach, post card perfect Cali town

Last sunset of 2015 from Manhattan Beach one of my favorite spot

Best New year celebration

Hope this little trip pleased you, I know I had a lot of fun

next won't be until this summer, somewhere new for me...

Dec 30, one last day in San Diego

Enjoying our last day in San Diego

Coronado bridge 

Visiting seaport village and running into new year festivity and mini marathon

Driving along the coast and having lunch in Encinitas

Then a little history

Quiet funky place to visit

One last stop in one of the best Italian area in the US

Sunset on the San Diego bay

Tomorrow is New year eve, time to go home...