Sarah Bird

It is the time of year where we are seeking out those perfect somethings for those perfect someones, and Sarah Bird's Etsy shop would be a fabulous place to start! Not only is she obviously talented, but she makes a wide variety of great items from recycled wool barrettes & rompers, to recycled cashmere baby blankets & hats.

Knitting gauge

A customer of mine gave me a great tip (Thanks Melissa!). She said that it would be helpful to use a knitting gauge for the froggable sweaters, so the yarn reclaimers would have a better idea of what they were getting. I went into my local yarn shop to see if they had them, and not only did I find one, but found some wonderful customer service and a fun store. If you are ever in Geneva and need yarn or knitting supplies, I highly recommend checking out Wool & Company. Now when I list a froggable sweater, like this lovely example from Iceland, I can take pictures of the knit gauge against the sweater! What do you think froggers?

Christmas crafts!

I have to decided that this year I will be making all my Christmas presents for my friends & family. With my husband laid off, I have the time, and homemade gifts are so much nicer! I want to share it all with you, but my family & friends read my blog! I have set up an online photo album, that is shared by a link. If you email me, krisnstevep(at)netzero(dot)com, I will give you the link. If you just put "link, please!" in the subject of your email, you don't even have to write anything, and i'll forward you the link. I will be adding things as I make them, and the link will remain the same, so you can save it. Please feel free to leave comments and suggestions under my photos... I need all the help I can get!

Sweater Sunday

What a busy weekend! I won't bore you with the details, and get on with the sweaters! I was late getting to the thrift store, and had a headache, so I didn't look as hard as I usually do, but I still managed to get a few goodies.
The wool,

The cashmere,

and the fun prints (love the little houses!)

Happy Sweater Sunday all! Tune in tomorrow for my super secret Christmas crafts!

The skinny on wool blends

I see a LOT of recycled wool tutorials. Almost all of them will say "you must use 100% wool". I say, that's great if you got it, but blends can work just as well in most cases, and there are a lot of fun patterns & colors out there in blends. A huge factor in your blend is whether or not the other fibers are synthetic or animal fiber. I consider anything animal fiber "wool" in my head when figuring out a blend. If something is 80%wool/20% angora, it is 100% "wool". If it is 80%wool/20% nylon, now that is something different. Generally, the more wool (or animal fiber), the better & easier they will felt (or full). I don't mind taking chances on blends for some projects though.

I am making **** (secret Christmas presents... more info on that coming soon to my blog), and didn't really need water repelling attributes (though they were repelling the water in the wash quite well), just felted wool. I threw in 3 blends that were lower in wool content than I will sell. All 3 felted up nicely and will be perfect for my projects! Here are pictures of the sweaters, and the seams I cut. I pulled at each of the cuts before taking the pics, so you can see there is no unraveling at all. The sweaters' fiber contents are:
dark fair isle - 60% wool, 40%acrylic (60% animal fiber)
pale aqua - 48% wool, 22% viscose, 16% nylon, 9% angora, 5% cashmere (62% animal fiber)
pink stripes - 50% wool, 20% rayon, 15% nylon, 10% angora, 5% cashmere (65% animal fiber)
I can't guarantee that all blends this low will felt, but the majority of the time, they will.




Now when you are using wool for diaper covers (longies, soakers, wool wraps), there are some different rules. I would not recommend anything under 80% animal fiber for diaper covers (though some lower blends will work fine, many will not). I have diaper covers that I have made from a 80% wool/20% nylon sweater, and they work fine, though of course, 100% wool is best when available. Never use blends with cotton, or silk, as they will wick moisture, and will retain smells.

Any questions class? ;)

tissue holder

This is a tissue holder I made a few weeks ago. It has really come in handy, since the tissues stay perfect inside it, after being jostled around in my purse. Cute, eh? Makes a great Christmas gift! It is easily made with your recycled wool scraps (merino is a good one for this). Just wrap a piece around a purse pack of tissues, making sure it overlaps a little, sew your sides, and you have a tissue holder. Ears, eyes, & fangs optional. ;)

100! 100! 100!

I now have 100 followers of my blog, thanks to each & every one of you 100 followers, so you deserve a sale! For the next 100 hours (sale ends Sunday at 11am central time), take 100 pennies ($1) off of every individually listed sweater in my shop, and 100 cents off of every 2 sweaters in a lot (50 cents off each one...for example, a 10 sweater lot will be $5 off) ! This kind of sale kinda makes you want to buy 100 sweaters, eh? ;)

eta: Sorry, but I forgot to leave instructions for the sale! The prices in my shop are full price. You can either pay the whole amount & i'll refund you the difference right away, or check out through Artfire and contact me for a revised Paypal invoice.