Alchemy Hour Sale

I honor of my birthday week I have made a coupon code to be used at Alchemy Hour.  From today till Sunday you can get 20% off your purchase at Alchemy Hour by using the code Bday20.

Don"t forget to enter the pattern giveaway!

First Custom Order Part I

I just recently landed my first custom dye order from a client.  It's been so much fun to dye a sweaters quantity of yarn and I've been taking photos to keep the client updated so I figured I'd share them here and let you see what's in the dye pot.  

Here are the five hanks of DK merino bare naked.  How scandalous!

The yarn took a nice relaxing soak in my bath tube before being tossed in the dye pot. 

My tools of the trade.  I will only be using three colors of dye for this order. 

Steeping in the dye.  This is the first of three rounds of color for this dye lot.  

As soon as the hanks are dry and ready to go I will post the final product.  My client also said that they would send me a photo of the finished sweater.  I can't wait to see it and will hopefully be able to share it here on the blog. 

Giveaway Winner!

And the giveaway winner is...Mandie!  

Congrats, let me know the best way to get in touch with you and I will make sure you super awesome swag gets to you as fast as possible.  

Alchemy Hour Give Away!

I am hosting an Alchemy Hour give away this month to celebrate my official opening of my newest yarn shop on Etsy.  One super lucky reader will receive a one of a kind small project bag and a hank of wool and silk lace weight yarn.  


The Goods:

Dot Art Small Project Bag 

This small drawstring pouch will protect your project and hold your yarn, needles and any other notions you may need. The bag is fully lined and has two inner pockets prefect for holding stitch markers, tapestry needles, double points or any other small knitting or crocheting accessory you made be using. Two drawstrings make closing you bag easy and keeps all your items safely within the bag.  

The colorful print is the best part of the pouch.  It is based off Australian Aboriginal Dot Art and the way the pattern moves and the colors used really make this fabric special.   The interior of this bag is lined with a teal batik fabric that reminds me of water falls and warm rain.  

Bag Stats:

8" tall x 6 1/2" long (at bottom of bag)x 4" wide
Opening at top of bag: 20"
Inner pockets: 5" x 4 1/4"
Drawstrings: About 10" apiece when closed

Pigeon, 440 Yards Hand Dyed Wool and Silk Lace Weight Yarn

This yarn is a lovely lace weight perfect for a small shawl or a lovely lace scarf.  The blend of Merino and Silk give this yarn a soft and lofty hand. 

The color was difficult to achieve, but worth the extra time in they dye pot, it has beautiful undertones of pinks and blues and the silk adds extra depth to the slate color of this yarn.  

Yarn Stats

Yardage: 440

Weight: Lace

Needle: US 0-3

Fiber: 70% Merino Wool, 30% Silk

How To Enter:

You must reside in the US for this giveaway.  Sorry internationals I'm not set up for international shipping just yet, but I will have a giveaway that is open to everyone later in the month.  

You must go to Alchemy Hour and pick out your favorite item, heart it and then leave me a comment below about it.

For additional entries you can do the following:

(Make sure to leave a new comment with your user name/link for every additional entry.)

-Follow @bluebetty on Twitter.

-Like Blue Betty on Facebook.

-Add Alchemy Hour to your circle on Etsy.

-Tweet about this giveaway.

-Follow this Blog

-Sign up for the Newsletter.

 All entries must be in by Sunday July 15th.  The winner will be announced Monday July 16th here on the blog.

Alchemy Hour: It's Official

Forest Birds, small project bag

It's offical, Alchemy Hour now has new stock.  Brand spankin' new stock of lace weight and sock yarn along with some new items, small project bags!  

Inside view of Lotus Blossoms, project bag

I love me some project bags.  I feel like I should have one for every project I am working on.  It keeps the project protected in a purse or tote bag as well as keeping all of your supplies together in one place.  The plan is to start with some small project bags and then start to make them in two more sizes down the road. 

French Lavender Hand Dyed Lace Weight Yarn 

I am also excited to start selling all of the beautiful hand dyed yarn that has come from my dye pot.  There will be lots more yarn added in the next few months.  There will be at least one shop update every month.  Here's a peek at some of the things you will find at Alchemy Hour this month. 

Midnight, Hand Dyed Lace Weight Yarn 

Tangerines, Hand Dyed Lace Weight Yarn

Cherry Wood, Hand Dyed, Fingering Weight Yarn

Night Watch, Hand Dyed, Fingering Weight Yarn

There is much more colorful goodness over at Alchemy Hour.  Go check out what's in stock.

Do you want to know what's going on at Alchemy Hour and Blue Betty before anyone else? Sign up for the Alchemy Hour and Blue Betty Newsletter to get sneak peaks at new patterns, special deals, and advance notice of shop updates.  Click the link below to sign up.  The newsletter is sent out once or twice a month, and only when something exciting is happening.

Newsletter Sign Up

Me Made Wardrobe: Summer Edition

I loved Me Made May '12 so much I didn't want it to end, but as soon as I said that statement I realized that wearing my me made wardrobe didn't stop because May was over.  I do wear my hand made items the rest of the year mixed and matched with my ready made items.  The whole point of this processes for me is to slowly have more handmade items in my closet and less ready made clothes.  That means planing a head a bit and looking at what I really love and want to sew.

Me Made May '12 Day 1

A few things happened this weekend.  First off my closet got another overhaul when I pulled out all my ready made clothes from the suitcase I had stored them in.  Anything that didn't fit, that I don't wear, or just isn't really my style will be donated.  This second cull wasn't as large as my first, but I got rid of a good chunk of clothes.  There are still a lot of clothes in the closet, and I have the feeling that I will be able to let go of even more as the summer moves on.  

Me Made May '12 Day 15

The second thing that happened is that I decided on how I am going to keep the Me Made May spirit alive this summer.  I am going to wear a outfit put together totally from my handmade items twice a week.  On top of that I am also going to wear a dress twice a week (handmade or ready made).  This way my dresses will get more action this summer and I won't feel guilty about making more (or about the three cotton jersey ones I bought).  Like Me Made May '12 I will photo document all of my me made outfits for the summer here on the blog and on my facebook page.  This will officially start today and go through to labor day.  It might go on longer than that, we'll just have to wait and see.   

Me Made May '12 Day 16

Thirdly I worked my tail off this weekendand am super sleepy.  I sewed new project bags for Alchemy Hour, went to the farmers market, cooked lots of food (roasted radishes are delicious, who knew), had an unexpected but awesome house guest on Friday, baby sat late on Saturday, started knitting a sample for my good knitter friend Nicole over on NoTwoSnowflakes  (I can't say much about the project other than it's green and black and 100% silk), and finally finished off the the weekend with a softball game at 9pm.  I am going to pour myself some more java and plant my self on the couch with my knitting until it's time to go to work.    

New project bags for Alchemy Hour.  These bags are reversible.

The Dye Pot

I got my new dyes and my base yarn and I got down to work dying some fab yarn.  Here are three of my latest lovelies.

Here is one of my first hanks of yarn.  I still had a couple hanks of sock yarn to dye and this is one of them.  This hank has browns and pinks in it and it reminds me of the cherry trees on our block.

Right now I'm just experimenting and getting my bearings with the new dyes.  I purchased a kit that came with yellow, black, a warm blue, and a cool blue, a warm red and a cool red.  Then I purchased two extra dye colors, purple and brown.  I've heard stories of blue and red separating and not creating an even purple so I thought why take the chance and I don't want to be bothered to mix brown especially if the dye company has already done it for me.

This hank is the lace weight yarn that I purchased and wow, this color was amazing to dye.  This was the first hank I dyed with my new dyes and wow, I can't even begin to describe how excited I was when I saw this come out of the dye pot.  It was also the first time I used black and I may have fallen in love.  This was a combination of the cool blue, the purple and of course the black.

Now this hank of yarn is for me.  I purchased some Ahimsa silk from my LYS it was the natural color so I thought why not dye it and see what these dyes could do.  Ta Da!  I wanted a cool watery blue that reminded me of the water in Forster in NSW Australia and I am pleased with how it came out.  I think I want to dye more of this base for Alchemy Hour so I will be looking into finding more.

2012

I am excited to see what 2012 holds in store for Blue Betty and me as well.  In the past I always talk about my personal resolutions and this year I'm not really making any.  Let me rephrase this I am making goals for me and for Blue Betty and starting up something new in the process.

For Blue Betty I have a bunch of goals for the blog as well as designs that I want to publish in the year to come.   One of these goals is to have more tutorials and guest bloggers on the blog.  Along those lines I am excited to be bringing back Vintage Finds Friday and Fiber Friday to the blog.

Now for the new thing.  I am going to start dying yarn on a more regular basis and am splitting my Etsy shop into two separte shops. My patterns and finished items will still be found in BlueBettyShop while all my hand dyed yarn will be in my new shop Alchemy Hour.  You can pop over now and get a look at my banner and some other bits and bobs.  Alchemy Hour will be open in the new year.

On a personal note I am making just two goals.  I want to start getting up a tiny bit earlier, mostly so I can get more stuff accomplished before work and my second goal is to surf more.  I mean as soon as it's the weather for surfing.

What goals or resolutions do you have for 2012?
See you in the New Year!