Growing Geraniums (Or Not)

Geraniums are one of my fav flowers in backyard pots. Mixed with perennial groundcover, the splashes of vivid colors brighten up the entire area.

Each year, I have tried to “save” my geraniums over the winter. I have tried wintering the plants by hanging the bare roots in an outdoor shed (no luck). And I have tried several times trying to save the plants in the garage (also no luck). Maybe they did not get enough water, light or heat out there, or maybe they just did not want to survive.

But this year, lo and behold, one pot of roots that was relegated to our garage for the winter FINALLY made it! And it is large enough to make a visual impact this week in our potted plant area of the patio.

Gardeners often like to experiment and keep over their geraniums from year to year. This is possible by taking cuttings in late August and rooting them … Plants can also be dug, trimmed back to one half their original height, repotted and placed in a sunny window for the winter months. Some people also save geraniums by digging them, removing soil and hanging from the rafters in the basement on hooks. In general this method will work under high humidity, 85 to 90 percent and cool temperatures of 50 to 55 degrees F, but modern homes are too dry, thus causing dehydration of the plant. Because there is no sure way of knowing if this method will work in your home, try it and if successful you will have plants next spring.

This information is from Ohio State University.

We put out about a dozen new geraniums this spring. We’ll see if they can survive the summer of 2008 and into the winter of 2009!

Dyeing with Kool Aid

Kool Aid as a dye intrigues me. Kool Aid has many pleasing properties when mixed with sugar as a drink. But I never knew it could be used for dyeing purposes until I started researching a bit into the fiber world.

Each color of Kool Aid will produce a differing hue on yarns. One "color chart" of Kool Aid colors is shown in the picture at the left. It comes from this site.

I decided to dye some hand spun wool to see how it might work up. Of course, I Googled various sites and came up with this information from Knitpicks:

Getting started dyeing with drink mixes: All you need is a microwave, a selection of unsweetened powdered drink mixes, canning jars or microwave safe glass containers and small skeins of yarn. To get your yarn ready, wash it lightly in mild soap and then let it soak in the sink while you mix up your solutions.

Mix up your solutions: A good rule of thumb is 2 packages of unsweetened drink mix per 50 grams of yarn. Empty your packages of drink mix into your microwave-safe dish with some water. Stir to dissolve. Add your yarn and enough water to cover it. Heat and set your color. Zap your yarn-filled dish for two minutes. Let the yarn rest for a few minutes, then zap it again for another two minutes. Continue this process until the yarn takes up most of the color leaving the water nearly clear.

Finish your yarn:Let the yarn cool in the container. Then, rinse it thoroughly in water the same temperature as the yarn. Wash the yarn in mild soap, rinse again and let dry.

Ok, so after reading the above, I decided to do the dyeing in a simpler manner. I decided that blue would be a safe color, because any hue would turn out to be satisfactory for coloring wool. Here is how I did the dyeing:

1) Wet the yarn thoroughly (uncolored wool in picture at right);

2) Dissolve two packages of Berry Blue Kool Aid in about 2 qts. of boiling water;

3) Let the yarn soak in the Kool Aid for about 30 minutes. All the colored water is absorbed by the yarn, and the water has just a hint of blue left in it since all the blue dye is absorbed by the wool.

4) I put about a cup of vinegar in the rinse water, then wrung the rinse water out of the yarn;

5) Final step: I drained the yarn in a colander and let it set out to dry thoroughly.

The resulting yarn was a very nice blue! I can use it for scarf-making in the fall. And the whole process took less than an hour.

Bucket Hats - Art & Jazz Festival

Grand Junction, Colorado hosted their 20th Anniversary Wells Fargo
Art and Jazz Festival over the weekend.

Main Street comes alive with jazz music performed by local and national artists, artist demonstrations in a variety of mediums and artists selling beautiful, high-quality work. This three-day festival surrounds the re-installation of Art on the Corner sculptures. A celebration of art and music, this outdoor event features street vendors, live music, extended shopping hours with participating merchants and other fun activities.

One of the almost 100 juried art vendors along Main Street over the weekend offered handmade clothing products for children. All the items were reversible with different fabrics on each side.

Here is a contrasting vintage fabric bucket. How cute!! It has a Velcro bow attachable to either side of the hat. And it is just the ticket for my four year old grand niece in Texas.

If you would like to made a hat, a great website is this one: Hats. There are all types of patterns there that can be sewn, crocheted or knit. Be sure and scroll through to the last pages. Those last two pages have the pattern (downloadable to your printer).

And this picture is fabric and ribbon that I want to make up into a hat using a Butterick pattern. The material will be made into a similar one shown in yellow in the upper left corner of the photo. It is just one of those projects still on the drawing board.