Today I am very busy with my first ever shift as editor on the new Refashion Co-op blog so instead of showing you what I did today I will instead show you the Valentines card my dear husband made and gave me the other day.

"This Monday (Valentines day for an easy to remember blog anniversary) I and 6 other wonderful women launched the Refashion Co-op. I want to share with you today a little about each of these women and their blogs but first I want to tell you that: WE NEED YOU! Ok that was more yelling than telling. But it’s true. We started the Refashion Co-op as a network and a place to get inspiration. But without YOU contributing your refashions or commenting and encouraging others in their refashions, well, it’s just not going to work."

Join me on Twitter (@EddieDuckling) or on the Grey Duckling blog

In the last couple of weeks of the TAD challenge I have been doing quite a bit of sweater recycling. Over the last two days I decided to use some of those bits of sweater that were left over from the yarn making to make some sweater beads. I originally wanted to felt them - which I tried. But sadly some of the wool knit just doesn't want to felt. But I will continue to try - next stop the tumble dryer!

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tad-day-14-15-leftover-sweater-beads-nwfEDlBEmpabxbgrmDeG.zip (1.03 MB)

Today the weather was aweful and this did put a damper on my plan to make a Valentines decoration outside. So I had to run out in the rain to get the budding branches and buying the daphodiles from the farmers market in the rain wasn't as fun either. But I wanted to do this to have somewhere to hang my hearts.

If you have made hearts for Valentines how about sharing them on 'A World in Love' too!

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tad-day-13-valentines-decoration-njfuDEngzAsurghCojsu.zip (712 KB)

Yesterday I had a go with this pink/green colour mix yarn and I really liked it. Today I decided to try out Judy's magic cast-on for toe-up socks (from Knitty) on this same yarn.

I have made the toe's so far and it worked wonderfully. No more short-row toes for me, my friend. I'm hooked. Thanks Judy!

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tad-day-12-magic-toe-socks-jveppExwGjnxifBsJbdr.zip (434 KB)

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tad-day-11-more-colour-mixes-IpAJsBEqajwAxgmEfbGv.zip (310 KB)

Today I'm just going to let the pictures speak for themselves.

If you are interested in details catch me on twitter/facebook or have a peek at my blog.

Eddie

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Twitter: @EddieDuckling

Facebook: Eddie Roued

Blog: Grey Duckling

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tad-day-10-fun-with-colours-oAplxgIehxpciwJhbnvy.zip (527 KB)

So what have I been up to today craft wise. Well I tell you - life is catching up on me so I didn't really have time for much, but I did sit down for 15 min and have a look at a new fun little idea of something to do with all this yarn I have been making. 

As you may have notices of over the last couple of weeks - I do frog a lot of sweaters to get to the yarn so that I can reuse it. But today I finally got to some of the less fun colours. I already have some colours that I plan to dye but some are too dark for this. So I thought how about mixing two colours. 1) I get a thicker yarn and 2) I get more fun yarn. Because let's face it most sweaters/blouses these days are not exactly made out of fun yarn. Also, since I go through all this trouble of making recycled yarn I might as well add my own little stamp on it. 

So today I mixed two types of red cotton that I had and knit a sample square and I did the same to a light teal cashmere and a light blue Ramie/Silk mix. In a way this mixing of colours and fibres reminds me of some experimental yarns I made last year under the name of Rare Breed yarns on Grey Duckling. I really liked the Green merino / undyed soya mix and the red silk / khaki cashmere mix. 

I really like the result and I may have some more fun with this tomorrow. 

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tad-day-9-update-on-my-echo-flower-shawl-mxdIizgkImIHdekgmiIG.zip (983 KB)

Today I want to show you some pictures of the finished and stretched shawl. 

I wrote a post on Historic Crafts about Estonian lace shawls that might interest. There is also some help over there if you are up for giving lace knitting a try yourself. 

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tad-day-8-more-sweater-yarn-and-the-first-day-in-the-garden-ldsymswEiolikcktwgcy.zip (428 KB)

Today I decided to give this pink lambswool blouse a go to make some yarn out of it. The thing is though that this makes for very thin yarn once it is unravelled - 24 st pr inch. So it will have to be 3-plied using the Navaho technique to make it a sports weight yarn that I can use. But I don't have a spinning wheel at my disposal at the moment so this final step will have to wait. If you are interested in spinning and plying have a look at Historic Crafts.

I have great plans for this yarn though - I want to make a toy pig! Yes you heard me. A pig! I adore pigs.

See my other yarns on Grey Duckling where I am also writing a post on making yarn from sweaters. This post is still a work in progress and if you have any questions or suggestions - feel free to add them in the comments. 

I also wanted to share with you a picture from my first day in the garden in 2011. I brought down this new knitting project I just began. It is a lace shawl using the AeRang pattern. If you are on Ravelry come on over and have a look at the pattern.

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tad-day-7-some-more-hearts-for-the-garland-iCFAlqroBwqgpGmurwzs.zip (419 KB)

I began my heart garland about a week ago on the first TAD day and today I made a couple more and I now have 5 all together. I only have 7 days left to make some more for the A World in Love project (described below). 

Are you making a heart or two for Valentines too. If so you are so very welcome to share it with us on the flickr group. 

The hearts i am making here are crochet with a magenta wool (see it on Grey Duckling) that I ripped from a sweater and 3-plyed last year. On TAD day four and six I did some more sweater unravelling. 

The pattern for the heart garland can be found free here on Skip to my Lou!

The idea behind A World in Love is really simple:

1. Handcraft a heart (anything goes!)
2. Take a picture of this heart in front of a place that means a lot to you
3. Share the image (flickr group, or post in in the Ravelry or the facebook group and it will be uploaded for you onto flickr) and us know where the place is!
4. Tell us about your handcrafted heart and why you took the photo where you did (optional)

The best bit is that all the hearts will be geo-tagged on flickr so that we can see how the love has spread across the world.

So are you going to join us. We hope you will. As of today you have 7 days to craft a heart in one way or another and share it with us.

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tad-day-6-preparing-yarn-for-dyeing-ibmIbxCwHhjswFonooEr.zip (1.32 MB)

Today I have been rather busy tidying my recycled sweater yarn on Ravelry and adding yarn to Grey Duckling. I have also been preparing this yellow yarn today. The yellow yarn is form a cotton sweater and I am planning to dye it with onion peel to get a more powerful yellow.

I also began writing this post on Grey Duckling about how to make yarn from recycled sweaters. The idea with the post is that it should contain a load of good links that you can use if you want to make or use recycled yarn. if you have any other suggestions or links do let me know. The post is still a work in process.

I have also been doing some more on the green sweater from the other day (TAD day 4). The bit's that can be unraveled into yarn can be cut up and felted.