Shameless self-promotion

I'm getting rid of some of my stash on eBay. Click on the link to see my auctions.

Open for business

I've changed the comments template so that non-Bloggers can comment as well.

My needles are on fire

The MIL's scarf is pretty much done. I'm going to add some fringing because the edges look a bit bare - and as a quick way to add length.
No close-ups until Boxing Day otherwise it will ruin the surprise.

I am still flushed with success from my orange Brie gloves, so I've moved on to a pair of striped fingerless gloves for Madam in black acrylic and silver Rowan Lurex Shimmer.

The current Rowan magazine is my favourite so far. I've got my eye on so many patterns that I won't have time to do them all before the weather warms up in March. Fortunately the patterns I like look fairly timeless.

One complaint

Why are the womens' jumper patterns so small? I'm not super-sized (a 16-18 on top), but only providing patterns up to a 40-inch bust is lazy and must exclude a large proportion of Rowan customers. It can't be a space consideration, either. If SIrdar can squeeze all the measurements on to one page of A4, then so can Rowan.
Surely many people knit their own clothes to get a better fit?
My maths skills are not up to upsizing patterns and I don't see why I should have to do so. I'm a paid-up member of the Rowan Club and I'm being treated like a second-class citizen. I will email Rowan to see what they have to say.
Rant over!

Goody, goody, yum, yum

My stash runneth over this weekend.

Not only did I get some red Koigu for a Mothers' Day present ...


..but I also got some navy Rowan Magpie to finish a project that is haunting me...

I made my husband a sweater in September, which I had designed. He loved it, but sadly the body is too short. At that time I was sick of navy yarn and 3.25mm needles. But now I've completed a few other projects, I feel ready to revisit this sweater. It's really a case of undoing the bottom edge and knitting a few more edges. Wish me luck!

Get Knitted had some Biggy Print on sale. My sister bought me a ball as part of my birthday present. I'm still not sure whether I'm going to make a bag, mittens or hat. Either way I bought another ball as insurance.

Praise where it's due

Got a lovely surprise in the post this morning - three skeins of Koigu and my Gypsy pattern from the fantastic getknitted website, which is the only British stockist of Koigu.

Super-fast delivery and friendly service. I shall be placing another order for woolly goodies in the next few days.
Pictures - as usual - in due course.

Non-knitting news: Sainsbury's have started stocking root beer, which tastes like fizzy cough mixture - definitely an acquired taste. Now, if I can find a British stockist of green relish, I'll be a happy lady.
There are loads of retailers in the US that sell British foods - I wonder whether I can find one that sells American foodstuffs in the UK?

Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers.

Bed? What bed?

I know I said that my bed was calling ... well, I lied!

My creative juices are flowing tonight and I wanted to get some thoughts down before I turn in for the night.
I'm going to make the Rowan Karis cape with some purpley/bluey/browney Colinette mohair from le stash.
I also fancy making a white Rockstar scarf with white eyelash and some pastel variegated baby yarn. This will be worn with my newly-acquired white scarf. Oooh - and what about some sleeveless mittens as well?

My fingers will have smoke pouring out of them by January.

Over-ambitious? Moi??

Say cheese

Knitting the second glove definitely felt like a drag and I was glad to get it over and done with. Him indoors thinks they look like rubber gloves, but the long sleeves will be hidden by jackets and will keep out any winter draughts.

For my sins, however, I'm going to make a striped fingerless pair for my sis. I plan to use the Fawne pattern by Kim Hargreaves, using a silver Rowan Lurex Shimmer and some grey alpaca from my stash.

But first, back to my mother-in-law's scarf. I had a brainwave last night. Why struggle trying to blend together yarns and sequins, when I can use a beautiful, elegant yarn that will be more my MIL's cup of tea*

Enter Giotto by Colinette.

* I really like the original scarf, but I used mostly stockinette stitch, which keeps curling in and holographic sequins are more my cup of tea

I'm using the same pattern that I used to make this Sprout jumper

The original from knitty.com

And my effort is here


But I digress...

This Giotto yarn is a beauty. The Moss shade is a shimmery delight of pale green with the odd spot of pale gold. It reminds me of the colours of leaves in early spring.
The recommended needle size is 8mm. I'm using US size 10 needles, which is a 6mm. This means that the scarf won't take too long to knit, but I don't want to cut corners by using massive needles. Besides, if I went any smaller, the scarf would be as flexible as cardboard.
I think I need to go to bed!

Glove affair

Finished the second glove last night. You'll have to take my word for it at the moment, but they look gorgeous!
I'm not going to thread ribbon through the wrist part because that's too fiddly, and the decrease on that part means they fit like a glove (!) anyway.

I'm so impressed with these gloves that I'm going to make the fingerless ones from the current Rowan magazine as well.

Back soon...

UFO spotting

This was meant to be an iPod cover. All I know is that the yarn is from Colinette. I'm using something else as an iPod cover, but I'd welcome any suggestions about what I can knit with the yarn instead..

Faerynuff wanted to know where I got the Kitty hat pattern from. Here's the web address for you... http://www.kittyville.com/knit/kitty_hat.html

One glove...

I'm really proud of this Brie glove. Not only does it look lovely (it's my blog and I'll crow if I want to!), but it fits and the Kidsilk Haze yarn is so soft and snuggly.


The real beauty of the pattern is that you don't need DPNs, which are the bane of my life. However, you will need to seam the fingers, but it only takes a couple of minutes to do each one. If you squint hard, you should be able to see to eyelet detail on this pic

The other one should only take a few hours to complete, which is just as well because I tend to run out of steam when it comes to knitting anything that comes in a pair. I am so pleased that the first one has turned out well that finishing the second half feels like a chore!

Glove love

After so many false starts with Charlotte's Web, it's lovely to be able to settle down and just knit. I am up to the middle finger of my first Brie glove. It feels strange working with such tiny needles (size 2.5mm) after the 6.5s that I used for the Kitty Hat.

The Kidsilk Haze yarn is like knitting spiderweb - in a nice way. It's so soft and lovely, although too easy to drop stitches. I think it would be better if I switched to bamboo needles, which are more 'grippy', but the smallest size I have in bamboo is 3mm.

Oh well, slow and steady wins the race, as they say...

I'm going to be knitting lots over the next couple of months. I need to lose a stone by January 19 - and if I'm knitting, I can't be eating ... well, it helped me give up smoking!

Bad Charlotte

I can't get my head around the Charlotte's Web pattern, so to save tearing all my hair out, I've had to retire it for now.
The pattern was so confusing that I've had more relaxing times filling in my tax return. I had tried everything - looking on the web for advice, writing the pattern out line by line, blowing the pattern up to A3 size, but nothing worked. In the end, I just admitted defeat and ripped out what I had done.
I'm all for a challenging pattern. But when a pattern consists of incomplete charts and confusing instructions, that's just sloppy work.
All I want to do is produce a beautiful shawl, not crack a secret code.

So now I am knitting a pair of gloves from the current Rowan magazine (issue 36). The pattern is called Brie, and I'm knitting it in Marmalade Kidsilk Haze.
It's a real breath of fresh air compared to Charlotte. Just simple, straightforward knitting. I'm using US size 11 and 12, which translates to UK 2 and 3. Compared to the UK6.5s that I used for the Kitty hat, it feels like I'm knitting with toothpicks.

I refuse to be beaten by the shawl problem. I've ordered the Koigu Gypsy shawl pattern and some more Koigu yarn from Get Knitted. I hope this won't be a case of once bitten, twice shy.
I noticed that Kerrie also had tribulations with Charlotte and swapped to the Gypsy pattern - at least I'm not alone!

Good Charlotte

I'm really beginning to enjoy Charlotte's Web right now. The enlarged chart makes a world of difference.
I keep changing my mind about which combination of colours to use. For now, I'm going to stick to greens and purples. The red/purple Koigu skeins can be put aside to make another Charlotte for someone else.



This is a close-up. It's hard to see the pattern at the moment, but blocking it will make the lacework stand out much more.


I might be back to tearing my hair out later on because the chart only goes up to row 50 and there are 150 rows to complete. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Kitty is complete

Here is the completed Kitty hat. I think the ears make it look more like a donkey or kangaroo, but it keeps my head lovely and warm. I might make one in some red chunky yarn that's been languishing in my stash...


I've deilberately made this picture really small. I don't want to put anyone off their lunch!!!

Charlotte update

Now we're getting somewhere. I enlarged the pattern and chart to A3 size. The pattern was just as confusing, even when I transposed each line onto a separate sheet of paper.
However, the chart makes much more sense when blown up to A3 size, and I've managed to make it onto row 19 without too many tears!

The moral of the day? When knitting with Charlotte, use the chart and ignore the pattern!

Pictures tomorrow, hopefully!

Charlotte headache

Tried to make a start with Charlotte's Web this morning. In fact, I tried to make a start four times before admitting defeat with the pattern, which is written really badly.
I don't know whether they are trying to save space, but all the instructions are jumbled up together on a couple of sheets of A4 paper, rather than being laid out clearly line by line. So even when I used a row counter as well as a ruler to block out the previous line of instruction, I still got horribly confused.
I have blown up the pattern to A3 paper to see if that makes a difference.
Failing that, I'll have to copy each line of pattern on a plain sheet of paper before knitting it.

The kitty has landed...

This has been one of my quickest knits. I started casting on yesterday morning, had a break in the afternoon to tackle some housework and by about midnight I had a hat.
Originally I used a black aran yarn but I realised that the hat would end up too small, so I switched to this Sirdar chunky with 6.5mm bamboo needles. I have a headful of curly hair extensions, so my hats need to have a very generous fit.

I'll post the name of the Sirdar yarn later on.



NEWSFLASH I have finished the ears! I will try to post the finished article later on tonight.

Now what shall I knit next? I have got a few things that need to be finished off (bags to be seamed, cushions to be stuffed etc). I'll tackle those this week and get them off my conscience.

I can't wait to start Charlotte's Web. Although I have the CW knitalong button, I'm not a fan of knitalongs. I just feel as if I have to finish the piece by the knitalong deadline. I put the buttons on this blog to remind myself of what I'd like to knit.

Here kitty, kitty

I'm now working on the Kitty62 hat, which has induced circular needle fatigue. You are supposed to work on 16" circular needles, which I find too narrow to work on comfortably. Once you begin the decreases, you then have to switch to DPNs, which I hate because they are so fiddly.
So I'm going to switch to 'ordinary' bamboo needles instead. Having to seam the hat afterwards is a small price to pay for not having to use DPNs.
No pictures because this hat is made from black wool, which doesn't photograph very well, and I'm sure you don't want to see a black blob.
Had a great night out on Saturday at a friends birthday party. It was at a new club/bar space in Shoreditch, which is east of the City of London. It's one of the last bits of ungentrified central London, so there are lots of derelict buildings, grubby factories and dubious 'saunas' around. It reminds me of Clerkenwell about 10 years ago when I had a job there. In those days (!) there wasn't even a cash machine or a decent cafe. Now you can't move for clubs, bars, loft apartments and chi-chi shops.
I'm at work now. I've finished editing my page. Now I have to wait for another 30 minutes to make sure nothing big appears on the newswires. Then I can make my escape and spend an hour or so in front of the TV with a cup of tea.

The long and winding road...

This is the infamous scarf being blocked on my spare bed. I had a problem with the scarf curling in on itself. There were three solutions:
1. Frog it and start again, but this time knitting a 5-stitch border to combat any rolling
2. Crochet a border or knit an i-cord border (too fiddly and could look rubbish)
3. Sew an ivory satin or velvet backing (ditto) ... or

4. Steam and block the living daylights out of the scarf. Leave to dry for 24 hours.
The blocked scarf should be much longer than the unblocked version. Then I can fold it over and hem it.
I want to add some more sequins by hand, so this will hide all the work as well!

Bingo!

Countdown to Charlotte

Just looking at this gorgeous collection from my precious Koigu stash is giving me lots of incentive to finish my Christmas present pile so that I can get started with Charlotte.
These came from A Good Yarn on the outskirts of Boston and the Get Knitted stand at the Knitting and Stitching Show. I'm going to spread the green out a little more, so that the odd flash of peacock green will show through.