This is another one of those “I was gone but now I’m back” posts

It’s true, I’ve neglected this blog AGAIN.  The truth is that I’ve been really busy, and I’ve been meaning to write, but never did.  Yesterday I read an article about a site called 750words.com, which basically encourages you to splurge 750 words in complete anonymity and privacy with the aim of increasing productivity and inspiration.  So over the past two days I’ve written over 1500 words, and some of it did indeed have some real gems to post here!

So, between the last post and this one, I’ve knit two hats, a scarf, a hoody for a little’un, a dog jumper and I’ve started a tunic for my mum!  I did say I’ve been busy!  Sadly I took zero photos, so there’s nothing to show here for my efforts, but I can at least tell you about them!

I knit a hat and scarf set for my auntie in February just before we had that sudden cold snap – right when you want to have just received a knitted gift!  I knit it in a simple basket stitch, from a red shiny yarn by Patons i think.. helpful i know!  It was very soft though and I was very happy with such a simple knit.

The second hat was in a chunky variegated blue yarn which i also knit in a sort of basket stitch, this time for my mum.  Again i cant remember the name of the yarn, I may have had the time to knit but not the time to write all this down!  I had just under half the yarn left so i started knitting a hat for myself, but havent finished it yet.  I had a horrible suspicion that I would run out of yarn, so i did what every sensible knitter does – put it to one side in case it magically spawns more yarn!

The next thing I knit was a hoody for my sweet little niece.  It was using some yarn I was gifted – already knit up into something else so I can claim I never actually knew the brand of yarn!  I designed a top down raglan cardigan with moss-stitch button-bands and cuffs, and a lovely King Charles Brocade through the body.  And of course it had a hood, with the same moss-stitch border around the edge.  I finished it off with some lovely pastel-coloured flower buttons.  I’ve been intending to write up the pattern for this but not got around to it yet!

The last thing I’ve finished is a wee jumper for Rosie.  She’s been feeling the cold of late – after all she is quite a slight little dog, so I butchered a drops pattern that was meant to include all kinds of intarsia and fanciness which didn’t get included in my version.  I used a striped yarn (Striped, not self striping – so the resultant effect is  more like awful camouflage) and knit the size meant for Chihuahuas, but it is still a bit too big!  I will probably knit her another one but this time not do as many rows before the split for the leg holes comes, and also the small strip that goes between the legs (and eventually is picked up from for the leg-cuffs) needs to be 2-4 stitches narrower.  She really is tiny!

Next time I will show you (with pictures, I promise!) the tunic I’m knitting for mum.  It really is going extremely slowly, possibly because I’m comparing it to my last few FO's, which have all been quite small and quick!

It's been a while!

Well it's definitely been a while since I wrote to you all last, I hope you're all doing well and keeping as busy as I am!  There's lots of news, but I'll try and keep it brief.

I've finished a few bits and peices, like the fern and waves lace scarf for my mum on mother's day and Amused from Knitty winter 2008.  I'm also about a third of the way through knitting The Great American Aran Afghan.  I joined a knit-a-long for this one, but it's not particularly taxing - just needs a lot of concentration!  The real challenge will be joining all the squares together, there are 24 and a border!

I seem to be having issues with socks.  On the whole, sock knitting is not difficult as long as you follow the instructions, listen to advice people give you and concentrate on you're grafting.  My problems are with sizing.  I tried a pair from the Violet Green Sock Generator which weren't too bad, but a bit short - not a problem when you can just add a few extra rows.  I did however find them really baggy and I can't decide whether it was the pattern or the yarn.  I've done maybe three rows of Media's Socks from "Favourite Socks" by Nancy Bush, but they've gone on the naughty pile because I'm not even 50% sure they'll fit me!

I've just ordered 300g of Stylecraft "life 4ply" in mint green for Pioneer from the latest knitty (spring 2009).  Not 100% sure I love the colour, but will have a bash at it anyway, if in the end I hate it, I'll frog it and turn it into something else - I have a friend who loves that colour and I'm sure I could find a pattern to make her smile!

On a related knitting note - The Angel yarns forums went down in dubious circumstances, so we have all moved to Pheonix Knitting Forums.

I've been doing lots of non-knitting related stuff too. I got my first peice of coursework back from my degree and got a really good mark, so I'm really proud of myself for that!  Exams on the 2nd of June though!  It's going to be tough because I work as a polling clerk, and polling day is on the 4th of June this year so I'll be dead on my feet by the end of that week!  I've also been seriously thinking of putting my horse in foal, but given she's a little fat at the moment, step one is getting her fit and it's taking a lot of work!

Finally, I've spent a lot of time reviewing products on DooYoo.co.uk under the nickname Poison_kitty.  Currently I don't have that many knitting-related reviews, but the few I've written have been received really well, particularly a review on Denise Interchangable Needles which earnt me my first crown!  Future reviews will feature more knitting books, so pop over and have a look.

Update

As normal, Ive been meaning to update this but just havent gotten around to it.

Finished a few bits and peices and have finally uploaded the photographs for it! So, in no particular order:

The little baby hat I knitted ages ago and didn't post photos for... if it looks an odd shape it's because its perched on a spindle of cds! I think you can just about see the yellow flecks in the bobble, it came out quite well really!




This is the palindrome scarf i half-knit on holliday in about 3 days, the other half took another 2 weeks! It's made from wendy serenity Aran and is in colourway purple haze. I never ever take it off, it's just too warm. Oh, and it's 6 foot long! A quick note to anyone considering the pattern - there is so much cabling that your hands will fall off. Seriously.





This bookmark took me about 2 hours to knit in total, although i did it in little bits because 2-stitch cabling is hell on my fingers, and I'd already knit enough cables to last me the year when i made my scarf! I used a stitch pattern from a dictionary, and added the border, a tassle and an eyelet to feed it through. If anyone wants the pattern, I'd be willing to pass it on, I prudently wrote it down as i was doing it!



These are my first pair of socks I've knitted - I bought a lovely set of 5 2.5mm dpns called "purple pins" from Knit n Caboodle (prompt delivery, didn't charge until dispatch) which have been my inspiration, after all you need to have the right tools to start with! I knit them with the super expensive chi sockyarn which i bought at The Natural Dye Studio open day thingy i went to in the summer, and they're so comfy, but i feel so guilty about wearing them cos they're handwash only... The surprising thing about the yarn though was that i only used 45g of it to make this pair of socks, so I've just started a second pair...

This is little blue teddy, the first of two i intend to knit (one in blue, one in fawn). This little chap is for a little boy being born in early january, and will be sent off along with all the other little things i knitted. The pattern is from jean greenhowe's Traditional favourites - The knitting was as easy as pie but the sewing up was another matter. The head, no matter how hard i tried, would not go on straight. I matched up seams to the best of my ability, but after sewing around the neckline, looked more like one of those tortured teddies that end up being used as some sort of voodoo doll for children! I eventually managed to get the neck so that he was looking in a more healthy direction, but it's still not straight and I'm not unpicking it again! The scarf was made from some white acryllic, couldn't tell you what it was though except that it was the first ball under my questing fingers. And thank god I've always got half a ball of some sort of black yarn lying around! Now all i have to do is work up the motivation to get the other one done too (will be posted to a lovely friend who is attempting to help me through my degree, more on that later!)

Thats all my finished objects... now i look back I've actually done quite a lot!

Update on shawl - it's still not finished - the sewing of the border has gone badly, it is in the naughty corner and will probably stay there til after christmas now. After hours of faffing about and arguing with my mother about how the corners should be sewn, we finally decided on a corner shape. The long and short of the problem is in the fact that she got the measuring tape out, made lots of precise calculations about how much of the work to use for the corners and how much would be needed in between, then completely disregarded them and pulled a different number out of thin air. Guess what? It doesn't fit. I don't want to talk about it anymore, it makes me sad.

Been planning as a future project a pair of rather theatrical armwarmers from some mohair that Mo sent me, with pointed cuffs that come down over my hand, and a big thick ribbon to lace it up the side, since I'll be knitting it straight I think. Unless i pull off the 3 rows i knit to start a top on my 4mm circs... Now there's a thought!

In other news, my love life still sucks and will remain in such a condition because there is no such thing as men when it comes to the equine industry, seems like what few there are go into hiding or something! It's gotten so bad now that i have various family members keeping their eyes peeled for me!
My degree is confusing the crap out of me but that isn't anything new. It's not the learning bit that is confusing, it's the process of organising to take exams and do coursework and the general administration of it all. I'm not the best person for getting out there and talking to people, and when i get worried about things i have a tendancy to get over-emotional about it and panic over nothing.
And I've still not had my refund from angelyarns yet. And it's been 2 months. Not Happy.

Late Post

Crikey, talk about late posting! I skipped one week because I just KNEW I'd be done with the centre part of the shawl and have it all sewn together and photographed by the next week. Well I have it all knitted and sewn together, but the only photographs are on my phone and it turns out not to like my pc very much! Guess you could say I'm not very good at this photography stuff!
I was really looking forward to finishing the centre part and starting the border of this shawl (it counts for only 20% of the finished piece) and I thought it'd take me five minutes and be an absolute breeze compared with the rest of it, but oh how wrong I was and in some completely unexpected ways! I'm getting used to the pattern now, but in the beginning it was hard to remember and I kept having to refer to the pattern a LOT, but now I'm finding it's so repetitive and completely boring that it's hard to just get down and do loads in one go, unlike with the centre panels which were quite varied. So it's taken me since the weekend (about 5 daysish) to do a sum total of 4,232 stitches (not including cast-on). Which in all honesty, is completely crap and means that all I have to show for my dedication (hah!) is a long, thin, curly (damn stockinette stitch!) snake thing, with funny coloured markers!
In my boredom I have been planning my next project (whilst looking at UFO's rather guiltily!). I've just ordered some Wendy Aran in Blackberry (like a darkish purpley pink in normal language) from the Angel Yarns website and like the name suggests, it's Aran weight so will be used for the Palindrome scarf in my Ravelry queue (it's a free pattern for cables that look the same on both sides!). In my error I thought that Aran was just the British version of Worsted (the pattern is for worsted weight yarn) so I'm a little concerned that my gauge won't exactly match that of the pattern, but I've been assured that I'm worrying too much and being silly, so full steam ahead (and if it goes horribly wrong , I have the names of who to blame!). Lets hope the yarn arrives before the end of next week though because I'm off on my hols next Friday and the idea is that I can start it and get a lot done whilst I'm there.
I've also discovered the clearance section on the kemps wool shop website and oh my god it's so cheap! I think coming across this site might have been a mistake, the trouble with cheap yarn is that you buy more of it, start (but not finish) more projects and then before you know it your stash has taken on a life of it's own and is suddenly demanding remote control rights and slamming doors and borrowing your car...
In other news, I've been knitting so much I broke my row counter, and had to buy another one. The new one is all clean and bright, but somehow it's just not the same since the old one was passed down from my mum from her mum!