All Fingers and Thumbs

So I'm off on my travels for Christmas in a few hours (first to Manchester and then to Watford - ah the glamour - it's not all San Fran here you know!) with my lovely revamped knitting bag. Rather than work on the veritable Augean stables that is my Christmas knitting list, last night I attacked this: with these (gasps): to make this (cheers): I've had this bag for years and loved everything about it except for the minor inconvenience that it had been completely unusable from about 6 months after purchase. Its poorly designed and constructed handles collapsed under the huge weight of a lunch I was carrying! Various attempts to push them back together being thwarted when carrying even a feather in it, it has lurked unused for several years. When I saw some recycled Sari silk online I knew I had found the answer to the handle issue and so when I saw Sanskrit at Artfibers I pounced on it and after rather more brutal destruction than I realised would be required (the secon...

...well maybe not that fast actually, but certainly as fast as my clumsy fingers will go. What a crazy idea it was to take up knitting in October, someone should have warned me of the overwhelming urge I would have to knit every loved or even just liked one a Christmas present. The list has been slashed in the last couple of weeks as the looming deadline has made me more ruthless and still I've had to wrap up one sock and an IOU, convert three presents into New Year gifts and I haven't even started on my Ma and Pa's as I'm not seeing them until the 27th, in my mind that is about a month away, rather than... can it actually be so... only 7 days! Perhaps I'll wrap up the wool I have to make things for them with, then it would be like they had two presents wouldn't it?! Speed knitting has created this gift scarf in a fluffy mohair a like yarn - that is not this colour at all - it's a very rich, bright teal. I have more so I'm sure it will appear again hopef...

Well I'm home, landed yesterday after many hours of knitting which made the flight much more pleasant than the one on the way out. Not too sure what time my body thinks it is but it's still up to knitting so it's not broken! You wait around for ages for one hand knit sock and then like buses three come along at once! I managed to get my lovely Volcanoes finished just before I left last Saturday and worked on Green Heather while I was away. Sadly for my friend whose Christmas present it is there is only one so far! Knitting is showing me how optimistic I am - or perhaps just utterly unrealistic.... I'm seeing him tomorrow to eat, drink and exchange gifts so it'll have to be one sock plus an IOU! I really love knitting socks, am definitely already getting better - the only thing I'm not happy about is the toe grafting - my pattern uses something called Kitchener Stitch and I'm thinking I might have a look round the virtual knitting world and check out the alt...

I've been knitting furiously to get number two sock finished for tonight as this will be my last chance to post for a while as I'm away for the next week and a bit. Sadly still not quite there though I am on the foot of number two. I'm now officially a dedicated sock knitter and will be taking wool away with me to make pair number two - these will be for a present so the pressure is on now! Having got onto the foot of number two I dicsovered that what I assumed was some misnumbering in the pattern was in fact me switching half way through sock one and reading the pattern for socks in 6-ply which is in the same leaflet as my 4-ply pattern. You wouldn't think it was that difficult to stick to the same page all the way through one small sock would you? Oh well you live and learn. I'm off to San Francisco on Saturday with work and am looking forward to some yarn tourism while I'm there as I hear good things about the shops. I was really frustrated to find out that H...

As planned there has been a lot of knitting this weekend, and I managed to get over the finishing line on these three scarves. Yippee! Two of these have been lingering just short of the line for a while but I just couldn't get interested in sewing in the ends - especially on the really stripey one, so many to do - and much more exciting knitting to be getting on with like my beloved socks. The scarf on the right is a bit of cheat to call a finished object of mine really as my Mum did well over 2/3. Thanks Mum :o) It is knit in Sirdar Curly Wurly in Charcoal which I absolutely hated knitting with, so it's a good job Mum came to the rescue to help it get done in time for Christmas. The bobbly nature of the yarn was okay but the base yarn is I think called a ' boucle ' style yarn and I really hated the feeling of knitting this - as if you needed to get the dips in the yarn to meet together to make a successful stitch. Uggh . I used all five balls I had in the scarf, so ...

Taking up knitting has brought me so much more than I could ever have expected. I thought I'd enjoy the crafting and (hopefully :o)) the items but I never imagined that there was a whole secret world of knitting to explore and enjoy. From the first discoveries of online knitting magazines and blogs to podcasts and now this week Stitch n Bitching. The fabulous BritKnitCast pointed me in the direction of the SnB website and Carrie Anne made groups like this sound such fun that I was determined to pluck up the courage and go along. I've never been the best at that sort of thing but blogging knitters seem so lovely and friendly that I was pretty sure I wouldn't get my head bitten off by the in the flesh version! My knitting friend from work was keen too so with safety in numbers we went along to The Jericho Cafe (great hot chocolate) on Wednesday evening and met some lovely and highly talented knitters. I had a great evening and lots of assistance on my heel shaping. ...

No it's a sock! (Did you hear the fanfare?) I am unnaturally excited about this little pile of wool. After seeing so many lovely socks on the blogs I've been itching to have a go but wondering whether I should get a few more knitting hours under my belt first. We have been away for a long weekend and when doing some shopping in Exeter on Thursday I found a lovely craft shop called Inspirations with a good knitting section. Having spent some serious fondling time with the yarn (most of my yarn knowledge is web based and while I can try and imagine what 75% wool, 25% silk feels like there is just no substitute for getting some hands on yarn time) I decided I'd take the plunge and have a look for a sock kit as I was aware I was leaping out of my comfort zone and wanted a bit more than to just buy some dpns. After wandering around looking a bit bemused for a while the very helpful ladies took me in hand and kitted me out with two balls of Sirdar Town and Country in Volcano (y...

This was it, the honeymoon was over. All my thoughts of 'knitting is so much easier than I expected' were out the window. I could not knit some simple ribbing! Literally knit 2 purl 2 and I couldn't do it, what was wrong with me? Was I some kind of freak? I tried to do a basic ribbed scarf - nice pattern in my kit book of varying ribs so you could practice. After several rows I just had a twisted mess and knew I must be doing something wrong but despite several feverish re-readings of the book I couldn't work it out. Off the mess came in a fit of pique and I resigned myself to another garter stitch scarf with some pretty stripes to cheer me up (still on the needles as other things keep jumping ahead!) The following Sunday we went to my bf's parents for lunch and I plucked up the courage to ask his Mum, a very accomplished knitter, what I was doing wrong. I felt ashamed to admit to my freakishness but I had to get past this or my visions of goregous jumpers and cardi...

The first scarf hot off the needles was Miss Skinny Minny (modelled here by the lovely Lilith who remained patiently in position for all of six seconds), mainly done so that I could learn to purl. I'd started off with a plain garter stitch scarf in a turquoisey mermaidy yarn(see picture below) but I quickly found that having only one project on the go is just not cricket, or knitting as it may be. Miss S Minny managed to overtake and become FO1 by virtue of her compact and bijou nature making her a more suitable companion for a train trip to Birmingham. She is really a rather lovely sparkly, green which has not come out here at all - Patons Spritz Shade no:03002 (ohI wish all shades had names - I would call this Envious Disco Diva :) ) I was pleased to have a finished project on 27 October - about a week after I really got going with some decent needles and yarn and only 18 days from K day (when I hit pay on the Amazon order). Is it wrong to feel so proud of something you have made...

I feel almost as excited about this - my first post on my new and shiny blog - as I did when I opened the knitting kit I bought last month. The time had arrived, after several years of vaguely feeling like I wanted to take up knitting (last seen holding needles with some impossibly tight mess hanging from them aged about 7 ) to take the plunge. The nights were drawing in, the need for woollen garments to snuggle into was bceoming obvious, this was it I was going to learn to knit. I've always loved making things but often feel like they don't live up to my mental image of what I am trying to create, and require so much 'stuff' to get on with them, that when I slump onto the sofa after a day at work getting out the card, the paper, the glue, the cutter, the glitter etc etc seems like just too much effort. The thought of having a pattern to follow and a ball of wool and a pair of needles ready and waiting seemed very attractive. I had no yarn, needles or idea of how to co...