All Fingers and Thumbs

There may have been play at Wimbledon but the chill in the air and the sad tales of flooding evicting people from their homes (like poor Webbo ) have had me searching for cosiness today. I found a beautiful blog suitably entitled Posie Gets Cozy which provided some much desired escapism. Glorious as the strawberry tart was though, it was a favourite recipe from Yarnstorm that cried out to be made tonight. I've managed a finished object in just two days. So fast they never made it to the sidebar! Last night it dawned on me that if I wanted to gift some bootees on Sunday I had better knit them before then. Pattern: Saartje's Bootees Yarn: Sirdar Bonus Flash: Peacock - super soft 100% acrylic - I love how squishy this yarn feels and the colourway is lovely - a little richer than the photo suggests Needles: 4mm Metal Circular Started: 27 June 2007 Finished: 28 June 2007 New Skills?: I think I'd done all the skills before but good practice with the M1 increases Notes: Tot...

...a parcel from Get Knitted . For me? What a lovely surprise! Now this will be the last of the 'ooh look - new yarn' posts for at least a month as I will not buy anymore before my birthday and if I find out about any bargains there will be trouble! This is shade 610 of the Cascade 220 Tweed and is a fair bit brighter than the dark inky purple I was expecting from the shade cards on the web. I had a look at a few to try and get the best idea, but they were really quite different from what arrived - on my monitor at least. It is lovely even if it wasn't quite as planned. I seem to be drawn to purple yarns in a way I've not been drawn to purple clothes. The Forecast is planned as a project for autumn but perhaps I will be starting it sooner rather than later as it seems that Mother Nature may have brought autumn forward. As for this Jitterbug, well it is everything I hoped and more. Velvet plum. I'm not whether to snuggle it or eat it. I want to cast on in this so ...

...as soon as I saw Dreamcatcher's comment about the Cascade 220 Tweed being on sale at Get Knitted I seemed to find myself there with it in the cart. The Karaoke wasn't looking like a goer in my swatch so it was just clearly meant to be. Now about the skein of Jitterbug that fell in as well - it wasn't that Gosia and Iwona were knitting with it on the course and I HAD to have it or anything like that. I'd held out against the beauty of the colours up until now but when I felt it knitted up into a sock yesterday... Receptive. That's what I am - open to inspiration. Here's my sock, long car journey today so I've made some good progress on the leg. I'm using the Blueberry colourway of the Trekking I got the other day and love the way it is knitting up. I do find the yarn a bit grabby on my bamboo needles though and think I might enjoy it more on metal needles. At the top is the Old Norwegian Cast On which I learnt yesterday. Very suitable for socks as ...

I like the idea that each day that I live is like a bead on a necklace that makes up my life. I am lucky enough that most days make pretty beads; sometimes there may be a flaw in the bead, occasionally the bead may more accurately be described as a shrivelled, dried pea (thankfully few and far between), the last two days however have been the brightest, shining, jewel-like beads. I spent Friday afternoon with one of my dearest friends, cafe crawling and gallery visiting in London, followed by a lovely Italian meal in the evening. Today I spent with Gosia and Iwona on the Socks, Socks, Socks course totally immersed in designing and knitting a sock*. We had the most fantastic conversations about knitting and life, a lunchtime trip to Loop and the small bonus of learning so much about socks from a fabulous teacher that my brain is literally buzzing. The really good news is that I get to do the same thing again next Saturday. So I made my way home, happy as could be knitting on my new pr...

... I am so much faster at buying yarn than knitting it :o) Knitting continues apace but it isn't very photoworthy - a bit more on Lady E, a bit of a sock and a bit of Arisaig's arm. So I just had to buy something to take a picture of. Here is some divine South West Trading Company 'Karaoke' from Get Knitted which I found when I was smooching around the site when I went to buy a 2.5mm circular for my sock course (yes the day is nearly here - on Saturday it'll be Socks,Socks, Socks for me!). I'm thinking of an entrelac cushion cover in this for some dearly beloved for Christmas - I'm going to start the gift knitting early this year, well once the birthdays are done. I'm off to knit up a swatch as I'm wondering about buying a whack to make a Forecast in.

So the pile of fluff is a finished item, the colour is such a teeth achingly sweet pink that she is the Candyfloss Stole. Pattern: Adaptation of the Easy Lace Scarf - 42 stitches = 3 - 2 stitch wide garter stitch columns around two 18 stitch fans Yarn: 2 x 50g acrylic mohair a like Needles: 10mm Clover Bamboo Circular Started: 9 June 2007 Finished: 14 June 2007 New Skills?: Working out a stitch count to adapt a pattern for my own needs - I like this all the more because I worked out how I wanted it to look and made it happen Notes: Since I first started acquiring yarn on ebay my inner yarn snob has been cultivated by all the wondrous yarns and natural fibres the interknitosphere has exposed me to, I was therefore a bit hesitant about knitting my best friend's gift in some inexpensive acrylic that I bought early on. I concluded that nice yarn is nice yarn no matter what its composition. I bought this yarn with my pink loving chum in mind so it was the right decision to mak...

...some yarn tourism. In my defence I only went to The Craft Box to get a 10mm circular to rescue the Feather and Fan Stole project. I ripped it out for the second time in the car on the way to Cornwall and for the third time on Friday evening. I tried to persevere but it was just not right on the 15mm needles - gaping holes rather than the pretty, lacy airiness I was after and I was hating the feeling of knitting it - the yarn was telling me to stop! So I had to find a LYS :o) I got my circular and had to buy this Opal sock yarn as it was the only one left and it wanted to come home with me. I'm still not sure how I got out without some of one of the heavenly shades of Kureyon they had. This shop has only a small section of knitting amongst many other crafts but what they have is well selected - some Noro, Debbie Bliss, Opal, Twilleys, some novelties and some high end Patons - fair range of needles and notions and some nice patterns. Well worth a stop if you are in Liskeard. Ap...

New obsession: Lady Eleanor Stole from Scarf Style . I borrowed my friends Scarf Style a while ago and nothing really caught my eye, then I saw Jess' version of Lady Eleanor following a mention of the pattern on the Stash and Burn podcast . This skinnier version speaks to me much more strongly than the almost blanket sized version in the book. I bought a bag of assorted Silk Garden (an ebay bargain of course ) towards the end of last year which was not yet assigned to a project and suddenly I knew I MUST make this. My kind friend agreed to lend me the book again and I was the model of patience while she retrieved it from elsewhere. (I so nearly bought my own copy but I didn't think there was anything else in there I was likely to make so I held out - looking through it again I still think this is the only pattern I really want to make so I think I did the right thing :o) - more money saved for the next ebay yarn bargain! Though I find that so often I don't like a patter...

Yey! Finished object time. These have been on the needles a while as I have just fitted them in round other things - socks are so good for that. I plan to always have a pair on the go but to restrict it to one pair at a time in the hope that wanting to make the next ones will make sure I finish the current wip. Although I'm modelling them in the photo above this will be part of my Mum's birthday present (along with the silk scarf if I can stop being a meanie!!) Pattern: Chain Rib Socks from Sensational Knitted Socks (54 stitch size) Yarn: Lana Grossa Meilenweit Scala in shade 6533 - feels lovely and I'm really pleased with the shade and the striping knit up - used about 50g for this pair which I opted to make slightly shorter in the leg than normal (rib plus 3 pattern repeats = 30 rows) as I thought my Mum would like this Needles: 5 x 2.5mm bamboo DPNs Started: 14 April 2007 Finished: 6 June 2007 New Skills?: Mastered Charlene's two stitch pickup at the top of the gus...

Sometimes I know something, I know I know it and yet I pretend I don't because I don't really want it to be true. I chose to make my Mum's lace scarf out of the Debbie Bliss silk. I knew I would need two skeins as I wanted to make it wider than the pattern suggested. I bought two skeins because I knew I needed two. As I was knitting it I started to hope that maybe the one skein would stretch. I knew it wouldn't but I started to pretend it would. Right up till about 1 metre worth of yarn to go I've been pretending that this will be a nice short scarf and I would have one skein left over. Well finally reality has bitten and I have admitted that there is short and then there is won't go round her neck . I'm sure that feature is integral to the classification of an item as a scarf. "Hey Mum here is a long bit of knitting" doesn't have quite the same ring as "here is this beautiful silk scarf I have lovingly made you". I can just see her...

Despite my hopes on Friday night it has been a weekend of fitting the knitting in around other activities. Some of them have almost been worth the sacrifice! We found a new (old) table at a car boot sale this morning for just £20, well you all know how much I like a bargain ;0) Here it is modelling the other swag from the boot sale and a couple of things I managed to spend some time on. Both the socks and scarf are inching closer to completion - they are birthday presents for my Mama and are well ahead of schedule, however I'm keen to get them finished up. I've made myself a little rule of only having one pair of socks on the needles at once and the bargain yarn is calling strongly. I'd like to finish the scarf before I start a stole in the same pattern for my friend's birthday - I am seeing her on the 16 th so that is pushing me along. It may sound ambitious but the stole is going to be done on my 15mm needles so I think I'm still on track. Off next to watch a 2 h...

My colleague at work commented this week "You receive wool most days - when am I going to see you in something you have made?" Now obviously this is factually wrong on a couple of counts - I only receive yarn on days ending with a y and I have worn my socks and my tank top to work and she was in on those days. It did strike me however that the yarn is flowing rather faster in one direction than another. Yet how could I resist this? I know it's always a bargain with me, but three skeins of hand dyed Trekking sock yarn for less than £10 including postage. If I hadn't bought it I really would have been certifiable! Seems like nothing for it but to ignore the housework and spend all weekend knitting.