Yarn Along........Two Hats and Two Shawls.

Hello, how is your week going? This week I've been working on two hats and two shawls, the first hat is a test knit for Melody of Manderine's blog. Check out her blog you won't be sorry, it's full of pretty photos of the Latvian countryside, nature, knitting and recipes, her photos are so tranquil and after reading her posts I always feel very peaceful.

I received the pattern on Thursday evening, cast on Friday and had it finished and blocked by the Sunday. It is a quick knit using worsted weight yarn, a fair amount of garter stitch and a beautiful textured panel at the front. If you follow me on Instagram you will have already seen the FO, modeled by my daughter but I'll share the photos on my blog, Friday.

Jodie kept the hat and took it home with her so I immediately cast on another one for me using a variegated yarn, I should also have this finished by Friday and will give you full details of the yarn on Friday.

The next project I've been knitting on this week is my Leftie by Martina Behm, as I'd said last week, Zena, Rachel and myself are all knitting this pattern with yarn we'd bought from Unwind. Zena and I don't live too far away from each other so we arranged to meet at The Library of Birmingham for a coffee and to knit on our Leftie's. We had a great morning, chatting and knitting away and hope to meet up again soon.

If you are in Birmingham, I highly recommend paying a visit to the library, there are activities going on, thousands of books to peruse, two coffee bars, lounge areas to sit and relax but my favourite part was The Secret Garden.

It's on the seventh floor and is a balcony wrapped around the building with an urban garden and places to sit, this was the view of Birmingham from the balcony. Unfortunately, it was a little bit too chilly to sit and knit up there on Saturday, I'm hoping for an Indian Summer so can go back and sit up there and take in the views.

Shawl two is the Menehune Shawlette by Mel, Episode Three of With Mel is now up with the third part of the pattern which is the middle section of the border.

This is a simple garter stitch section which didn't take long to complete, so I now only have the last part to finish which will be in next weeks episode. This has been such a fun knit, I really enjoyed this week's episode, she took us on a boat trip with her family and of course it's great to sit and "knit with Mel" !!!!!

 

I'm into my thrillers at the moment and have just started reading Fresh Doubt by Eva Hudson, I've not read any of her books before and so far, so good, I'm enjoying this book, the first in a series of books featuring Ingrid Skyberg, FBI Agent.

I'm linking to Yarn Along, WIP Wednsday and Keep Calm, Craft On, I've decided to post it a day early this week as one I've written it in advance and two, Nicole from Frontier Dreams, posts her KCCO on a Tuesday.

 

There is just one last thing I would like to say, Mel has just wrote a heartfelt post and would like some help raising some money for a bereaved family, if you could please pop over and read it, she would really appreciate it. She has just released a shawl pattern called Hapa and to help this family from 19th-26th August, Mel will give all profits from the pattern to this family who's life has tragically been ripped apart. I've bought mine, every little helps.

Thank you for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your week.

xxxxDebxxxx

 

Yarn Along.....lots on the needles.

Hello my friends, how is your week going? I'm writing this hoping the rain will stay away this morning so we can take my niece and nephew to the park. Well, I seem to have cast on quite a few things this week, including something using these gorgeous mini skeins from Fivemoons Yarns.

I'll start with this project first, though these aren't my usual colour pallet but they jumped out at me at Unwind Brighton. They came in a little wooden box called A Big Box of Sweeties and had 10 x 10g mini skeins of Luna Plus 4ply, 75% superwash merino/25% nylon. I resisted at first and bought the Fade to Grey which I knit my Pebble Beach shawl in.

As I sat in the Pavillion Gardens, knitting on my shawl, Zena said those mini skeins would be perfect for the Leftie Shawl by Martina Behm. I'd had my eye on this pattern for some time and thought what a great idea and those colours I'd been looking at would be perfect, so later that afternoon I headed back to the Marketplace and bought them.

The main colour needs 150g of yarn so rather than having to buy 200g and having leftovers, I started looking for 50g skeins. I found some Artesano Alpaca Silk 4ply which is 70% alpaca/30% silk. It is beautifully soft and has a very slight halo, I love how it looks against the bright colours.

After speaking to Zena, we decided to cast on and knit it at the same time, I then found out Rachel from The Good Yarn Guide wanted to knit it too, so we are having a mini knit along together. We were all just about ready last weekend to start it and I cast my Leftie on Saturday evening, managing to get six leaves finished.

My only reservation with this pattern were the short rows, I've always had a problem picking up the wraps and making it look neat. I looked on You Tube to see if I could find any tips and after the finishing the first two leaves found it wasn't too bad. After avoiding short rows when I could, I'm now finding them not to be a problem. If I need any help with knitting, I tend to use the tutorials by Very Pink Knits, she is very clear and does great close up shots.

My next new project is by Mel, she has a brand new look blog with a new name and podcast, if you take a look at the first video, you can find out the reason for this new look and name, it's wonderful news, you can find the first video here.

Mel is such a warm, kindhearted person and loves to bring people together, she has come up with a great idea for knitting together. On the first episode she encourages us to pick up 100g of fingering/4ply, some 4mm needles and cast on a gorgeous, easy to knit shawl that she's designed especially for her podcast listeners.

She talks us through the intructions and also has them written on the video, so grab a note book too. It didn't take me long to finish the first part and was ready for the second episode.

As promised, Mel was back the following week with episode 2 and the next part of the pattern. I'd got 460 yds of yarn so I wanted to make mine bigger which Mel explains how to do that, leaving enough yarn for the border. She then goes on to tell you the instructions for the first part of the border which I'm just about to start. I just think this is a wonderful idea, the pattern hasn't been released yet, this is just for her podcast viewers at the moment, so go check it out.

I've also cast on a mini version of the Georgie Blanket by Helen Stewert, I've cast on 81 stitches rather than what's given in the pattern. It will be the perfect size for the carry cot and car seat. I'm using some leftover Rooster yarn which is one of my favourite commercial yarns, it's a dream to knit with.

We went up to see her on Sunday, here she is with just 8 weeks left to go.

We took all the baby things up that she'd been storing at ours until the nursery was finished including this sweet little Mose's basket we bought them, you can just about see the first Georgie blanket I knit for him.

Now on to the book I'm reading this week, it's a great thriller that I have on my Kindle called Abducted by T.R. Raglan, it's an on the edge read and I'm loving it. This week I'm linking to Yarn Along, WIP Wednesday and Keep Calm Craft On.

Thank you for stopping by have a great week.

xxxxDebxxxx

 

FO Friday..... Hana Hou Tah-Dah.

 

Hello there, my friends, how are you? I'm back today to show you my finished Hana Hou. I'm thrilled with how it turned out, I think this will be a firm favourite, it's so warm and snugly, perfect to throw on when we have those chilly summer evenings and great for winter.

I started it back in March so was a fairly quick knit for an adult size cardigan as I was knitting on other projects too. My favourite part of this design is the collar, I love the shape of it and I love the look of the Copy Cat stitch.

The pattern is by Mel from MSkiKnits, the pattern called for a Sportweight yarn but I wanted to use what I had in my stash. I had a sweater quantity of Rowan Pure Wool DK, so with a few calculations and a swatch, I worked out that if I knit the Small, I would get the Large size using a DK.

I was trying to look sophisticated, whilst Paige took a photo of me wearing it but she kept making me laugh, so this was the result, not very elegant but at least you can see me with it on. I wore it last night to go to Crafty Sew and So's and everyone said how nice it was.

I'm linking my FO over on Tami's blog for FO Friday so check out what others have completed this week.

There's just one last thing I wanted to mention to all the knitters,who are reading this. Did you listen to A Gripping Yarn on Radio 4, this week? It was presented by Jane Garvey and explores the world of knitting from the American Revolution to modern day and how popular it's become again through Socila Media. It includes some great knitting soundtracks that made me smile, yarn bombing and even prisoners who are knitting to reduce their sentence!

It's was very interesting and worth a listen, I'm hoping my International friends will be able to listen to it as well, if the link doesn't work, it's a BBC production so may be able to find it another way.

Thank you for stopping by, have a great weekend.

xxxxDebxxxx

 

Yarn Along......Magic Loop or DPN's

Do you remember these socks I cast on, back in February, my first self striping socks, I was very excited about knitting them but I kept looking at them and just wasn't happy with how they were looking. I usually used two circulars to knit socks but I decided to try Magic Loop for the first time.

As you can see with this close up, the start of each row, looks really untidy, I never had this problem using two circulars. I had a look on the web to see if there was a reason this was happening and by the looks of it a few people had the same problem. The common problem seemed to be pulling the yarn to tight and recommended holding the yarn a bit looser. I tried this but I still had the same problem.

While reading up on this problem a lot of knitters said that they preferred to knit with DPNs so I thought I'd give them a go. I had tried them before but always felt very awkward holding them. I prefer toe up socks so I used a circular needle to cast on using Judy's Magic Cast On and then changed to DPNs, once I finished the toe increases.

It took me a few rounds to get use to using DPNs but I soon got the hang of them and I'm much happier with how my self striping socks are looking. Look at the difference between the two socks side by side, once I've finished my sock on the DPNs, I will frog the other sock and knit that one on them too.

I'm knitting the collar of my Hana Hou and just have a few more rows before I can start seaming together, I absolutely love this pattern and can't wait to finish it.

I'm enjoying my stripy vanilla socks as they are easy to knit whilst out and about or watching TV but I do prefer something with more of a pattern, so this week, I cast on the Crocus Socks by Wendy D. Johnson. I'm using A Fine Fish 4ply sock yarn in Roller Disco, again I'm using Knit Pro Symfonie DPNs. I have just bought some Knit Pro Karbonz to try, I've heard quite good things about them, I'd be interested in what you think, if you've used them.

I haven't worked much on my Miss Winkle and have only knit a couple more loops, I'm over half way through the book I started last week and really enjoying it, it's a great chick lit to read before going to bed.

I've also cast on another new project, I asked Jodie to choice a few Rico Essential Cotton from The Homemakery to knit a striped garter stitch baby blanket, these are what she chose.

I couldn't decide which colour to cast on first, so I asked my Instagram friends to chose for me, the first person to comment chose the Lime Green, so that s what I went with. I'm going to go through the other comments and knitting the colours in order of what they chose, I'll show you my progress, next Wednesday. I know I'm going to enjoy knitting with these pretty Spring colours.

I'm linking to Ginny's Yarn Along and Tami's WIP Wednesday, check out what other knitters have on their needles.

Thanks for stopping by, enjoy your week.

xxxxDebxxxx

 

Yarn Along.......Hana Hou.

Yay, I've cast on the Hana Hou by MSkiKnits, I've wanted to start this since the pattern was released back in January but I was already knitting the Aureus. I didn't want two large projects on my needles so held off casting it on until my other cardigan was finished.

The Hana Hou is a beautiful, oversized, boxy cardigan using the same Copy Cat stitch used on the Halele'a, giving it texture on the large overlapping fronts. As soon as I saw Mel's latest pattern, I fell in love with it and decided what yarn I'd use.

I'd already got a sweater quantity of Rowan Pure Wool DK in a gorgeous caramel colour, shade 054 in my stash, the pattern actually uses a sport weight but by doing a swatch, I worked out the small size would knit up to my size in the DK. The Pure Wool is very soft and squishy, perfect for this cardigan. I can't wait to finish it so I can wrap myself in it. Hana Hou means "Again Again", I can see why Mel named it that, I will definitely knitting it again, next time I'll try a sport weight, in a pretty Sage Green.

I've been knitting on my Easter Shawl (Miss Winkle), in between working on my Hana Hou and I'm now up to 18 loops. Check out Crafts from the Cwtch blog on Thursday, for everyone's progress this week.

I'm still reading V is for Vengence by Sue Grafton, when I go up to bed but I'm still reading The Diary of a Provincial Lady, in between. It's quite funny and though it's set in the 1930's some of the things that she writes about, could be about the present day, some things never change!!!!!

I'm linking up with Ginny's Yarn Along and WIP Wednesday, this week, Check out what everyone else has been up to this week.

xxxxDebxxxx

 

Yarn Along.....weekend knitting.

 

Hello, how are you all, I hope you had a good weekend. As I said in my last post we went to Betws-y-Coed on Friday morning, we've drove through the village numerous times but have never stopped before.

It was a very relaxing weekend, we didn't do much apart from taking in the stunning Welsh scenery, I loved that the mountains had a sprinkling of snow.

We headed to the coast on Saturday, this is Criccieth, we just parked up and watched the waves crashing against the sea wall. I don't know about you but there's something so relaxing about the ocean.

On the evenings, we went to the local pub, both nights were really busy and no chance of finding a table so we grabbed a wool blanket that they supplied, sat under the outdoor heater, enjoying a drink. It was so nice to be able to sit outside in the winter, sitting under the canopy watching the rain and the world go by. Bliss!!!!

I managed to get quite a bit of knitting done over the weekend, I turned the heel on my second Diamond Gansey socks, I'm still enjoying this very simple knit and purl pattern.

Olivia's "blue cardigan" has seen the most love this week and I'm on the right front. I love when a pattern is knitted in one, so no seaming!!!!!

The final project that I've been working on is my Aureus cardigan, I've nearly finished the right front. I was hoping to get it finished by the end of March but I'm not sure whether that's going to happen. I've read a couple of chapters of Knitting Yarns, if you love knitting you will love reading about different authors that knit and their different stories of why knitting is important to them, very enjoyable and easy to pick up and down, as they are only short chapters.

I'm so tempted to cast on Mskiknits brand new pattern, Hana Hou that has just been released, I love the slouchy, relaxed fit of this gorgeous cardigan, perfect for all seasons but I'd better finish one of my other projects on the needles first. If you hurry on over here, you can get a discount code for $2 off the normal price, this offer finishes on the 14th February so you need to be quick!!!!!

Check out Ginny's Yarn Along, and see what others are knitting and reading, this week.

Also pop over to Tami's blog and check out more Works in Progress.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope to catch up with visiting all your blogs, this week. I've been busy making wedding invitations for my friend's son, which I hope to share with you soon.

xxxxDebxxxx