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Halo Cushion

Published by louise

I finished 3 WIPs this weekend. Three! *does dance*

Two of these are for the imminent arrival of a friend’s baby and this one was in real danger of becoming an UFO.

I wanted to make something that wasn’t the usual bootees or blanket and while thumbing through Erika Knight’s Natural Nursery Knits that I saw the lace pillow pattern

 

I did have a couple of misgivings – the lace panel, as I thought, did draw out at the bottom and top of the piece and it was not rectangular. I did not want to block it too aggressively to correct this as my moss stitch was a nice texture and I didn’t want to open it up; also I wanted the pillow to be lovely and plump and doing so would have made the cover bigger. [The pillow, incidentally, was purchased here and I am very pleased with its feathery plumpness!]

As a result I had to fudge the seam when it came to this part. I don’t think it looks *too* bad, but I would swatch a little before I tried this pattern again to try and minimize this.

Does anyone have a trick for stabilising lace within a project to stop that stretch in the fabric? Or maybe there is a type of stitch that skews the fabric less? I would love to know.

I was slow in knitting the lace edging and really this needed a few more repeats to be suitably gathered. I blocked mine fairly well and still I needed to unpick the cast off and do 3 more repeats. It is clearly a bit taut, but hopefully baby won’t mind!

I am really happy with the finished object though. I have never knit on an edging to a seamed edge before and that was a bit fiddly (probably won’t be doing it again any time soon!) and that wool is just so soft that Halo was really the first name that came to mind.

This was British Yarns Bluefaced Leicester, which I bought from Laal Bear’s Etsy shop. I have knit quite a few things with this wool now and I really do love it. It is as soft as cashmere and just knits up beautifully…in fact one of my other FOs this weekend was made in this yarn, but more on that in another post.

It feels so nice to have finished up a few projects – gives one a sense of relief and simultaneously a wonder of “what can I cast on now?”!

Odds & Ends

Published by louise

My projects for KnitBritish do appear slow in coming, if the blog is anything to go by!

I assure you I am not just buying British wool, but I am working with it too! My needles aren’t working any less, but I seem to be starting projects before finishing ones and putting off finishing others due to the prospect of knitting finicky edgings!

What I have come to realise is that I have only knitted one thing for myself so far. This contravenes the pledge I make every year – that I am sure many knitters also pledge….

I MUST KNIT FOR MYSELF!

While thinking about my year of knitting British I quickly came to the conclusion that the patterns I knit would need to be small-ish and quick enough to generate lots of project blogs (ahem! There WILL be more!) and already I am thinking that I could get a real head start of the gift knitting for birthdays, expected baby of friend and, dare I say it, maybe even some Christmas gifts ( don’t gasp, I may be optimistic, but I am rarely *that* organised)
Then I thought those five words again! Even if my F&Fs have lovely knitted gifts made from British fibre, what shall I have to show for my year? – apart from this blog, naturally!

While organising my stash, I found the answer. My odds & ends balls from my projects so far – and the odds & ends of future KnitBritish projects – little projects in themselves! When i cast off a project I am going to use the remaining yarn to knit a square of whichever size the end allows.

I’ll put that square aside and add to the pile after every pattern. At the end of the year I will try and piece it together; I might have enough for a scarf, a runner, a wall hanging, a blanket… Just something that represents everything I made in the year and celebrating UK fibre, as well as everyone who goes into producing it from animal to the finished yarn!

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Drinking it in

Published by louise

 

I have been drinking in the full prettiness of my Edinburgh Yarn Festival booty today. After the event I placed everything in my hand-luggage (cos if that plane was going down, I was going down clutching that yarn!) and I have only begun to really play with it all today.

My first purchase is the alpaca you see above. This came from Border Mill, a small scale alpaca processing mill in Duns. This was the first stall I frequented at the festival and Juliet was positively animated talking about their product. For me Knit British is about supporting local businesses who genuinely love what they do from the animals they rear to the end product and I really believe The Border Mill are such a business.

I was drawn to that green – it is absolutely delicious. I can’t wait until their online shop is a go!

 

Next door to Border Mill were Travelling Yarns – I actually tried to edge my way into this stall a few times, but they were a popular lot with their stock of Lett Lopi, roving yarn as well as St Magnus Angora and Wensleydale Longwool Sheepshop…my KnitBritish heart skipped a beat.

 

The day before the festival I had read on Ravelry that Wee County Yarns would be selling baby JC Rennie balls. I fell in love with Rennie when knitting the Orchid Thief and let me tell you, I sought that stall out! How sweet are they?! (I had them bunched up in my hand whilst showing LovelyFiance later and quipped, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a bouquet of yarn?” That may have been my first solid wedding plan!)

I know they are only little, but they are perfect for a project that I will tell you more about later.

 

 

Cake, anyone?

Old Maiden Aunt was always going to be a must-visit, but was difficult to find – until I peered very hard through a throng of people and found the stall there! There was so much to feel faint about at that stall – such fibre and such colours. I spotted a half-closed suitcase on the floor and managing to crouch between two shoppers I opened the case to find oodles of Corriedale! It was like finding treasure! Okay, so someone had bumped the case and the lid fell shut, but there were definitely jewels!

I was thrilled to learn from Lilith that the Corriedale is bred in the UK and I snatched up two skeins of Last Night’s Red Dress 4ply – which is reminds me of undiluted blackcurrant cordial!.

This is going to become something as special as it deserves!

It was so lovely to say hello to woolly people I really admire. Helen from Ripplescrafts and Susan Crawford were two such. Again, both stalls were just pinned, but it was lovely to say “hello!”. I was thrilled to hear that Susan is working with the Shetland Museum on something rather exciting and that she is returning to Shetland Wool Week this year. I couldn’t attend her workshops last year and so I am going to make sure I have some annual leave this time! Susan had a wonderful array of her books and patterns, as well as Jamieson’s yarn, her own Excelana and some Juno Fibre Arts. I have some lovely Excelana in stash, but I was eager to get my hands on a bit of Juno Belle, which is British alpaca and BFL. The colour is so vibrant  – like a 1940’s Femme Fatale’s  nails and lips!

From Helen I purchased some Na Dannsairean 4ply in the Winter Sea colourway – It was going to be a lovely grey, but someone filled the basket as I was delving and Winter Sea lept into my hands. The base is BFL with flecks of lovely Donegal nep running through.

I had sort of made a pledge to buy no more BFL. It is absolutely beautiful, but often when you search for British Breed wool I find that Bluefaced is promoted a lot and I really want to try and knit around the British Isles – breed-wise, at least (although I am not ruling out a knitting tour of the UK) and promote as much of the breeds as possible. That having been said, I have been coveting Na Dannsairean for ages so I feel justified!

I will probably keep the rest to show off in the future, but suffice to say I went to the Edinburgh Yarn Festival for the wool and came back shorn! Not that I begrudge it – I am in love with it all. I still have some to get as Shilasdair were very wise and didn’t come to Edinburgh with a bulging van, but with samples of all their wools and colours – and once I chose my yarn they post it out on their return to the shop!

What do you think of my cups, by the way? They are the same pattern that we had when I was growing up(that probably most Shetland households had in the late 70s). My mum has one solitary plate left – I call it the happy plate – and when I let that slip she and my sister sourced the cups for my Christmas!

In every single way I am a very lucky girl.

 

Three Bags Full!

Published by louise

I am probably the last in a long line of Edinburgh Yarn Festival goers to blog about the wondrous event, but we only got back yesterday and there was the dreaded unpacking and clothes washing and hoovering to do before I could settle down to the blog.

 

Saturday morning was dull and drizzly, but spirits were never less damp in that queue outside of the Out of the Blue Drill Hall off Leith Walk. I might also add that never was I quite so happy to queue in the drizzle!

I hardly took a photo – I was a little distracted! There were 40 stall-holders and it was hard enough politely edging into see some stalls, never mind get the camera out.

When I say “polite” that is definitely a good word to describe the crowd – polite and eager. I have been in squashy, busy situations before, but never were the squashers and the squashees so polite about it! One woman (in a lovely chickadee sweater (I saw three variants of that design)) said, “I am sorry – but isn’t this all MARVELLOUS?!”.

She was not wrong.

There was alpaca; there was merino and BFL and Hebridean; there were silks from India; there was handspun and every kind fibre and fluff. There was Ripplescrafts, The Yarn Yard, Old Maiden Aunt and Ysolda and Susan Crawford….and that was just some of the interesting & talented people there…

…are you feeling slightly seduced yet? I had to move to the edges of the room to take it all in! Heady!

 

There were forty stall holders in the Drill Hall – two thirds more than organisers Mica, Jo & Linda originally thought they might host when they began planning Edinburgh’s inaugural (and long overdue) wool celebration last year. The hall was very well organised despite the jostling (I was worried that everyone’s lovely woollens would be felted at the shoulders due to the mixture of drizzle and friction!) – I think that the venue was far more characterful and sociable than other events held in conference centres and the like, which lack what the Drill Hall offered.

What they achieved was nothing short of wonderful – not only did they host a vast delegation of stall holders and have classes with top instructors, but there were organisations like KidsKnit  and The Seamen’s Church Institute and they brought together over 1400 like minded people, from as far a field as Switzerland! I know myself that it was lovely to say hi to some of the faces behind twitter and ravelry avatars.

I was honoured to be part of the fun and I really look forward to the next event…maybe over two days, next time?!

I will blog about some of my purchases later, but here are the contents of my three bags full!

clockwise: Edinburgh Yarn Festival bag, Little Red in the City, New Lanark Donegal Aran Silk, Ripplescrafts ND 4ply, Ripplescrafts merino sport, St Magnus DK, Wensleydale longwool sheet shop, New Lanark, Old Maiden Aunt Corriedale 4ply, Juno Fibrearts, EYF mug, Border Mill Alpaca and mini Rennie balls!

Baa Baa Book Sheep

Published by louise

Just before Christmas I was thinking that maybe I needed a little mascot to cheer me through my KnitBritish projects. As if by magic, the next day I got my wish.

I have blogged before about how much I really like the work of Bronia Sawyer – particularly her book sculptures. So when I joked that she should try making a sheep, I was in awe when – later that same day – she produced a picture of the little paper fella – replete in curly locks!

Further awed was I  – after thinking how I should find a KnitBritish mascot – when she offered her little creation to me!

Quickly I knit up a cowl to offer in kind – how could one not respond woollily when offered a sheep? – and within a few days a parcel arrived!

 

 

…and all tucked up inside was a a wordy, curly, pal….

 

 

Thank you, Bronia! Your little work of art  is now overseeing blog-writing and keeping an eye on the KnitBritish board!

 

 

Works in Progress

Published by louise

Would you like a little peek?

I have probably made it known before that I have a little notebook obsession

 

Actually, it’s not just little ones – big, small, functional, impractical, ruled, plain – I do love a nice notebook.

 

When I decided I was going to undertake this project I knew  I would need a special kind of book to keep within samples of the lovely yarns I was soon to discover.

My favourite lovely-notebook-shop did not disappoint. Page upon page of crisp brown paper: to write extolled virtues of local yarns, to stick down business cards and sew swatches into.

‘Twixt the pages

 

The only thing I couldn’t find  were the kind of handy pockets that should be widely available, but you usually only find in recipe journals, or in the back of scrapbooks (the kind you used to get to keep your negatives in, in old photo albums)  – the kind one needs to keep UK wool ephemera in. However, I do ‘make do and mend’…

I used to try and keep ball bands and a little sample of the wool I used in projects – if I  intended to use the wool again –  but they used to clutter up the bottom of my stash box. I was also very bad at making gauge swatches too.

Do you keep a note of the wool you use and what do yo do with your swatches?

I guess a lot of people will use Ravelry to remind them – I think the yarn database there is totally invaluable.

When I get a new wool to sample, I look forward to writing some notes in the book for future reference and knitting a swatch to keep inside.

I seem to have coupled my love of stationery and wool… I think this could be the start of a long, happy relationship!

 

 

Speaking of works in progress,I have been trying to fix a jumper I made last year – I say fix, I mean lengthen (when will I learn to knit the length for me, rather than the length the pattern thinks I am?)

I did this just before Christmas…..

I know! How destructive?!…and risky, but I followed the instructions here and I was happy that I managed to do it efficiently!

I decided that, as well as being too short, the pattern around the hem was just accentuating my buddah belly, so it did not return.

I was delighted when I eventually got it to the desired length (but I don’t think I can knit with thin yarn and thin needles again, I am too too impatient), but I cast off too tight! *shakes fist at oneself* – so I am off to unpick and try again!

I love this wool (regardless of its thinness!) it is lambswool, spun at Tod & Duncan.

How are your #knitbritish wips?

ETA – see that lovely mohair in the very first image? That is from New Forest Mohair and you should definitely contact Frances and find out which colours she has (she likes experimenting, so new colours may be added from time to time), but if you want to try out a new yarn/fibre just order up a skein of the natural and just squeesh and love and cast on!

things there to be noticed

Published by louise

We took a drive, we took a flask and we went for a stroll…

 

 

lovelyfiance indulged me in showing off my latest knit

 

 

And he took some lovely pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

and I snapped him snapping things

 

The colours today were just phenomenal. I love Shetland on a day like today. I feel like days like this are only shown in a certain light so that we notice things around us and appreciate them more.

“…the mind alerts itself –

it is as if the landscape were suddenly to become aware

of the existence of its own elements….

…The things there to be noticed.”

 

Norman Maccaig.

 

Me. Noticing.

 

…and noticing all those beautiful colours today has got me strolling through the stash now….