Some finished objects

Reversible child's hat, done as a demo at Manor House the other week.


Bulb bag hand-knitted in local alpaca (Toft Alpaca) and felted. Had to buy more yarn to complete this, so the strap is a slightly different colour. I don't think it's obvious though.

FO: Duffer felted slippers

These are really quick and easy to make - "Duffers". If I made them again, I'd do a provisional cast on so that I could graft the seam that runs under the foot. I'd also be tempted to rethink the shaping - I think the decreases were supposed to be paired to make them look neater, but I couldn't make them match.

I'm also tempted to convert them to machine knitting, and put the increases/decreases at the end somehow. Might be too complicated though.

The pixies are at it again...

Having spent a few seperate occasions today, trying to relocate my blue flowery scissors, and finally finding them down the side of the sofa? The ruddy row counter's gone missing, instead. Feh! I swear there are anti-knitting pixies living in my house!

Frogged the cabled patchwork aran twice back to the 2nd pattern start. Once, because I didn't like the way the M1 stitches looked, and again, because I got the cables out of synch somewhat, not being able to find my fr*ggin' row counter!

The Crystal Palace Taos felts far too easily in an automatic machine, and produces a small, thick, shrunken mass that's more akin to a brillo pad than felt. If you plan on felting it, do it by hand. Luckily I also felted some 2ply yellow lambswool, and that has come out really well, so the Tomtom will still get its case. When I can work my way over to the sewing machine!

Next post: how a simple tubular vest on the Passap can go very, VERY wrong in my expert hands! :)

Current mood: determined

FO: Felted bag

Sunniest day of the year so far on saturday, and I am ensconced in a damp & cold church hall. Am I bothered? No! I am making a bag out of some pieces of felted fabric I made.

I had a major panic Friday night, and felted some material for the second half. I needn't have bothered, really - the bag came out really long, I should've cut it down, but I do not like cutting my hard work up! :)

I made quite a few cock-ups during construction - made the first pocket inside-out and upside-down, then used the leather I'd cut for the top for the handle, then didn't have enough lining material so had to add another bit. I guess I was concentrating on getting it done and not paying so much attention to what I was doing! It turned out OK anyway and I have some more scraps of leather should I decide to make another (smaller!) one.

The heart was sewn on, and the bobbly yarn applied with the embellisher. My sewing machine would only sew the leather if the leather was on the bottom, so it was rather hard to keep to the edge (because I couldn't see it).

Now, some gratuitous pictures of the garden, before the heavens opened:


Bleeding Heart - my favourite!


One of only three tulips in bloom


Rosemary - this was just a twig when planted


Thomas discovers something interesting under the rose bush


Some sort of willow, aka the "Treebush", planted from a twig outside the french windows


Thomas: "I lurve the scent of freshly-cut grass in the morning". *wriggle wriggle*


Thomas: "You can't see me, can you?!"

Felting - before and after

Before...


...after


This took forever and went wrong. Oh well! Trying to knit with 9 ends was a mistake, clearly!


Thomas: "I haz a sunbeam."


Current mood: working

Busy as a bee

Been up since 6am - actually woke about 2am - serves me right for going to bed early on two glasses of wine, I always wake up when I sober up! So have been knitting, or thinking about knitting for nearly 11 hours (apart from a 1 hour jaunt to the supermarket!)

Before breakfast I removed the arms from the Lizard Ridge jumper, and removed two repeats. I can't remember if the sleeves were too long before I washed it, but they were certainly ridiculous afterwards! Will probably sew them back on tonight. That jumper needs a shave, too, it's pilling terribly.


Crystal Palace Taos - knitted swatch which is curling, and felted swatch. I'm not entirely sure of the size of the felted one, it's just a sample for the Crafty Cottage. If you think it looks crumpled, it was actually football-shaped when it came out of the washing machine!!

This is lovely soft yarn, and yes, I cheated, made them on the knitting machine, knitted up no trouble at all. Another yarn for the "objects of desire" list!!


A small felted purse from Yarn Treehouse Rhythmn... I keep finding more odd balls of this!


Basketweave crochet baby blanket.


Close-up of pattern. It is made by making 4 front post trebles and then 4 back post trebles, and then changing the pattern every 4 rows. Really effective, and uses lots of yarn.


Sneak preview of the intarsia sample I'll be walking the Coventry Knit-Wits through on Wednesday.

The Cog is downstairs making coq au vin and he is taking me to the flicks tonight, as I have now lost a whole 14lbs this year! Hopefully he'll also let me have one scoop of ice-cream, too! Yay!

FOs - felted bag, hat

Another felted bag. Not sewn together brilliantly - the felt is so thick it was really hard to pierce. Might trim the edges with something. Cut the corners with sharp scissors, undecided whether to edge them.


A quick reversible hat for BISS. Dead cosy!

FO: Felted bag

Finally sewn up, a bag made from Noro Kureyon oddments left over from the LR afghan and felted. In hindsight, it would have been better to narrow it for the handles - I was just messing about really and had no idea how far the oddments would stretch.

I have another blank ready to be sewn, but I have tapered the edges with a sharp pair of scissors and will have to hand-sew it - it's just too thick to go on the Hague linker (and don't think I didn't try, 'cause I did, haha!).

I have started an MK sock for the Cog, aka 'im indoors, out of a sample skein someone gave me. It snapped whilst I was doing the toe, so I restarted, and then it snapped again and I unpicked 6 rows to rescue it. But otherwise, it's looking good, and actually fits him too! And boy, was it nice to get back onto a knitting machine - it's been too long!

Taught someone to knit at the Crafty Cottage yesterday and she was a whiz, she even got the yarn wrapping bit right (I can't knit like that, I'm crap!). Got another lady onto increasing and decreasing - she wanted to knit a tanktop but we couldn't find a pattern she liked. Then I got someone else started on hand-knitting a lizard ridge square - the Kureyon was a dark shade, so a little tricky to spot the wrapped stitches, but I think she got the idea.

Jo made her first garment on the knitting machine - a long knitted strip. She was also talking about making I-cord with DPNs until I showed her how easy it is to make one on the machine. Why spend time on something if you've the means to speed it up?!

Onwards and upwards!

Felted bags and wavey jumpers

Some finished ojects and some yarn pr0n behind the cut...




Koigu KPPPM - purdy, huh? Kinda autumny!


Felted bag before...


...and after. This is my new fave bag!


This is the other one. Didn't turn out quite so well.

The felted bag pattern is available here


See also the finished waves jumper - and a guest appearance by Amelia!

It's currently chucking it down. Good - a night in, swatching and knitting, methinks!

Current mood: happy

Pictures part 1

Some miscellaneous pictures...



Unidentified yarn. It's gorgeous!


Fingerless glove in progress. World's easiest pattern!


An attempt to make a weave-effect pattern - rib 4, garter 4 x 6 rows, then alternate. Since frogged.


The kureyon leftovers from the blanket, knitted at T10 on the chunky machine, then washed at 60 degrees C. It's got a nice drape to it.


The MK Guild stand at the NEC, before opening time.

Onwards & upwards...

• Make two pairs of socks for Jo (on 2nd of 4th sock)
  
• Sew up charity tees and blankets made last weekend
  
• Make a Passap "neckline" border for both ends of the raspberry ripple blanket
  
• Add a strap to Murphy's bag
  
• Buy beans and finish the bean bag
  
• Tackle some of the UFOs
  

Had to laugh at today's knitting pattern (I have the pattern-a-day calendar on my desk at work). Apparently you can only knit the Deco-ribbon Shrug using Crystal Palace Bamboo or DAISY needles. Yeah, right! I don't imagine anyone's daft enough to fall for that! And I don't think anyone's going to worry about not having their exact needles, after having bought 7-9 balls of the correct yarn.

Neatened up a few of the charity tees I made at the Godiva festival - discovered another one in a pile by the door after I'd put the linker away. I still need to finish up the blanket - one piece is longer than the other, so I shall join the short ends first and then the sides.

I made a little cropped top with two skeins of Colinette Lasso I got in the sale room last year. It's white with flashes of hot pink and turquoise. Haven't sewn it up yet - I don't think the pattern (converted from a hand-knitting pattern) was quite designed with us busty women in mind, but I'll reserve judgement until it's sewn up.

I also made some straight stocking stitch with some Adriafil Felis, bought in a moment of weakness at the NEC. It was deliberately felted in the washing machine last night. I might make a little clutch bag with it.

I'm determined to make some serious inroads into my stash now.

Tried to do a single-bed slip stitch pattern with the Passap. All I really got was tangles, and massively slipped areas. Pretty sure it wasn't supposed to look like that! The linen yarn doesn't knit off well, it should probably go into the "Silver Reed only" pile. It's rather amusing that I've got to grips with double-bed work, but single-bed work still eludes me - the exact reverse of learning a Japanese machine, in fact.

Felting workshop

Had an excellent workshop last night, making needle-felted flowers. Thanks to Kellie for organising it. You stab at a bit of fluff with a barbed needle until it turns into something. The needles hurt if they go into flesh (ask me how I know!). I made a big blue flower - not sure how come it came out so big, but it's very pretty! Came away with some needles, a scourer (for working on top of!) and some gorgeous bits of multi-coloured fluff. Not sure what else I'll make with them. Sure is therapeutic - think about something or someone that drives you mad, and stab away! :)

Trying to stay positive

I just visited my college's website, and apparently there are now TWO MK courses - the one I'm apparently on is "Intro to MK", but there's also "OCN in MK", which is what I *thought* I was on. Alas, the latter requires 2 days a week minimum (no, they're not open Sundays).

BANG! There goes my head against the working person's brick wall. Again. Getting a large dose of deja vu - this is exactly where I was this time last year when I was looking into starting an MK course. The one at Willenhall was more convenient, because it was evenings, but it stopped running due to lack of interest. How come I pay taxes, but can't attend courses because of the timings? It's my taxes paying for these services, after all!

<climbs off soapbox>

Have completed the main part of the Rowan bag, and am now onto the strap. I'm sure I shouldn't speak ill of yarn that cost £22, but ribbon twist is basically roving and a ribbon twisted together with a very fine thread. Which means I'm having to work my ends in ASAP before they turn into, well, fluff. Pretty, sure, but impractical. Also, the balls fall apart at the slightest provocation. I've have many wool escapes lately. Why can't they make proper balls like everyone else?

Completed making a crochet needle case on the sewing machine - it's not brilliant, but it'll do for me.

Had first goat "felting" - correct term is fulling. Knitted a piece using Artika's colour merge patterns - dark brown to beige, and back to brown. Not my fave colour, but it was the only 100% wool I had to hand. Fulled it by tacking it onto a towel and washing it at 60 degrees inside a pillow case, then a cold rinse, and switched the machine off when it got to the spin cycle. I wish I'd remembered to take a pick of it beforehand, and measurements, but I forgot. Anyway, it felted really well, but is a bit buckled at the ends, I failed to latch up some long floats so that was my fault. Not quite sure what I shall do with it now.

Sewed up one charity tee top, then managed to do the next one wrong, so gave up (it was getting late).