I am going to have to get over these summer blues that I am suffering from at the moment. It's getting to the point where it's really no fun. Kris over at Strikker says that she's being lazy and maybe that's what's wrong with me too, I just can't seem to be quite bothered.
The weather has been so bad that it has been pointless trying to take any pictures of any of knitting because the light is dreadful (it's the middle of August and the husband and I actually discussed putting the heating on yesterday...)
But there may be light at the end of the tunnel. First of all I got my Rowan Exchange gift. Remember that I knit for Isobel? Well someone knit for me and my gift arrived in the post at the weekend. I am going to keep quiet for now as I don't want to give anything away until I have pictures to do the item justice but suffice to say that I was gobsmacked and that Polly tried to run off with it.
I also finally managed to block my Birch shawl which has been sitting on top of my knitting back for months waiting for me to stretch her and show her inner beauty. So there will be pictures of that once the light clears up too.
As you can see, there has been nice knitting stuff going on. I also decided that sitting here beating myself over the head about Joy was rather pointless and instead I am going to put her aside for a bit and come back to her later this year with a fresh pair of eyes. I will make Joy, just not right now. So instead I went to Liberty and bought some of one of my favourite yarns. This:
to make this:
I love Salina. I have loved Salina since she was published and I have seen a few on Ravelry that have made me really rather jealous. I have to admit to having bought the yarn in the Herb (green) colour that the pattern is published in. I went to Liberty fully intending to chose some other colour, especially as I have started Martha (remember her?):
in the same colour so it seems silly to have 2 garments in the same colour. But I wanted something that would go over my jeans so all of the greys and blues were out, I am off purple for the short term (there's a lot of purple in my stash) and reds/oranges are not my thing. So it just had to be Herb. Mind you, I probably knew that from the start, but I am good at this denial thing.
So the plan is to knit Salina alongside a few more hats and to enjoy lots of easy knitting. (Although I am having trouble matching the Felted Tweed tension, another source of annoyance). And then, when I have my knitting mojo back, I am considering knitting this:
Sigh. It's just so so so beautiful. Although I am most probably just setting myself up for failure again.
So I may not be getting on with Joy at the moment but have you seen that the gorgeous new collection by Kim Hargreaves is up?
If not, go and have a look at her new The Thrown Together Collection. Here are my favourites.
Although these are likely to change on an hourly basis.
I've been listening to some of the back issues of Brenda Dane's Cast On Podcasts this week on the bus to and from work. Yesterday's selection was one of the series on knitting muses and it dawned on me that my knitting muse appears to have run off. I am not sure who with at this stage but will let you know as soon as I find out.
There must be plenty of other bloggers that feel this way. Sometimes you feel as though you have so many things you want to write about that you don't even know where to start. You have to force yourself to cut it into chunks and keep some stories for the next post. Other times you struggle to find anything that you are interested in (let alone anything that anyone else may be interested in). I suspect that part of the problem stems from the fact that I haven't been around to take any pictures of my knitting (not that I've done much other than lots of little hats and frog Joy) and honestly, showing you pictures of any newly acquired stash seems rather pointless unless I have started making something out of it. And anyway, that's what Ravelry is for, right?
So this week is a blah week. I have a few baby things on the needles and have finished the crochet edging on Dandelion. Which I ended up doing twice as the spacing between the crochet stitches felt all wrong to me. After frogging Joy, all my knittng seems rather dull and I can't work out what to do next.
I shall therefore just give you a story that my lovely sister Juliette found in Metro this week (copyright Metro etc etc).
I am speechless. And now understand why non-knitters think that we knitters are all a bit dotty.
You really should never tempt the knitting gods. I should know that by now. Really I should. I mean, it's not as though I haven't had my fair share of knitting disasters over the years, many documented on this blog. But no, there I go typing titles such as 'Joy is a joy' to my blog posts and then wondering why my knitting goes so dreadfully wrong.
Having written my last blog post, I went to Liberty to meet the girls (there will be more on the recent redecoration of the Art Bar Cafe at Liberty next time) and got thinking about my tension with Joy and so I got measuring. Which was good as it saved me from knitting a whole cardigan and then realising that it didn't fit me.
The tension of unwashed Rowan Denim is meant to be 20 sts x 28 rows. I am getting 20 sts x 24 rows. When I wash my denim (yes, I swatched, it was quite the experience), I get a washed tension of 20 sts x 30 rows.
Now on the one hand I don't mind a slightly longer cardigan than the ones that Kim Hargreaves designs, on the other hand I do realise that I'll need to work out the length of the sleeves etc. A bit of me can't be bothered as I can't immediately work out how to do this. And a bit of me really wants to knit Joy. Really wants to knit Joy.
So here are two questions for you all:
1. Should I even bother pursuing this or should I offer Joy (and Hush) up for grabs on the basis that working it out is just WAY too much hassle.
2. And if you think I should stick with it, do you have any clever ideas on how to work out how many rows I should work and where so that once it is washed and dried, it fits me?
In the mean time, just so that you have something to feast your eyes on, I leave you with a picture of Marie-france's lovely hats.
Remember, you have until the end of the month to get your hats to me to enter the raffle. I am still working out what I am going to send as prizes but 2 of the yarn presents that have been earmarked are going to be hard to let go of, that's all I have to say!
I've pretty much been knitting hats for Innocent drinks since I finished the shawl. I've added about 25 to my tally in the last 5 days and plan to have knitted at least 50 by the end of the month. Although I am running out of DK yarn. Well, make that running out of DK yarn that I am willing to put towards hats for charity. I have a fair amount of DK yarn hidden in various places in my stash.
But I mentioned a while back that I had ordered this:
Kim Hargreaves' Joy from the 'Out of the Shadows' collection. I really love Joy who is made (will be made?) of Rowan's Denim. To the degree that I have the kit to make her alter ego, Sal (from the 'New Beginnings' collection, in Rowan Wool cotton. The pattern seems to be fundamentally the same but with longer sleeve.
Note that I hadn't realised this until I looked at them both at the same time. Ah well, my taste is nothing if not consistent...
Here's the progress that I have made so far.
I really like the simplicity of the pattern. The only thing 'worrying' me is that the pattern (and the ball band) both say that denim should be knitted on 4mm needles and I can only get gauge on 5mm needles. Which seems to be a huge difference and I didn't think that I knitted that tightly anymore. All of which would not bother me all that much except that there's no other way to check that it works out other than to knit the whole thing, wash it, watch it shrink and see what happens next.
So please wish me luck. There's no more grafting in my foreseeable future so if this is works out wrong, I shall be using the cardigan as a dishcloth once it's done.
The good news is that Jacqui's wedding was amazing. She looked stunning, the weather was perfect, there were tons of lovely people there, the food was delicious and the venue stunning. It really couldn't have been better.
I gave her the Myrtille Leaf stole and suffice to say that I know that she loved it. But the bad news is that I completely forgot to take a picture of the finished item. I meant to, really I did, but it was all a bit of a rush at the last minute and somehow it completely slipped my mind. Even as I was wrapping it in purple and cream tissue paper, I didn't think to grab my camera (which was on the table next to me). I shall ask if she can get a nice picture of her with it for me some time this week.
Sometimes I am such a muppet, it's untrue.
So I shall make it up to you all by showing you another FO which happened a while back but taking pictures of navy blue is rather difficult. These are the remanents of a very long grafting and seaming session:
This is a close up of one of the areas of ribbing that went through the grafting operation in order to shorten it. I am quite pleased as you really have to look quite close up to see it. I can obviously see it but I do believe that a good blocking might yet work miracles.
Here's the sweater seconds after I sewed the last end in.
And then I modeled it for the husband.
And some more because I was very very proud to have finished it after all that grafting.
And because it's my first bit of real fairisle, here are more pictures than you really need of the yoke.
In situ:
A close up.
And on me.
I promise that's the last you'll see of her :)
Debbie Bliss ski sweater
- The pattern: Ski Sweater from the Cashmerino DK book by Debbie Bliss
- The yarn: Debbie Bliss Cashmerino DK bought from Get Knitted.
- The needles: 3.25 and 3.75 Addi Turbos.
- Size: Small. Mmm. If I were to make it again (which I really wouldn't), I'd make it a size smaller as it's a tad bit big in the chest and the sleeves were way too long. I shortened the sleeves by about 7cm each (grafting ribbing is now officially my least favourite knitting technique) and the bottom of the sweater by about 10cm.
- Started: I swatched on the 11th of November 2006 and cast on a few days later.
- Finished: In July. I finished way earlier and the realised that the sleeves and bottom needed shortening so the sweater was rolled into a ball and hidden away for a few months. Luckily I got a few weeks off work and that gave me the space to consider grafting, work out how to graft, knit and test my grafting on a swatch and actually do the grafting. There was a lot of procrastination involved.
- Thoughts: I love the sweater but it doesn't fit as well as I would have liked. I wouldn't tell anyone not to knit it but just measure, measure some more and keep an eye on the overall length of the body and sleeves.