Woo Hoo

I don't think that I've been so happy to finish a project in a long time. But then again, this is probably the biggest project I've ever knitted. And I wasn't too keen on the colours ( my sister's choice). Having said all that, I'm delighted with the way this mitred square blanket turned out.


I pretty much designed it myself after seeing a photo of a similar blanket on Ravelry. The yarn is Jaeger Extra Fine Merino DK in colours Rose petal (982), Cream (931), Natural (937) and Ocean (940). I was one ball of Rose Petal short so I substituted a ball of Rowan Extra Fine Merino DK in pale pink which was a pretty good match (the square knitted with it doesn't really jump out and sock you between the eyes - second from left, bottom row, below). I used a 4.5mm needle throughout.


Here are the techi bits - I cast on 55 stitches per side, per square and decreased two stitches in the middle every second row. I picked up stitches for subsequent squares whenever possible to minimise seaming. I seamed when necessary using double crochet stitch. The blanket is just over 6 feet square.


I picked up the stitches for the border on 4 circular needles. There are 1320 stitches in the border! This meant over an hour per round!
It's off to it's new home with my sister on Sunday... and I can cast on for something new...

Celestine

This was a very quick little project to occupy some time while I was waiting for yarn to arrive.


It's an dodecahedral star, knitted modularly and stuffed with toy stuffing before finishing the last point. The pattern is Celestine Sox. I used Regia Bamboo Colour sock yarn and 2.25mm needles.


I modified the pattern slightly (as ever) in that I used a provisional cast-on and then just released stitches from the life-line as I knitted the subsequent pentagons, instead of picking up stitches.


It was a really quick knit - about four evenings total and will make a great baby gift which should have a much longer useful life than a jacket or jumper because as the baby grows and becomes mobile, the star can be kicked about and chased. Each point is just about the right size for a small hand to grasp.

I have several friends having babies over the coming months, so I can see quite a few of these in my immediate future.

In my life outside of all things yarney, the Resident Radiologist and I have been making the most of the few dry, sunny, weekend, autumn days that have come our way in recent weeks by getting out onto the hills around Glasgow. A couple of weekends ago we did the Queen's View walk to the Whangie and back over the hill.

(That's Loch Lomond in the distance).


We'd been this way before but not managed to find the Whangie, which you would think was pretty strange, as a 50 foot high rock formation isn't the easiest thing to miss.


This time we realised why. I was actually standing on top of Auchineden, about 8 feet away from the top of this craggy drop before I could actually see it.

The formation is pretty amazing and is supposed to give some weird echoes if you get the spot just right.

Warning...

... this post contains a real live (knitted) FO!

My knitting has actually taken off a bit lately with progress being made on several fronts. Funnily enough, this was precipitated by running out of yarn on the major WIP I was working on, and being forced to diversify a bit.

Here is my (finally) finished Gathered Pullover by Hana Jason in Interweave Knits Winter 2007.


This was started in Feb '08 (I think) but languished without arms in my WIP box all summer. I just couldn't work out what I wanted to do with them - long, cropped, cuff-up or top down.

Eventually I picked up stitches all round the armhole and worked a short-row cap sleeve (slightly puffed - unintentional but I like the outcome). I then put an EZ applied I-cord round the edge of the sleeve and armhole to prevent rolling.

I'm delighted with the result and have worn this several times already (despite it still having an un-woven in end in one of the sleeves)!

The yarn is 100% merino 4ply from a mystery cone I bought on Ebay. The body was worked in one piece in the round to the armholes, then flat to the tops of the shoulders and grafted together. The hem is a turned hem as rolled hems round my middle just seem to keep on rolling until they sit somewhere round my rib-cage! I went down a couple of needle sizes to introduce some waist shaping, then went back up one to work the upper torso.


If I was knitting this again (which is a definite possibility) I wouldn't bother with the gather either side of the cable panel. I don't think it adds anything and just looks a bit weird.

Reworking

I couple of posts ago, I showed a photo of a back-to-school necklace and shawl pin set I made for my sister. The pin I was very pleased with - that's what I worked on first and the idea had been fermenting in my head for a while. The necklace was an afterthought really - I was enjoying myself too much to stop and it just happened. The thing was, I was never quite sure about it so I sent it to my sister with a note saying that if it didn't work for her - wrong length / wrong style etc just to send it back and I'd rework it... And this is just what has happened... And I'm so pleased that she sent it back because I'd been thinking about it a bit anyway, and I'm much happier with its second incarnation.


Apologies for the photograph - it was (gasp) too sunny in Glasgow to get a good photo showing the colours and the shapes.

This is the product of a couple of hours beading and crimping on Sunday morning while the Resident Radiologist was watching a DVD and playing on his new Wii...

I took out all the small seed beads and bugles and drastically reduced the number of larger seed beads. I also added in some lavender-dyed freshwater pearls I found in a local bead store and some fluorite rectangular tubes from the Scottish Bead Fair. The final arrangement has freshwater pearls (tiny white and larger lavender) on the shortest wire, fluorite tubes on the middle wire and a mixture of freshwater pearls (tiny white), fluorite beads and amethyst chips on the longest wire with a few glass seed beads covering the ends. All the findings are sterling silver and the wire is aculon.

I was enjoying myself so much a pair of earrings 'happened' before I knew what was going on!

I'm delighted with the new finished product and hope my sister will be too.

I Aten't Dead

... in the immortal words of Granny Weatherwax.

I am, however, waging war on a large and slow-moving WIP which hasn't provided much interesting material for blogging. I will be back soon.... with photos!

Stringing some ideas together...

... I've not really been knitting much lately, though I have finished a long-standing WIP which I'll blog about once I've taken some photos.

I have however been beading.

I've been feeling the urge to get the bead stash out for a while now and last weekend proved to be just the time.

It started with a shawl / cardigan pin I bought (in an unbent form) at Woolfest, which I shaped up with a spring bend (wound one and a half times round a pen) and embellished with bits of amethyst, a few pearls and some other purple and white beads I had lying around. I enjoyed that so much I wasn't quite ready for it to be over, so I got out some monofilament and before I knew it, I had a matching necklace...

These are going to be a back-to-school gift for my sister who's a teacher.

It didn't stop there though - I ripped out a necklace I made a while ago and remade it with a stronger support wire so that it sits better, and the dangles for a pair of earrings to match (I don't have any ear-wires to mount them on at the moment though).


I also made a simple memory-wire necklace with mixed seed beads and horn heshi discs...


a beach-comber style knotted necklace with some embroidery cotton...


And a macrame beaded bracelet.


This is all a bit of a build up for this weekend really. The Scottish Bead Fair is on in Perth on Sunday and I'm going for a little look round (though I'm going to have to take it easy as I've just come down with shingles so am feeling a little under the weather). Mostly I'm going to be browsing for stash and ideas, but I also have a little list.....

Fandango

A month or so ago, I was browsing the Get Knitted site, like you do, when I noticed the link to their sock club. Now, I've been considering the idea of a sock club for some time, and when I realised that the Get Knitted one was using specially-dyed Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, I jumped on the band-wagon immediately.

Here's the first installment:


Colourway 'Fandango'.

I've no idea what pattern I'm going to knit yet, or when, but the yarn is sooooo pretty, I think I might just look at it for a bit!