Success and Failure

As usual, this post has been a long time in coming. The first yarn I spun on my, now nearly one-year-old, wheel, was some lovely Shetland which was a gift long ago from Helena. I spun it up quickly (for me), and decided that then was the time to try out my first own design, which was to be a little tank top, or vest, for Laurie.

On the niddy noddy!

It was to be knit in the round, with a plain stockinette back, 2x2 rib around the bottom, with a cable pattern on the front. I scanned Knitting for Dummies, which is still a constant point of reference even though I would now consider myself an experienced knitter, for some cables, and decided on a chain cable set centrally between two wave cables, to be edged with moss stitch. I began from the bottom and quickly got to the armholes, about which I was the most apprehensive, but I did some workings out (to cut a long story short) and was really happy with how they turned out.

Due to the pulling in nature of cables, I gave whatlooked like quite a lot of length to the vest, which did result in it looking slightly peculiar by the time I arrived at the armholes, but I kept inserting my arms into the bottom and stretching it out to the sides to reassure myself! The moss stitch actually became an edging in itself as I began decreasing for the armholes; I had planned to add ribbed cuffs, but considered actually leaving the moss stitch as the edging. More on this later...

So, I completed one front shoulder, moved onto the other and completed that, but the further I got, the closer I got to the end of the yarn. I moved onto the back and finished one shoulder, with about six inches left with which to complete the remaining shoulder, both cuffs and the neck - an obvious impossibility! Oh dear.

The vest in its current state.

 You may also notice that I somehow failed to cross a cable, right in the very centre of the chain cable - what excellent placement for a mistake!

So, I shall have to wait for Wonderwool so I can purchase about 10 grams of Shetland and hope I can get this finished before Laurie's grown out of it (for the uninitiated, you cannot buy fibre in 10g increments - 50g is usually the minimum!) Joking aside though, I am reasonable pleased with this as a first quick design. I have so many swirling around in my head, as well as drawings, paintings and textile projects. By the time I am actually able to produce any of them, I will have sketchbooks full of ideas and won't know where to start. Oh actually, wait, I don't have time to record all these ideas anyway, so who am I kidding? I definitely feel the need to end this post with a LOL, so please laugh with me and leave a comment.

xxx Sam

Thank you Santa

Pretty much exactly a year ago, we went to Shropshire with my lovely old schoolfriends for a reunion Christmas weekend. This is a (kind of) annual event and part of the weekend entails a secret santa, which is the cause of much hilarity. The gift I received, however, was far from hilarious, but a perfectly thought out and utterly suitable present, and I was, suffice it to say, astonished, to open the wrapping to reveal a beautiful hank of Colinette OneZero yarn. Mmmmm... soft and creamy white with cleverly placed splashes of pinks and purples, spun in a sequence of tight, followed by a massive, fat slub, followed by tight again - beautiful!

The hank, however, languished in a box for the year before I decided what to do with it. I'm not really a one-skein project kinda person, preferring the torture of knitting a sweater which takes forever, with no other works in progress (WIPs) alongside. But I'd just got to the end of a very large amount of stocking stitch on my Laar, and I suddenly felt the urge to produce something quick, which I could see grow before my very eyes. I opened the box in which the skein was kept (I hardly ever open this box, so every time, I was surprised to see the yarn haha!) and realised I had the perfect yarn with which to produce said project!

I had a quick gloss through Ravelry and decided a cowl would be the ideal project to show off the gorgeousness of this yarn. In fact, I pretty much decided on the first cowl project I saw - the Drop Stitch Cowl by Abi Gregorio. I'm delighted with how this cowl has turned out, and even more with how long (or short) it took - only a couple of evenings.

Here it is in all its glory, followed by some shameless selfies (I find that term hilarious!). Well, the light was perfect...

The last one's a bit rubbish because of the shadow, but you can see the gorgeous thickness and robustness of the yarn, even though it is gorgeously soft. I've hardly taken it off since I finished it; I know it'll be fantastic as a wear-in-the-house garment when it gets colder.

So thank you Santa, whichever one you were (though I have my suspicions...) - you've enabled me to have a gorgeous new winter garment!

Ode to a Hat

Actually, I must come clean; there is no ode to follow I'm afraid to say. Just a lot of photos of my Kat hat from Kim Hargreaves lovely book, Precious, from which I also knitted Thea. Marno was having a mess around with the settings on his camera, hence the rather large number of photos of one of the smallest things it is possible to knit, but I loved how these turned out so thought I'd just go for the photo inundation. Here goes...

I'm not generally pleased with photos of myself, but I think the altered reality in these shots helps haha :)

I love how the first photo has a kind of halo around the hat, which is a pretty good representation of what Kid Classic is like - beautiful stitch definition, yet a lovely fuzzy halo over the surface. I've realised also, that if I want to spin yarns like this, its going to have to be long draw, and I don't have time to finish a huge great pile of Falkland (in the most beautiful pistashio colour) which is currently on my wheel, which I'm spinning short draw, to practise long draw. In fact, I can't remember how long ago it is now since I last sat at my wheel; a good few weeks. Very sad.

I am, however, progressing nicely with my Laar cardigan, which I'm knitting in Jillybean's Knot Another Granny Yarn in Staying Calm. I think the colour is called Staying Calm anyway - it's the colour of a calm sea in the early evening - beautiful. I bought it at Wonderwool a year and a half ago, totally on the spur of the moment; it was utterly irresistible. On the link, the top photo of it is more representative of the colour in real life.

So I am making a bit of progress with the making. Basically just trying to keep it going during these years when I can devote very little time to it. Like so many mummies out there.

Time to go and watch the Great British Bake Off!

xxx Sam

Shellseeker Numero 2

As I discovered with Thea, ten weeks post birth + breastfeeding does not equal a good figure in which to pose in a newly knitted garment. However, since I have no idea how long it will take to reclaim my post baby figure (or indeed, if I will), here are some slightly reluctantly posted photos of my finally finished Shellseeker, almost completely reknitted as I frogged the whole body but hadn't knitted the arms.

This pocket is absolute genius. When you read ahead in the patttern, you haven't a clue how it's going to work, but it all becomes so clear once you arrive there.

I wasn't sure how the neck would hang, and considered adding a ribbed collar to give it some shape and structure, but it actually works perfectly now the ends are woven in.

 It's exactly what I wanted - a jumper that is casual, cosy and warm; that can be used for outdoor activities, but has the comfort of gorgeous, soft yarn (in this case, alpaca) that you can snuggle into on a cold evening. It was fun to knit, particularly due to the many "ah-ha" moments, and the rounds went quickly because of the divisions in each one of the front, back and pocket - it felt like there were targets constantly, pushing me on to the next one.

I'd definitely recommend this knit. The original is in cotton, which may, in the long term, be the best fibre due to the drapey nature of the finished garment, but at least I'll be warm in my alpaca!

Why, what a lovely sack you are wearing!

After speeding (for me) through my lovely Shellseeker, I finally reached the end of the front and decided now would be a good time to try it on (pause for derisive laughter). I had tried it when I got past the armholes, which was quite some time ago in terms of the length of the garment, but had neglected to since then. Items turning out too short is usually my problem; I certainly didn't anticipate an item being far longer than intended...

Don't misunderstand - I had been looking at Shellseeker with a critical eye and wondering if not only the length but also the width were somewhat more than intended as I got closer and closer to the end, but I somehow managed to sweep this possible issue to the corner of my mind.  I didn't think it possible for one of my garments to be so drastically large in comparison to the schematic. I notoriously need to go up a whole mm in order to get gauge as I knit so tightly.

Well, as you may possible have inferred from this post title, miracles can happen, and my lovely, soft, alpaca Shellseeker is a lovely, soft, alpaca sack!

I don't think I need to elaborate on how unimpressed I am with this fact - my expression says it all - the front is a whole 12cm too long!

You can't really appreciate from the photos just how large, unshapely and unflattering this jumper is. Because there is no side shaping anyway, and the only shaping consists of side decreases and centre increases to form the pocket, unless the garment turns out exactly the intended size, you risk looking as if you are, indeed, wearing a sack.

On the first of these back views you can see the size of the jumper in all it's rectangular glory. On the lower photo, you can see how, when one's arms are by one's sides, the fabric forms protrusive folds on each far side around the armholes, which Marno kindly pointed out to me, due to my not being able to see the back!

I knew Shellseeker had no body shaping and relied on the pocket shaping to create interest and, well, shape, and I was fine with that, but I think this jumper can only work if its exactly the right size for the wearer. With that thought in mind, I have taken drastic action. For the first time ever, I have entirely frogged (for the knitting uninitiated, ripped out) Shellseeker. Well, not entirely, as I hadn't anticipated it taking so long and didn't have time to rip it all out during Noah's nap, so I'm about two thirds through, but make no mistake, it will all be gone and I will start again, from the very beginning, with a 1mm smaller needle (I did go up a needle size and a half)! Its funny actually, because even when I did my tension swatch I wasn't entirely happy with the looseness of the stitches, so hopefully with Shellseeker mark 2, it will be a little stiffer (though not much as its alpaca) and just hold together better.

I am entirely blown away but the pattern though, and can only say good things about it. It is sheer genius. So utterly simple yet you can't imagine how on earth something is going to work, in this case, particularly the pocket, until you get to it. Then the method, which you've read through so many times before you arrived at that point, just falls into place and uses such obvious yet subtle ways to achieve it's aim.

So I hope to have a me-sized Shellseeker very soon, although ironically it would be better at this point in time to keep the large version, as I will be expanding in the next six months to accommodate Noah's little brother or sister!!! (Pause for gasps and "ahhs"). Yes, I'm 14 weeks pregnant, and its certainly very exciting. We are so very blessed and thankful for all God has given us.

But I seem to have created a little pattern of making clothes too big for myself lately. I made a dress quite a few months ago that ended up looking like maternity wear, which I decided to keep for when I became pregnant again, so photos of that to come in a few months when I have a bump to fill it with! I also didn't pull it apart because I was actually really pleased with how it turned out, even though it is a tent.

So, all in all, not a particularly successful couple of months in the clothes making department. A sack for a jumper and a tent for a dress. Surely it can only get better from here...

xxx Sam

Under the Apple Tree

We've reached the stage with our house where we're running out of projects and looking for what to do next. It's funny when doing up your house becomes a hobby and you start to think, "What shall we do when we've done everything?" Of course, that will never happen, however, we have made two new projects for ourselves, both rather large, though one more so than the other. The first is that we are going to replace the bathroom. Only the suite and the floor, as the whole room is tiled and it would be a mammoth and expensive job to replace them. They are large and white with bevelled edges, and there is a row of coloured mosaic tiles around the centre. Perfectly inoffensive, and plenty of potential for improvement.

The other, somewhat larger job is that we have begun to strip the paint of the front of the house. It began when Marno, after a few weeks of saying what a bad state the paint on the bay windows was in, took a chisel out to the front garden to see how easily the paint would come off. Low and behold, it stripped off like wallpaper over most of the surface, revealing very well preserved sandstone, typical of the majority of houses in Cardiff and one of my favourite features. We are hoping to be able to keep the sandstone bare and just treat it with a weatherproofing finish, but I want to paint the sills, which are currently black gloss, a nice matt charcoal grey, rather more period I think!

Here's a progress shot;  it's not particularly clear, but you can see where we've removed the paint on the bottom bay (n.b. not all of it came off like wallpaper - there's still a fair bit to remove from that one!)

So what was I doing under the apple tree? Well the point I was getting to with the above is that, what with all these projects suddenly piling up around our ears, you'd think we'd make the most of the weather and get on with it, but it's been so gorgeous here, we spent a lot of Saturday sitting on the picnic mat in the shade of our beautiful apple tree, chatting, (me) knitting and reading, and generally chilling, followed by a lovely barbeque at a friend's house in the evening.

 View from the picnic mat


 I made a little progress on my Shellseeker, which is charging along, for me. I'm so glad I changed my technique, it's made such a massive difference to my speed, and the alpaca couldn't be more perfect for this project.

So all in all, a rather pleasant weekend with far too much relaxing and certainly not enough work, but you just have to make the most of these rare moments of warmth and sunlight I think.

There's what I'm reading - The Help. A fantasic book, which, on this very rare occasion, I'm glad to have seen the film of before I read the book, because it's written in the accent of the narrators of the story, and it really helps to have that fresh in your head. I can imagine it would read rather peculiarly otherwise.

Last Friday I was due to have some friends over from our church with their little ones. There were supposed to be four of us mummies and six babies and children, but in the end, only one friend could make it with her two - a seven month old and three year old. Anyway, in anticipation of such a crowd, I hastened to the kitchen to make a gargantuan chocolate fudge cake. There would be plenty for all for us, but hopefully not too much left for Marno and me to have to finish. Unfortunately, as I was in the process of making, which was the day before, the friend who did come texted me to say it would only be her. Oh dear! I foresaw myself wrestling inside for the next week until the chocolate cake was finished, as there was no way it was going to be demolished the following afternoon...

 Several slices later, I packed it off to work with Marno yesterday, to remove the temptation once and for all. It went down very well with his boss!

xxx Sam

Wonderhaul

It seems like Wonderwool was months ago now, as we've got so back to normal since our little holiday in Pembrokeshire (of which more in a future post), which we planned to coincide with the weekend of Wonderwool. We went to Pembrokeshire for a week and returned the Saturday of WW, so did a slight detour home through Builth Wells, the town in which it's held, to stock up on yarn for projects for the coming year. Ok, so I only bought yarn for two major projects, but we all know I, shall I say, take my time, over large projects. However, I'm hoping all that is to change as I've drastically changed my knitting style in the last month or so, intentionally, as I'm fed up of taking so long to knit jumpers which I want to wear, like, now! Like I've said before, my knitting is neat and consistant, but the reason I take so long is the method I used to create the actual stitches - I would take my right hand off the needle and kind of physically wrap the yarn around to create the new stitch; a method which requires much more time per stitch (ok, we're only talking mili-seconds but it all mounts up) than the new way which I've been working on, and which now feels like I've always used, of tensioning the yarn with my little finger as I used to do anyway, but then resting the yarn on my forefinger and holding it taught so I can just pass it over the needle tip without having to remove my grip of the needle. Sorry if that is rather impossible to visualise! I assure you though, it's made a huge difference to my knitting speed. I thought, after the Apres Surf, that I wanted a simple (but bot boring) project which was mainly stocking stitch so I could improve my new technique and speed up considerably. I chose Shellseeker by Heidi Kirrmaier as yes, it certainly complies with the request for lots of stockinette, but also has two colours, in the form of stripes, which is another new technique for me. So far in my knitting career, I've only worked with one colour, though I have a kit waiting for me for the Fiddlehead mittens, which the Midnight Sheep kindly put together for me quite some time ago, but which I've always found a little forbidding. I'm certainly fearful of all those colours!

Aaanyway... here is the lovely yarn I bought for Shellseeker. Its by UK Alpaca and I bought a cream and a muted lime green.

Actually, a more accurate description would be a mix between lime and mustard, which sounds rather revolting but trust me, its gorgeous! I've cast this on now, using yet another new technique - magic loop - which I wasn't sure about to start with, but it's turned out rather well. I was going to post a progress shot here, but I've only done seven rows so far so it may not be particularly interesting yet. I'm also not a huge fan of progress shots. One or two perhaps, but I like to save it all for the big reveal.

Ok, moving on. A few weeks ago, my friend Lorna showed me this beautiful pattern by Gudrun Johnston. It is rather reminiscent of something you may find in my very favouritest shop in the world (obviously I realize there is not such word as favouritest, in case you are wondering) - White Stuff. It reminds me of a cardigan I bought in there when I was pregnant actually, a size too big to accommodate growth (!). I couldn't get it out of my head, and found myself accidentally purchasing some gorgeous yarn from the most fantastic Jill of Jillybean Yarns. I bought her Knot Another Granny Yarn in Staying Calm.

I realize the colour looks different in each of those photos, but its somewhere between them all. Hopefully you can see why I couldn't resist it, and lovely Jill gave me a discount as well, so I couldn't refuse :)

I also bought some fibre for spinning. This gorgeous rhubarb pink, which I'm hoping to spin into yarn for a short sleeved, button up cardigan - well, it's in my head at the moment. Then the plain white to practise with and maybe experiment with some dye, and the bit of blue just because it was gorgeous!

Again, none of these colours are true. The top one is taken with the toy camera setting, and the bottom one on vivid. I'm looking forward to messing around with these though.

Time to go, as I've been trying to squeeze time out of my lovely boy, but he's fed up of me writing now and keeps dragging my arm away from the keyboard. I'll leave you with this photo of me enjoying some fibre.

x Sam

A Turn About the Garden

Yes! I've been so excited to finally write this post. I've been leading up to it shamelessly, which could have been dangerous as there was always the chance of stalling again, but I have, in fact, actually finished the Apres Surf Hoodie.

I was debating whether to knit the hood or not for a while, as I don't generally get on with hoods, I find them rather cumbersome and awkward to place when wearing a coat over the top. This is probably just me as I realize it does sound rather ridiculous as I write it, but nevertheless, a valid consideration since I'm going to be wearing it myself.  But after having scrutinized many, many Apres Surfs on Ravelry, I concluded that the hood is more like a light piece of additional fabric, rather than a huge bulk, and it does finish off the design beautifully, so I went along with it and am glad I stuck it out.

The yarn I used is Fyberspates Scrumptious 4ply sport superwash, which I bought at Wonderwool last year (more on this years WW coming soon), and it has proved the perfect choice and was a really pleasing yarn to work with. The skeins are pretty generous so I have a reasonable amount left to stash! Man, that hood though. It really was a work of patience to work my way through it after feeling like I'd finished the jumper when I completed the three needle shoulder bind-off. Speaking of that, I did use three new to me techniques including the three needle bind-off, plus provisional cast-on and i-cord bind off. I found them all really enjoyable to use, which may sound peculiar, but that is whan I love about knitting - the ingenuity of it. It looks so complicated to the untrained eye, but makes so much sense when you understand how stitches work with each other to create such a variety of effects.

Here are a few more gratuitious photos of the hoodie.

I think overall, it fits really well and the colour and yarn are perfect. The only thing I'd do differently is change up a needle size for the i-cord bind-off on the body and sleeves. I did for the hood, which has come out perfectly, but the cuffs and waist are a tiny, tiny bit tight but probably only noticable by me.

After ripping out my Spring Forward socks at the end of my last post, they have been re-cast-on and are going somewhat speedily for me. I've just printed out my next project, purchased on Rav, so lots in the pipeline, but I'm going to save that for next time as well, as I bought the yarn for that at Wonderwool.

Well, goodbye lovely readers. Leave me a little message. Have you knitted something which has just taken months and months, or even years? I have to say, the thing that attracted my to this project in the first place was the juxtaposition of a hoodie, usually associated with beach bums or chavs (!), with the use of lace to create a garment which is both beautiful and casual. What attracts you to a project and makes you want to give your time to it? I'd be really interested to know.

xxx Sam

Disclaimer: The beach bums and chavs comment was entirely for effect you understand. I do possess a couple of hoodies myself, though generally only wear them snowboarding on on outdoor activities - I can't deal with that hood problem too often!