No Ends, But Plenty of Beginnings

Hello Everyone, I hope you all had a good weekend.  We had a lovely spontaneous trip to Sheffield to see Grace.  Although it was still very cold and windy at the weekend we did get out and about in Sheffield.

On Saturday we visited the cathedral.  Grace has lived in Sheffield now for two and a half years, but this was our first visit to the Cathedral and we were very impressed with the interior.  From the outside it doesn't look very exciting, but inside there is a lovely mix of ancient and modern architecture, plenty of interesting side chapels and, my favourite, lots of lovely angels to spot.

On Sunday, we walked to the Botanical Gardens.

It's always good to meet up with Grace, because we have plenty of knitting chat to catch up on - comparing works in progress, yarns and discussing future projects.  For the trip, I took my Leftie Shawl.  This had been languishing at the bottom of the works in progress pile, mainly because it's a good travelling project so I was saving it for the next long car trip.  I managed to get lots done on this, more than I thought I would. I could quite possibly finish it this week - I'll have to find a new travelling project for future trips.

The other shawl I have been working on and  had intended to finish this week has been put to one side because I've cast on another Fair Isle Hat.

I want to get the pattern written up and the best way to check what I've typed up is to knit it up again.  I'm using leftovers from the cardigan I knitted Eve, so it all helps towards stash reduction.

I've also been doing some dress making - little and often, so it's coming together nicely, without any stress.

Neckline and armholes to finish off, zip to insert and then only the hem.

I've also joined in with a new crochet CAL.  This one is called Mandala Madness and it's by Helen Shrimpton.  The pattern is being released over 18 weeks.  So far the first 6 weeks are available.  Here's the pattern picture of what's been released so far.  Isn't it gorgeous.

The finished object will be a very large circular blanket.  I've only just joined in but I'm part way through the second part.

I would have made more progress but my eye strain problem flared up again - you would think by now I would have learnt that trying to read complicated crochet patterns on my Kindle late at night is not good for my eyes.  Anyway, I've had to put it down for now, but as soon as my eye recovers, I'll be back with it - but only in good light!

I've just remembered that I do have something finished after all.  I've been continuing to make my mini sock yarn sweaters to add to my bunting decoration.  Here's another 7 that have been completed recently.

So that's what I'm up to at the moment.  I'm off down to London on Friday to have a girlie weekend with Eve.  Can't wait for that.  I'll have to sort out a new travelling project for the train journey.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

Happy and Productive

Hello Everybody, I hope you all had a lovely weekend.  I had a wonderful Easter break with both of my daughters coming home to visit.

We visited grandparents, had a lovely meal out, baked brownies and made an apple crumble.

We visited the Pre-Raphaelite exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery and we watched the recent film Suffragette.

We had a night out at the pub and ate lots of chocolate.

And my lovely girls took me out for a feast of cakes at one of our local cafes.  All in all an absolutely perfect weekend, why did it have to end so soon?

And obviously there was plenty of knitting done.  Over the past week, since finishing Eve's cardigan, I've managed to make excellent progress on other WIPs that were lying around.

First of all, here's a picture of me and Eve in our twin cardigans.

Eve was delighted to receive her own version and wore it most of the weekend.

I completed the grey version of my Olivia cardigan pattern and wore it most of the weekend!

The yarn was recycled from this cardigan which I never wore.  You can see details of the project on my Ravelry page, here.

I also completed my socks for March.  I used a plain coloured sock yarn for a change because I wanted to knit a lacy pattern and felt that self striping sock yarn wouldn't show the pattern up properly.

The pattern for these socks is the Petunia Dursley Double Eyelet Socks by Erica Lueder, a free pattern on Ravelry, and it's so pretty.  I'm entering these in a Harry Potter KAL that's currently running on Ravelry.  Details of my project are here.

I have also caught up with the Block-a-Month Crochet along that I'm following.  Here are my March squares.

Tiptoe Through the Tulips Square

Starburst Square

Tears from Heaven Squares

I now have the equivalent of 8 large squares in total.  The plan is to make 16 squares for a medium sized lap blanket.

All this activity has meant a significant reduction in my stash.  I'm looking forward to totalling it up at the end of the month.  I also managed to off-load over 500g of acrylic DK yarn to Grace for her ripple blanket - although this felt a bit like cheating, but if it gets my stash totals down I shouldn't complain.

I've still got a few other WIPs lurking around but I think I can treat myself this week and cast on a few new ones.

Wow, uploading a blog post and sorting the photos always seems to take more time than you think - as least I'm up to date now.

Enjoy your week and I hope it's a good one.

Catching Up

Time marches on, and I have a number of projects to share with you.  Recently I've started two new shawl knitting patterns (not that I'm short of a shawl or two!)

The first one, I've been wanting to knit for ages.  It's called Hansel Hap and it's by Gudrun Johnston.  This is the pattern picture...

And here are the colours I'm using.

I'm using Jamieson & Smith 2 ply jumper weight Shetland wool.  I've completed the garter stitch central triangle and I've just started the border.

The second shawl I'm knitting, is probably more of a scarf than a shawl.  It's called Leftie and it's by Martina Behm.  It's a pattern I had down to do at some point in the future, but Grace visited recently and brought me some lovely Rico Superba Poems 4 ply which works perfectly with this pattern.  Here's the pattern picture...

And here's what I've done so far.

It's fun watching the colour changes evolve.  Can't wait to get to the lovely red colours.

The only things completed so far this month are my squares for the Block-a-Month CAL.  I'm only crocheting two of the three squares for this month, I've decided to be far more selective this year as to which squares I complete.

The first square is called Fan Dance.

The small square for this month is called Granny Heart Square and as usual I made four of these to equal the size of the big square.

I seem to have quite a few projects started now and I'd like to start work on another pair of socks.  I'd also like to make an effort to sort out my stash and try and lose a few kilos from it.  So there's plenty for me to be getting on with.  I think tomorrow will be a lazy knitting day for me.  I hope you're all having a good weekend and Happy Valentine's Day.

Serendipity

Well the New Year has got off to a good start.  I'm getting myself organised and managing to find plenty of time to knit and crochet.

As an added bonus, I have had the good fortune to acquire a significant number of craft magazines that were no longer wanted by the previous owner.

What treasure!

This little lot will keep me quiet for a while.

I shall saviour them and browse them slowly and carefully, enjoying the inspiration that arises from them.  How fortunate I am that these came my way.

The work on my leftovers Fair Isle cardigan continues, although, at what seems like a slow pace.  Because I'm knitting all the pieces concurrently, it doesn't feel as though it's growing much, but I'm loving the way it is turning out.

I hadn't intended to join any crochet-alongs, I have enough to be getting on with at the moment, but I received a message on Ravelry inviting me to join in again with the Block-A-Month CAL for 2016, and I just couldn't refuse.

This year I'm going for a muted palette - last year's colour choices were bright and "in your face" - so for 2016 I've picked colours that are more unusual for me.

I'm using Stylecraft Special DK in cream, stone, pale rose, cloud blue, wisteria, silver and grey.

Here's this months' squares - firstly the main square, which is called Stars Aligned.

The filler square is called Larksfoot.

And the small square is called Circled Granny - as last year I have made four of these to make them up to a large square.

I'm very pleased with these squares - I'm sure the blanket will be lovely when it's finished - but that'll be months away.  For now, I'm back to some Fair Isle knitting.  Enjoy your crafting time.

Bold, Busy, Bright Block-a-month Blanket

Hurray!  It's finished!  My Block-a-month blanket.

My bold, bright and very busy blanket.

It certainly is colourful.  It has been fun trying to place the squares, in the end I decided it didn't really matter where they were placed, so I just got on and sewed them up.

I did a simple border of lemon then lipstick to.complete it.  I think the lipstick helps to bring it all together.

It has a certain jolliness about it that will make it a lovely blanket to snuggle under in the Winter.

Despite cutting the project short, the blanket is still a generous 52 inches square.  You can see full details of yarn colours and amounts used on my Ravelry page, here.

It's good to get that project out of the way, it was starting to become a bit of a chore.  I still have another CAL (the Circles of the Sun cushion cover) and a KAL (the Dancing Bees shawl) on the go.  They should both be completed by the end of the month.  I'm then looking forward to starting some new projects - I can't believe how disciplined I'm being at the moment.  Although, there are a few other CALs I have my eye on but I'm trying not to be tempted to start them yet.  For now I'm concentrating on catching up with the shawl knit-a-long whilst watching the golf in the evenings.  Hope you're having a good weekend.  Bye for now.

Final Squares

Here are my squares for the Block-a-month CAL for August.

The main square this month is called Cow Parsley Afghan Square.  Isn't it pretty?

The filler square, that we voted on, is called Tropical Delight.

It's extremely beautiful but it was anything but a delight to make.  The pattern wasn't clear or helpful.  It was a frustrating project that was only excused because of the gorgeous end result.

The small square this month didn't appeal to me, so I substituted this one, called Sunburst Square.  As usual I made four.

So that brought my total up to the equivalent of twenty four large squares.  As I have decided to call it a day on this project, I needed one more square to be able to complete a 5 x 5 blanket.  So I decided to use the See How They Run square.

A nice and straight forward one that looks quite effective.

So now the fun begins.  I need to decide in which order to join the squares.

They're all so bright and colourful, it'll be fun to plan the layout.  So that's my task for the next few days.  See you next time, enjoy yourselves.