FOs
I thought for a moment that I didn't have anything finished to show you, then I realised just how long it had been since I last did a proper update!
So I do have a couple:
Socks that fit me perfectly! Finished just in time for the warm weather to start, and the need for proper woolen socks to significantly decrease.
The very beautiful Rosie did not seem to be overly impressed with her Easter Bunny Ears, but I'm told that the look was very popular with many humans.
WIPs
I've got 3 active projects right now, 2 of them are KALs, and the third is a test knit of sorts.
Remember the knitted cupcake from the last update? That was part of the current Shef Knit KAL, and the theme for this is pointless items. That is, items that lack a purpose, rather than items that aren't pointy, although I did suggest that a doily might fit both descriptions! I've always been baffled by the idea of knitted food. If you're going to make food, then make it from something edible! So my pointless knitted item is a small batch of cupcakes. However, in order to motivate myself to actually make them, I've had to give them a purpose (I'm not very good at this pointless thing, am I?) anyway, I'm going to give them to my niece, because she serves me imaginary tea every time I see her, and usually a plastic boiled egg too. This gives her something else to feed me :)
The problem I have is that the cast off day for this KAL is the 30th of April, so I've not got long to knit the remaining 2 cakes and 3 bun cases (all of the toy tea sets seem to have 4 cups and 4 plates, so there has to be 4 cakes!)
The second KAL I'm working on is with the Countess Ablaze group on Ravelry. This year the Countess is taking her inspiration for a series of one of a kind colourways from Homers Odyssey, so this KAL has a similar, but broader theme - Greece. The only condition is that you use Countess Ablaze yarn in your project, and that you explain how your project relates to the theme. I believe some of the girls are having a private competition to see who can come up with the most tenuous, and yet still acceptable link to the theme!
I'm hoping to complete 2 projects for this KAL, as we have until the 1st of June to cast off. This is where I'm currently at with my first entry. The pattern is called Artemis, goddess of the hunt, and the design is supposed to represent her arrows. I'm knitting it in Viscount of Spark, and the colourway is called The pedestal is waiting, a one of a kind colourway from last years Twelve Caesars collection.
My second entry, if I can manage it, will involve me first finishing the sweater quantity spin that is currently occupying all of the bobbins on my wheel, so that I can spin this smooshy beauty, and hope that I've acquired sufficient skill at spinning to produce something around a sport weight.
I'm really excited about this one, and I hope to be able to tell you more in about a month :)
Finally, there's the test knit. Well, actually, it's not a true test knit, as the pattern has been finalised and released, but a request was made for people to knit a few versions using Countess Ablaze yarns. The pattern is Ribs to go, by Susan Ashcroft, and there are 3 slightly different versions. I really want to knit the lace rib version, so I did try that one first, but as you know I am a really big fan of variegated colourways, and lace often doesn't work so well when there are lots of colour changes in the fabric, the details of the pattern can become lost. This turned out to be the case with this pattern.
This is the first few rows of the lace version worked in my chosen yarn. It is very pretty, but I don't feel that it really does justice to the pattern at all. So I ripped it out and started again following the moss rib instructions, and this is allowing the yarn to shine, as it should.
I've not got very far with this, as I've been spending most of my time working on Artemis, or spinning, but it is a great 'lazy' knit, you can more-or-less switch your brain off and get on with it while you watch tv, or sit and chat.
I'm still determined to knit the lace rib version at some point, because I think it's beautiful, but I'll have to choose one of my semi-solid colourways for that.
*cough*Stash Acquisitions*cough*
You remember how I was recently made redundant? You know how if I was a sensible person then I'd be carefully budgeting and saving right now? Uhm, well, I'm not a sensible person. I comfort-shop.
I went on holiday last weekend. Kelly has somehow managed to put up with me for 12 whole years, and we thought that the occasion deserved to be commemorated with a romantic weekend away together, a whole evening in the spa, lots of relaxing, apparently riding bicycles seemed a good idea at the time, although my bottom begged to differ for a few days afterwards, and there was a giant cookie too:
I'm procrastinating about the yarn hoarding, aren't I?
I also hired a car for the weekend, rather than steal Stephens again, and leave him stranded for 3 days. This meant I had full control of a car, and I was just a few miles away from Nottingham, and Kelly wanted to go for a distressingly long bike ride... clearly all of this was telling me that I needed to let Kelly explore the world of bruised bottoms and aching thighs on his own, while I went to visit Eleanor at Knit Nottingham! It's obvious, isn't it?
Well I had a lovely chat with Eleanor, and found some not-quite-white Masham yarn to go with my handspun for my second OdysseyKAL project (I'd love to think I could spin both yarns in time, but I know I'm not up to that just yet!), and maybe a couple of other things too.
Then, a few days ago, I was suffering particularly badly with my wrists, and realised that some sort of light support probably wouldn't go amiss from time to time, just when they're really bad. I was at Stephens at the time, and the nearest pharmacy that would have tubigrip just happens to be right opposite The Haberdashery. So I just popped in to grab a knitting magazine, and as I walked in, I spotted a gorgeous colourway of Zig Zag. Having bought one of the new colourways in Nottingham, I knew that they've changed the fibre content of this yarn from 50:50 wool:nylon, to 75:25 wool:nylon, and in doing so they've discontinued the colourways in the older version. The colourway I'd spotted was one of the older versions, so I had to snap it up while I could.
And of course, no stash update for me is complete without a big, gushing, girl-crush mention of Countess Ablaze. This time it's even better though, as today (technically yesterday I guess, since it's nearly 2am) I went over to Manchester to a fascinating place called Ziferblat. It's sort of like going over to your mates house for the afternoon, if your mate happens to live in a converted warehouse, and has invited a fascinating selection of Manchesters hippest young things to hang out there. There's a kitchen area where you can stick the kettle on, and grab a biscuit, or a slice of toast, there's dining tables with chairs around them, and grown men and women playing Kerplunk, there's bijoux tables for 2 in quiet corners with people playing chess, there's coffee tables with comfy sofas around them (we claimed one of these for the greater good of the city state of Knitters), and today there was a sort of artisan marketplace going on in a side room. The Countess was there, gorgeous as always, and she'd brought a huge pile of yarn and fibre to sell, including a few rare and precious skeins left over from previous updates or sock clubs, and some new repeatable colourways, never before seen.
I claimed 3 skeins of Lady Persephone sock yarn, and one Lord Kitchener lace. Two of the sock yarn skeins were ones that I had coveted from previous sock clubs, that for once I'd been too sensible to sign up for. These were called Masquerade, and Spirit of resistance. The remaining sock yarn is one of the brand new colourways, called I like what you've done with the place. The lace weight is another of my favourite Nerds prefer their rainbows darker, but I particularly like this one for how it demonstrates the different ways that the same colours can appear on different yarn bases. This particular skein is really light, parts of it are like silver and gold, it's gorgeous! The very first skein of Nerds that I bought was so dark it almost appeared black until it caught the light, and shone like an iridescent oil slick. So different from this, and yet recognisably the same set of colours.
Here's a better look at those skeins, just because we love the yarn porn!
Oh, errm, there *might* be some fibre on its way to me too, because the Countess had a surprise one day fibre sale, so I took advantage and grabbed a couple that I loved the look of. I'll show you those next time...
Not forgetting the Penguins!
Because of course, we've just missed international Penguin Awareness Day, on the 25th April! Like anyone might not be aware of penguins, and their general awesomeness, and how humans need to stop messing with the climate so that penguins can keep Antarctica. There, that was me being almost political!
I have 2 new penguins too :) The first was my leaving present from Kiss Me Deadly, because our boss there was lovely, and took us all out for a goodbye dinner (OMG! The BEST cheesecake I've EVER had!!!) and gave us all thoughtful little gifts. Here is mine:
Then in the Ziferblat market place today there was a chap selling terribly geeky jewelry, including pin badges like the one that is now attached to my knitting bag:
So as you can see, I've mostly managed to keep myself happy and positive through intensive use of retail therapy this month. Obviously I can't keep this up for much longer, but I'm hoping that it will see me through until I work out what's happening next.
In the mean time, just keep knitting!
ttfn my dears :)
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