Back in the real world

Hello again my dears.  I have returned from my holiday, where we all had a lovely time, with the added bonus that we didn't end up either involved in a car crash, or turning the engine off on the M5, both of which happened last year.  I do have the inevitable post-holiday illness, but at least I don't have to go to work, right?

Stash Enhancement

Ahha!  I got you there!  I'm swapping it around a bit this time, because after that rather down-beat intro, I feel I should show you why returning to the real world isn't so bad after all.

Look at all of that yumminess!  It cheers me up just looking at that photo :)  

I genuinely hadn't intended on doing any yarn shopping while on this holiday.  Last year I did my research, and I tracked down every yarn shop in Cornwall, then I dragged Stephen, and sometimes his parents too, to almost every one of them.  So I figured that maybe this year I should give them all a bit of a rest.  Then Stephens mum said she'd like a new scarf that was pretty, and able to keep her warm in a Shetland winter.  Obviously I needed to find the perfect yarn for it!

Now clearly I'm not planning on using all of that yarn to make one scarf, it would be distressingly garish if I did, and longer than Tom Bakers Dr Who scarf.  If you're wondering which is for the scarf, then it's the blue-green in the bottom left.

Here's the list of what's in that pile:

* Manos del Uruguay Lace, variegated purple

* Lotus Tibetan cloud fingering (stop giggling Stephen!), grey, and seems more like a 3-ply to me

* Araucania Botany lace, blue-green, and it's not lace, it's 4-ply

* Touch Yarns possum merino 4-ply, cranberry

* Artesano Definition, crocodile

* West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4-ply, Black Currant Bomb

* Opal 4-ply, self-patterning sock, variegated pink-green

That all came from a gorgeous little yarn shop called Spin a Yarn, in Bovey Tracey, and to be fair, it did constitute pretty much my entire budget for all holiday activities, but I felt it was worth it. We actually had an amazingly good day in Bovey Tracey, which is a small town on the edge of Dartmoor, home to the Devon Guild of Craftsmen, where we had a very nice cream tea on the terrace;

And I fell in love with this sheep:

Ahem, anyway, stash!  I did get one other yarn purchase when on the holiday, and it was totally unplanned.  There was a day when we all wanted to go out, but none of us were really feeling up to a long day of driving and sight-seeing, so we decided just to visit the nearby town of Liskeard, where our map assured us we'd find the Liskeard district museum.  Imagine my surprise when right across the street from the museum there was a wool shop!  A strange wool shop that also sells shoes, and underwear, but none-the-less had a very reasonable supply of commercial yarns.  I couldn't go without buying a little souvenir, so I came out with a couple of balls of Wendy Roam in a lovely marled purple, which will be perfect for some of the beautiful cabled sock patterns I have, but can never knit because I love to choose variegated colourways.

Last, but of course not least, I mentioned in my last update that I'd managed to order a skein from the latest Odyssey Trail update by Countess Ablaze.  So this scrumptious lovely was waiting for me when I got home on Saturday:

The colourway is called 'What man are you and whence', on Lord Kitchener 4-ply, which is silk and blue-faced Leicester.  Amazingly, a few skeins of this and a few other yarns from the latest update were still available last time I checked.  The Countess usually takes down any limited edition colourways that haven't sold out when a new update goes live, although I don't know if she will do that this time with all of the complications around her being so poorly, but just in case, if you're interested, get in quick, the next update goes live on the 29th May!

WIPs

I have finished one large project, and you'll see that in the FOs section, but that means I've cast on something new, of course.  The sharp eyed among you will have spotted it already in one of the photos above.

It's a new pair of what I call Work-a-day socks.  It's a simple cuff-down, heel-flap, ribbed sock pattern that is easy to adjust to fit any size or shape of foot, and it's called A Nice Ribbed Sock.  I'm knitting this pair in King Cole zigzag, and the colourway is called 'gorse'.

Other than these, I've mostly been working on my Ribs to go by Susan Ashcroft, but I've not made enough progress to be worth a photo really.

FOs

I'll show you the exciting project last I think.  

While away I cast on, and finished, 2 baby hats to be donated to a local neonatal ward. I do love to knit for charity from time to time, and I do at least one big charity project each year, but in this case I just wanted an excuse to try knitting with some Peter Pan Cupcake really. The photo is dreadful, I'm sorry about that.  Could not get the lighting right to show the colours in this yarn at all!

Now for the thing I've been dying to show you all day!  Last night I finished the shawl that I've called 'I've never been to Greece'.  It's special to me because I designed it myself, and I spun half of the yarn for it myself, and somehow it's come out as a piece of rustic beauty that I am unbelievably proud of, and totally in love with!

I finished it last night, and managed to pin it out to block just before this damn ear infection hit me (good thing too, as I block in my yarn room, which is in the attic, up windy narrow stairs, I don't like climbing those while feeling this dizzy!) But I was stubborn enough to go up there when the sun came out this afternoon to un-pin it and take it outside for some half decent photos.  Here's another, just because I love it so much it needs to be shown more than once:

I've been wearing it ever since I took it off that fuchsia bush.

Penguins

I'd already packed for my holiday last time I posted, so I couldn't show you this lovely pin that Kelly bought for me:

He now lives on my knitting bag, so I can take him everywhere with me.

Then an obliging motorway service station supplied this next little fellow.  Strange the things you can buy in a motorway service station, I shall never understand why it always includes small cuddly toys.  Food, drinks, reading material for you passengers, those curvy cushions for stopping you from getting a crick in your neck when you fall asleep in a car, phone chargers that plug into the cigarette lighter, these things all make sense, but why do they also always sell comedy fridge magnets, those weird rubber gonk things that feel fascinating, but leave your hands smelling like you've just left a fetish club for the next two days, and cuddly toys?  Baffling.  But since they are so ubiquitous, I had to check for penguins.

Now it is much later than I had intended it to be, so I am going to go to bed.  Sweet dreams my dears.

Designing, and Disturbing.

Hi guys!  I probably sounds like I'm living a life of luxury right now, but I'm off on holiday again tomorrow, so I thought I'd write an update before I go.

FOs

I've only got 1 finished knitting object to show you this time, but there is also a small crochet project, and 2 spinning projects.

First, there's the shawl I was working on for the Countess Ablaze Odyssey KAL.  The pattern is Artemis, byt Valerie Johnson, and the yarn is Viscount of Spark by Countess Ablaze, in the limited edition colourway "The pedestal is waiting".

The second, very small, finished object is a tiny crocheted rose brooch that I made because a friend and I decided to pop into our local craft shop on Love your Yarn Shop Day, just to see if they were celebrating.  It turned out that they were, with lots of yarn on special offer, as well as a free craft session on making knitted or crocheted flowers, with tea and cake.  Since I'm not terribly skilled at crochet, I thought I'd take the opportunity to practice while I had access to the help of girls far more experienced than me.  We had a lovely afternoon :)

Remember that I was working on making a sweater quantity of handspun for myself?  That I'd actually started work on in July last year!  Well, I finally finished that a few weeks ago:

Then I immediately started work on another spinning project, making the yarn for my second Odyssey KAL project:

 I'm really pleased with this, because I'm still a fairly inexperienced spinner, but I was aiming for something between sport, and DK, which is exactly what I achieved, and the yarn is pretty even too.

WIPs

Which brings us straight on to the only project I've done any work on since finishing these, and it's another thing I'm pretty proud of.  I've actually designed this one myself, inspired by a few images of modern day Greece I found online:

Based on these, I've done a bit of pattern designing:

And this is where I'm at with it so far:

Stash Acquisition

Not much of this since the last update, basically only a bit that I bought on Love your Yarn Shop Day, but I am really pleased with it, because I managed to buy a sweater quantity of Shades, by King Cole for myself for only £12!  And just because it was lovely and soft and fluffy, a ball of Cupcake by Peter Pan yarns.

Sadly, my beloved Countess has been poorly for a few weeks, so the Odyssey Trail update was delayed until last night.  I have, of course, ordered a gorgeous skein for myself, but it won't arrive for a few days.

Penguins

I can't show you one of my new penguins, because I already attached it to my knitting bag, and my knitting bag is at Stephens house in preparation for our trip to Cornwall tomorrow.

I can show you the other 2 though.  One was a gift from a friend who recently visited Norway, where he met a glass worker making glass penguins.  This chap was hard to photograph, because you can see right through him, but I think he looks a little like Private, from The Penguins of Madagascar :)

Then this rather disturbing fellow was brought home for me by Kelly:

We think he's vaguely reminiscent of the even more disturbing owl from the 1981 version of Clash of the Titans, and we've decided that he is our mechanical Guard Penguin, who comes to life at night to protect the house :D

So, on that rather terrifying note, TTFN my dears!