Isn’t it amazing how quickly a knit goes when you love the yarn? After my nemesis socks this pair in the beautiful Collette are zipping along…
Mara @ Fantasiamusings and ramblings on crafting and life… |
Moving on…
I’ve finally finally FINALLY finished my nemesis socks and handed them over so quickly I didn’t have time to take a photo. Such a relief to have them done. So moving happily on I’ve started a new pair of trainer socks with the yarn I bought last week in Alnwick. I’m working my way down the heel flap at the moment but I think I’ll put a pattern on this pair. This is a Collinette yarn, the first of theirs I’ve knitted with and I’m loving it. The colours are fab and it’s giving great stitch definition. I’m sure this pair will be a joy to knit and be finished really quickly as result 
Nemesis
Do you have a knitting nemesis? That’s mine in the photo. Eventually it’ll be a pair of socks (that’s the second one).
I bought the yarn (which I won’t name as I’m going to be very uncomplimentary about it) earlier this year online. It was a disappointment as soon as it arrived because of the colour. In the online photo it had been much more lilac than pink. However this was just before my mother went into hospital and I needed something to just knit. Socks were perfect as my portable therapist to go with me into the hospital and so the pair were started.
While Mam was in intensive care the colour didn’t really register and as she grew in strength my dislike of the yarn increased. I was all ready to ditch them, as in into a bin rather than frogging, when Mam said she liked them. So they were saved from the bin but my dislike continued to grow.
In fact I’d say it’s now reached full blown hatred. I’ve wandered off and made other socks, mittens and all sorts… But they’re remained in my project bag – mocking me.
So these socks are my nemesis, glaring at me from my project bag…
Tea and Yarn
My internet is still down, but I just had to post this shot of some lovely sock yarn I just found. Now I’m sat petting my new purchase in a lovely little tea shop. Hmmmm there is a lot to be said for this mobile blogging on your phone.
Fibre East … (part 2)
Ok so it’s time to show and tell…… What did I buy at Fibre East?
Well I simply fell in love with these guys. I mean how SSSWWEEEEEEEEEETTTTT!!!!!!
I especially loved this guy. Look at those horns, just fabulous! There was a bit of a squee moment when I discovered that you could buy a kit to make them. They’re from Manfield Crafts and the wonderful ladies on the stall managed to contain their laughter at my reaction to these little fellas.
Yarn wise my main purchase was some beautiful silk from Copperfield Yarns. Unfortunately I can’t find a website for this yummy yarn but if anyone knows one then please point me in the right direction. I was drawn to the copper tones and colours. At the moment my hair is predominantly black but my natural colour is coppery blonde. Since I’m planning on going back to my natural colour this seemed the perfect yarn to make myself a shawl.
I also bought some more dpns for sock production. I normally use knit pros but the helpful lady at the Crossways Patch / Tall Yarns stand showed me the HiyaHiya ones. These were of great interest as I have quite a loose tension when knitting and so I’m always on smaller needles than my friends. The HiyaHiya’s actually go down to less than a millimetre which is much smaller than the smallest knit pros. In the end I bought 2 packs of 2mm’s (one Knit Pro and one HiyaHiya) and a pack of 3.25 Knit Pros for some DK socks.
Speaking of DK socks I also picked up a couple of balls of pure wool in a dk weight but without ball bands. I can’t tell you the stall as I didn’t clock their name. These aren’t really ‘me’ colours but the socks are destined for my mother and they are very much her colours. I have to say that I was delighted at how much faster dk socks knit up compared to sock weight yarn socks. I also had a little bit of yarn left over from these which I’ve used to make a sat nav pouch.
Then lastly I bought some buttons.
Yes, I know they will probably just sit in my sewing box but they were so pretty… and cute… and shiny… and I just had to have a few……
It’s been a while….
Well it’s been a while since I posted and I’m sorry about that. Life however, sometimes takes over. The short version of the story is that we had a family crisis. My mother had to go into hospital for a major life saving operation, and wasn’t expected to survive. Fortunately against all the odds she did pull through and is now making a slow but steady recovery.
While crafting didn’t stop it was pretty much limited to sock knitting in the hospital. There are only so many posts you can write about that!
Anyway, looking for that silver lining I can say it was really good for sock production. I could now happily stop my socks of the month project now as the sock drawer is full. I’m not going to though as all the stress, sleepless nights and general kafuffle have left me completely exhausted. I returned to work this week and it was all I could do to make it safely through to Friday. So plain old simply sock production will continue for a while until my brain recovers enough to cope with anything more complicated.
So here are some shots of the plain old vanilla socks I’ve been knitting. I’m rapidly running out of sock yarn again so I sense some yarn shopping in my near future. Hopefully it won’t be to long before my next post as I have something wonderful to tell you about from Nikki at Sew Quine.
Knitting, Tea and Photography–What’s not to like?
Last weekend Maytheweed and I made a little baby road trip to Lavenham to visit Knit Cafe and play with our cameras. Naturally we headed straight for tea and knitting.
As we arrived it was difficult to decide what to concentrate on first – tea or yarn shopping! What a fabulous idea to combine a cafe and a yarn shop. They didn’t carry the worlds greatest selection but it was all lovely yarn, and the atmosphere was very friendly.
I was really tempted by some of the Manos but in the end I was seduced by some Araucania sock and Debbie Bliss dk. I’ve been a little despondent by the selections of sock yarn available recently with nothing really catching my eye – this little beauty sorted that! I’m resisting the urge to immediately cast one with it though as I need to finish the socks currently on my needles.
The Debbie Bliss cashmerino dk has been combined with some more Araucania sock yarn to make another set of fingerless mittens. I love the pair I made from the Manos yarn but it’s simply not hard wearing enough. I’ve finished the first mitten and I’m about half way through the second (I’m hoping to get them finished for next weekend) and I’ll take some shots and post them next week.
Above is the horrid socks I’m currently working. I didn’t get that yarn at the knit cafe and I’m resisting the urge to bin it in favour of some of the loveliness I got there. After our tea and yarn shopping we wandered around the town with our cameras and I’ll post up about that later as well. However, if you’re ever in the area I strongly recommend calling into the Knit Cafe for a cuppa and some cake.
Socks and warm feet…
I’m a huge fan of hand knit socks to keep your feet warm. So when I knit my socks a small number of them have longer legs for me to wear under my hiking boots. My latest pair with the longer legs, exactly for this reason, are one of my February socks made out of Regia. Naturally I wore them yesterday when I went out to photograph the sunrise.
Despite everything I’ve said about keeping your feet warm I came home with cold feet, but that’s not fault of the socks! So I curled up on the sofa where Pebbles the dog decided she would make a perfect foot warmer. Fortunately I managed to get this shot on my phone that not only shows how pretty Pebbles is, but also the colours of the sock.
A Crisis Averted
Last year I placed myself on a sock yarn buying ban. My stash was growing rapidly to alarming proportions in this area, and while I personally think it’s impossible to have to much yarn – it is possible to have to much to store! So I went on a yarn diet. No more sock yarn till I used up what I had. This happened by Christmas and during the holidays I bought 2 more balls from a local yarn shop. One I loved and the other I hated, but I’ve already blogged about them here. So I was terrified when I realised about 10 days ago that I was just hours from finishing my last ball of sock yarn. There was the going cold all over and breaking out in a sweat, the gnashing of teeth, and probably a little bit of whimpering until I had another ball safely tucked away in my bag to take home.
Hot Socks Casablanca in colour 55.
So what I have got? Some further internet shopping secured a little bit more as no one wants to see a grown woman cry when she can’t have socks on her needles!
The top shot is of the ‘emergency’ ball that was hastily purchased to avert the lack of socks crisis. The yarn itself is lovely but the colours – not so good. They’ve not come out very well in that shot but they just don’t seem to work together very well.
Wendy Happy Bamboo Colour2519 Fjord
This is my first time knitting with Wendy Happy and also my first sock bamboo yarn. The colours are very pretty pastels and I’m looking forward to seeing how it knits up. I’ll admit to some concerns about stretching once finished though because of the bamboo.
Jawoll Magic Degrade Colour 7310
Still in it’s packed but the colour looks lovely and more red than in this shot.
Schoppel Wolle Zauberball – Can’t remember the colour
I have friends who rave about this yarn so I thought I’d give it a go. My initial feeling is one of disappointment, it’s much pinker than I imagined from the photos online. I’m not really a pink person but I’ll try to reserve judgement till I see how it knits up. Perhaps the white and green bits will win me over.
Finally those shots were taken with my mobile because although my proper camera is in fine working order, the ‘big’ pc isn’t. So while I can take shots, I can’t upload them. New parts are on order and hopefully this problem will be sorted next week! In the meantime I thought I’d leave you with a flower shot from last year.
I’m still knitting honest…
I am! Cross my heart…
Unfortunately between work and a photography project I’m working on I’ve just not been knitting much overly exciting. Unless you count trainer socks of course. My December, January and February socks are all trainer socks, which as per usual are difficult to photograph on my feet. Must remember to pester someone to help me with that one day. Anyway here are a few piccys taken on my phone of socks in progress.
This was the December socks while still in progress. It’s the Regia hand dyed effect yarn and it’s a so-and-so to knit with as it splits something chronic. That said I love the socks and they’re hardly ever off my feet.
And here are the February socks still in progress. You can see the yarn is Hot Socks Spectra and it’s even worse to knit with than the Regia. Splits like you wouldn’t believe and I dare say it’s going to pill when washed and worn as well. That said I am loving the colours and can’t wait to see how they look when finished. I doubt there is even a remote chance of them matching but hey ho, who says socks have to match….
January’s socks really do need to be photographed on so I’ll have to motivate myself to do just that when they emerge from the laundry.
Photography wise I’ve been very busy and I’ll post some more images up soon. I guess I feel my blog is being a little neglected especially from a crafting point of view and I hope you’ll all forgive me. Hopefully in a few months I’ll be able to share the photography project I’m working on which is taking up so much of my time.
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