A finished pair of socks

I finished up this pair of socks for D just a little while ago. I saw the wool first on Jane Brocket's blog, and when D requested orange socks the choice was obvious.... It really is a great colour combo - loud, but composed too with the two shades of orange. Sadly my photography skills aren't quite up to the same standard, not helped by the intervention of cat...

Liberty prints

It's all to easy to get too obsessed with Liberty fabrics, there's nothing quite like them. I just bought this tunic from howies...

... and in my inbox today flopped a sweet little message from Liberty about their new Liberty Art Fabric range. *sigh*

A Wedding Cloche

I have a very important wedding to attend in December, and my mind is turning over what to wear. It's winter, it will be cold outside at least. The dress I really want to wear is kind of white though, albeit with a black print and touches of royal blue. To tone this down I was hoping to create a few accessories in tones of dark blue. In particular, Anna socks (rav link) in the marine shade of 4 ply soft; some slightly more delicate wrist warmers/fingerless mits than the ones I wore to my brother wedding (which I love, but are a little loud, below); an undecided scarf/shawl/shawlette (possibly ishbel (another rav link); but perhaps most importantly, a hat. A cloche to be specific. And having trawled Ravelry and even the internet to find a pattern, I cannot come across one that meets my requirements - which means I'm going to have to design one (eek!).

I mean, this needs to be a HAT. A proper wedding hat. Two reasons: a, my family has a strong hat wearing tradition at weddings and I don't want to let the side down; b, this is a special friends wedding in a beautiful location and I want to make sure I live up to the moment. I realise I'll probably end up wearing said hat for about 5 minutes before I get too hot inside, even in Decemeber, but I want to have it!

So, requirements (the client brief as it were):
1. Knitted, felted cloche - dark blue, marine/royal blue
2. Not to thick on the felting side, but dense enough to have good structure
3. Asymmetrical, with pleats and I like the idea of some ridges on the 'bell' too. Quite low over the brow, and cutting down close to my shoulder on one side.

Points of inspiration -
The Miss Fox cloche in the V&A exhibiton
The cloche's in lizarietz's etsy shop
And this purple vintage number

First things first, I ned to find the wool and swatch the hell out of it. To get the pleats just right I think I might need to make the bell first and add the pleats on, like the V&A hat.

Valentine

I know it's a little late but this is the valentine I made for Dan this time around

Potential

I have a lot of work right now, but this arrived in the post and it's so tempting...

New project

I've been wanting the make another cardigan for a while, but something lighter I can wear more often than the last one I made, which is really more of a jacket. After much thinking and flicking through Ravelry I settled on Alice, by Kim Hargreves (Rowan 35). I cheerfully cast on all 339 stitches of the bottom edging (less cheerfully towards the end there) on needles about six inches too short... After hoiking my way through that lot and doing all the cast offs for the frill effect, I'd pretty much decided I didn't like that particular detail - too fussy by far. I've cast on a sleeve instead, just three rows of straight garter stitch for an edge - less fussy, but prettier I reckon. I've yanked out what I'd knit on the back panel now, but you can see the comparison below. My new resolution: always start on a sleeve so you can really see if you like it or not before you've committed too many (wo)man hours!

Inspiration Wednesday - Animal Yokes

So, not that long ago I came across the owl jumper by Kate Davies and fell in love. This is firmly on my to do list. Even more so after encountering a method of doing cables without cable needles via Mason-Dixon. Shockingly I've never done cables, mostly I think because I've never seen cables I really had to knit before. As the pattern calls for circular needles too, the cost of investing in a circular needle set (I like the idea of interchangeable needles, I've put off buying any circulars at all so I could justify this to myself when the time came) and cable needles was somewhat prohibitive.

Almost immdeiatly after that first encounter with the owls I then spotted this gem on eBay (from this seller, brazenoleoman). I wasn't the lucky bidder, but it got me thinking...

...animals on yokes. A bit of hunting on Ravelry found me some squirrels and reindeer too.

Cycling socks

This weekend just gone (Sunday evening in fact) I finally finished the second sock of my second pair of cycle socks. Kind of ironic given that I crashed my bike on Saturday morning - going to fetch my new Rowan magazine from the parcel office too! Spent a goodly portion of the weekend saying "ouch" repeatedly whilst watching my bruises go from pale blue-green to deep purple. 

Anyway, back to socks. I struggled with these to be honest and largely I think it was my needles. It seems to be very easy to forget that bad needles equal a bad knitting experience, you never think on it. A project just seems 'hard'.

I knitted my dad some socks for Christmas out of Kaffe Fassett 4ply Regia yarn and invested in some 5" Brittany sock needles too (because my sock needles were elsewhere engaged). I could not believe what a difference these made! My old DPNs were metal 10" jobbies and the strain and awkwardness working in the round with just twenty stitches per needle was not apparent to me until I got hold of the 5-inchers, I was whizzing round by comparison. Not to mention the added portability, sock knitting went from absolutely-not-bus-knitting to the perfect handbag carry-along, instantly. Today on the bus (hurts a wee bit too much to cycle still) I missed not having a pair of socks to work on...

They're Hedera from knitty. I like the lace pattern, nice and stretchy, ideal for cotton socks. I like the idea of the reinforced heal, but I think in reality this is too big a feature for the kind of shoes I wear (who am I kidding - the only pair of shoes i even own right now). I might do a toe up version with the same lace pattern (all be it in reverse).

New Year

So, New Year, new blog resolution. Write Something! Make Something!

Part of the reason for a total lack of enthusiasm was a terrible work load towards the latter half of last year. Another reason was the theft of my laptop. For a time I even gave up knitting (in the mistaken belief it was stopping me working)!! After going slightly mad for a while, I'm back on the knitting and some lovely christmas presents have me inspired again.

Amongst the goodies:

Embroidered Flora and Fauna by Leslie Turpin-Delport and Nikki Delport-Wepener...

...Rob Ryan Skirt from Cloth Kits...

...and a much coveted swooping swallow necklace from the Etsy shop Verre Encore.

As well as that, after barely having a minute to walk down the garden last year either, January gets me thinking of spring....

So, here's to the New Year and avoiding the financial crisis by making bread, knitting socks and growing some killer veg!

the garden in june

Due to excessive amounts of work and minimal amounts of crafting or anything vaguely interesting the only post I have to write is a garden update. (The sewing machine is out and I'm sort of making a skirt, but it's a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants affair and only time will tell if it's actually wearable, or photographable)

The hydrangea is turning blue,  a petal at a time. Except for the one rogue pompom head which insists on being pink. This is now a pretty big thing with countless flower heads  but even last year it was small and sick looking. It had been pruned very badly I think and half to two thirds of the plant had died off. More considerate pruning and a bit of TLC have brought it back to something of a more vigorous nature - I think it's root stock must have been relatively intact still.

Last year I brought a foxglove in flower from home in the hope it might sew itself about the place in addition to all the wild ones I grew from seed. I did this because the genetic population back home has some recessive white genes lingering in the foliage. And so, amid all the mammoth pink foxgloves - one white one.

We did'nt inherit many things to work with in this garden except excessive weeds, but there are two fairly substantial an ill pruned roses and a very healthy peony. This peony seems to specialise in growing exceptionally tall and uses the neighboring rose for support. Before the blooms get spoiled by rain it's just about perfect.