Posted By Laura on July 2, 2009
I have seen a new afghan that I absolutely love love love. Not felt this love since I started my Babette Blanket about 2 years ago. This time, I have fallen in love with the African Adventure Blanket [pdf file]. It’s just gorgeous!
Posted By Laura on June 29, 2009
Goodness, it’s been hot. I don’t like it much. It’s rather too muggy for my liking.
Here is a photo:
Posted By Laura on June 26, 2009
It appears to be a bag with lots of granny squares in it!
I decided, on a whim, the other day that I need to make something for baby girl. I haven’t made anything for her yet so I searched my stash and found some rather yummy rowan cashcotton dk in lots of girly colours. So, the hook came out and I grannied until I ran out of yarn. There are only 24 squares, but that’s alright. It’ll be big enough for the pram or car seat or whatever.
Currently joining the squares so expect a FO in the next few days 
I also want to do a Baby Surprise Jacket in the next couple of weeks, before Operation Eviction starts. I have some rather yummy Cherry Tree Hill in my stash that will do for my BSJ.
Posted By Laura on June 10, 2009
This pattern took a long time to make. Not because it is a difficult pattern (far from it) but half way through I lost my knitting mojo. I fell pregnant, couldn’t concentrate on anything intricate for a long period of time and I started a new job, which was extremely stressful and meant that I had no time to myself. So, it lingered for quite a while. Which I regret now, because it is a fantastic little pattern.
Kiri is an adaptation of Sharon Miller’s Birch pattern, from Rowan 34. The major plus point that Kiri has from Birch is that the pattern starts at the base, with only a few stitches, whereas Birch starts with about 200. And the idea of casting on that many stitches fills me with dread.
This was my first adventure into lace knitting. And I mean *proper* lace rather than the odd yarn over in a sock or whatever. It has a simple pattern that is easy to remember once you start, which meant that mistakes were minimal. This is rather good because frogging kidsilk night is a nightmare. It is not a nice thing to do. At all. Mistakes are easy to spot because of the simplicity of the pattern. This was a spur of the moment pattern, too. I had some kidsilk night lying around (got to love the JL sales!) and I was waiting for yarn for my Forest Path Stole.
I am so chuffed with how well this has turned out. It came out much better than I expected. I only did 10 repeats, rather than 12, as I didn’t want it to be quite as large as they suggested on the pattern. So, instead of using 3 balls of KSN, I used 2. And it has given me a rather nice size. It will be perfect as a neckerchief in the winter.
The kidsilk night *is* a bit of a nightmare. If you make a mistake, frogging is a bit of a pain. And when blocking, it is atrocious. Taking it out of the water is like dragging a wet cat out of a bath (not that I have done that, mind. The idea of Suzy taking a bath beggars belief! But it is how I imagine it would be). It is not a nice thing to do. The mohair makes it rather difficult. I did think I had ruined it. But once I had it all blocked out (using the welding rods that my dad helped me get!) I was happier. It took quite a blocking. I pinned the picot edge. There isn’t too much of a picot as I couldn’t get it *quite* right, but that’s ok. I don’t mind too much. I am just so pleased with the overall product.
Now that Kiri is finished, I am back at the FPS. I have completed 5 out of 23 tiers (that sounds rather depressing!) but I am still plodding along. I do love it, it’s just not the easiest pattern I have ever made. It needs more concentration. But now I am on maternity leave, I intend to attack it these few weeks before the babba comes
Posted By Laura on May 24, 2009
Posted By Laura on May 22, 2009
I am on school holiday now. It is half term and I have a gazillion number of things to do before I start maternity leave in a couple of weeks so, obviously, today is the perfect day to block kiri for a second time. And I seem to be more successful this time.
As you can tell from the photo (ahem) there is kiri, all wrapped up, my foam jigsaw pieces, the welding rods and the pins all ready to block it out. It is currently pinned out on my bed. Yay! I shall show photos of a FO when it is all unpinned. I do have some funky photos to share with you already, but they can wait.
In the meantime, here is a classic Suzy pose. That cat is rather amusing.
This is exactly how Suzy is most of the time. Silly little cat that she is.
Posted By Laura on May 17, 2009
Yesterday I finished knitting Kiri. How exciting. So, today, armed with my welding rods, I decided to try and block it. First, the inevitable soaking.
And goodness me. The designer of Kiri was absolutely right. She said that wet kidsilk haze (or in this case kidsilk night) would be like dragging a wet cat out of water. And she was right. It was horrible. Yuck. Anyway, I took it out and used the welding rods but I made a boo boo. I was blocking the picot edge wrong. Argh. I was not happy. I undid the whole blocking and stomped off downstairs. Having looked at pictures, I now know that to get my picot edge right I need to pin it out at the yo, k1, yo rather than the sk2p that the pattern said. I think that would work much better. Oh yes. But that won’t be until next weekend now as I need the blocking area (ie my bed) before it would be dry. Gah.
In other news, I bought some pretty flowers yesterday. It is horrible weather so I thought that some nice flowers would help make the day a little bit brighter.
And it did. It was not a nice day at all. The rain was horrible. But I managed a smile 
Helped a friend make a granny square out of crochet. I think I may make a tutorial for it. Yes. But again, probably next weekend. I have lots of reports to write for school this week.
Posted By Laura on May 15, 2009
Woohoo! This week I purchased some welding rods! How exciting.
This is not as random as you may think. I am nearling the end of Kiri and I was trying to work out the best method of blocking that would save my own sanity. I decided that using blocking rods would be the best solution, instead of using hundreds and hundreds of pins and then getting rather annoyed at it all, swearing at it and then throwing it out the window, which would be highly likely.
So, with the help of my wonderful daddy, I have purchased some welding rods at a fraction of a price of blocking wires. I had no idea what I was looking for in this line, yanno, with me not being a welder or owt, but my dad knew what to search for and he found me some on ebay that look perfect. So, I shall try and get Kiri finished so that I can try out the rods. I am rather looking forward to it. I have 7 rows to go, so hope to finish this weekend. How exciting. It looks a bit like a woollen mess at the moment so I can’t wait to see what the finished product will look like. Lace is quite exciting from that point of view. Maybe I’ll get Forest Path Stole out next …
Posted By Laura on May 9, 2009
Well, it is the weekend again and I haven’t got very much to show you, really. I find it tricky to knit during the week as I just come home from school and sleep. But I’m on maternity leave in 4 weeks time so I may find a little bit of time then to do a bit of knitting before baby arrives. Yay.
Last week, my darling husband did me a huge favour. He has moved me over from Movable Type to Wordpress. And he tried to keep my layout very similar and all sorts. All this, so I can have my WIP bars from Ravelry in the left column. Whoops.
This weekend, my darling husband has laid our new turf. Yay!
In knitting news, I took Kiri shawl off the needles to try and see how big it was (not my picture, not the yarn I am using!). I am only going to do one more pattern repeat and then the border. When I finish this entry I shall attack it then.
I also purchased Whimsical Little Knits and Coraline from Ysolda Teague. I intend to make Coraline out of some sirdar bonus DK that I have stashed away upstairs and I intend to make Ishbel out of some yummy Araucania that I also have stashed away. Very nice.
I leave you with a spot the difference.
Silly Suzy.
Posted By Laura on May 3, 2009
Hello! I know, I know. I have been MIA for quite a while now. I apologise. I shall try to do better now. I have my knitting mojo back, which is good! So, I decided to get some UFOs out and work on them instead of knitting anything new or knitting for baby. Liesl was the first of such finishes. Well, it’s also the only one of such finishes, too, because I haven’t finished anything else!
This is the first garment that I have ever knitted. And I love love love it. It is knit using the wonderful Rowan Kid Classic that was first purchased for a crocheted cardigan that never materialised. The yarn was really smooshy and I would definitely knit with it again. The fabric that it produced was lovely and light, but warm at the same time.
The way Ysolda wrote this pattern was just divine. She made is so customizable that my Liesl looks different to all the other Liesls on Ravelry. She wrote the pattern so that it would be exactly how you wanted it to be. And that’s what happened. I decided to use the low neck line, made it waist length and had long sleeves. I also decided to use the picot cast off and the 3 buttons at the top.
The picot edge made it more lacy than the normal cast off and I think that it works really well with the fabric already produced. It is a nice touch as a finishing off.
I steam blocked this cardigan,, which is a technique that I hadn’t used before. It worked really well. I was unsure if I was going to block it but am rather glad that I did. It just opened up the lace that little bit more and makes for a better fit.
The buttons were the bane of the whole project, though. When my parents were here in October (yep, that’s when I started this project!) my dad bought me these gorgeous buttons from Heaths Country Store in Ollerton. They really are gorgeous but they are far too heavy for the light, lacy fabric that this cardigan produced. So, I ended up in HobbyCraft and all sorts of places but couldn’t find anything. Eventually, I went online and looked at Pavi Yarns. They have such a wonderful selection of buttons and ended up finding some that were simply perfect.
They were just perfect. They are simple, shell buttons that don’t pull on the fabric at all and just set the whole cardigan off.
I love Liesl. I would make it again with with different yarn and different finishings to create different effects. Simply a fantastic pattern from Ysolda.
I do love her designs, though. It is her that created the wonderful Elijah (my Bertie!) and Mousie patterns that I have completed. And the next cardigan that I want to make is Coraline, which is another Ysolda creation. Shame her website isn’t working at the moment to share these delights with you all.
Other knitting news includes the resurrection of Kiri, which I hadn’t picked up since August! How shameful.
I shall try and stick around a bit more. I am knitting more and have an idea for a new feature, which will hopefully start next week.
Hope everyone is enjoying their bank holiday weekend.
