Done, Doing and Planning

Hi All,

This last week has been as hectic as ever, however I have managed to get some essential knitting in as well, not as much as I would have liked, but then it never is.
First of all I have finished a little boys shawl collared jumper, knitted in Stylecraft's 'Wondersoft'.  It is a nice yarn to knit with, lovely and soft and economical, this item was knitted from just one 100gram ball.  It is 100% acrylic and can be washed in the machine and dried in a tumble dryer - ideal for a little one.  See the picture below, let me know what you think, I have knitted this pattern 3 or 4 times now and always battle with getting the collar sewn on correctly.

Secondly the project I have on my needles at the moment requires a little more concentration than the above.  I am knitting a shawlette in a merino/silk 4ply from Triskelion Yarn & Fibre.  It is called Branwen 4ply and the colour is Llyr and is beautiful.
It is a lovely yarn to knit with and is beautifully soft.  I am enjoying knitting it but it does require my concentration whilst doing it.  Check out the image below.

And finally, I celebrated my birthday last week, I had a wonderful day and some fantastic presents, including the camera the images above were taken with. Another of my wonderful presents was a voucher for Great British Yarns, the difficulty was what to choose.  In the end I went for the following; 100grm skein of Drifter Lace; 100grm skein of Drifter 4ply; 100grm skein Union BFL superwash sock yarn; a 50grm skein of the oh so fine organically farmed merino lace weight wool and a pattern by Kate Davies 'A Hap for Harriet.  So lots of planning to do - what shall I use this new stash for?  Any suggestions?  I want to use them for special things because they are such fantastically beautiful yarns.

Great British Yarns is a really friendly company to use, give them a try at www.greatbritishyarns.co.uk

A busy weeks knitting

HI Folks, so here I am back again for a second post.  I had intended to post more last week but got very absorbed by my knitting projects.  First of all I knitted my 5 year old grandson a jumper. See picture below.  It is knitted in Jarol's Heritage range, which is 50% wool, 25% nylon; 5% acrylic and 5% viscose, so quite a mixture.  It has a lovely soft feel to it when knitted up and is a dream to knit with. The ball band says it can be machine washed at 30 degrees or hand washed (think I would go for the latter personally). Oh and it also states NOT to use fabric softener (first time I have seen that).

But that is not all I have produced this last week.  I finally got around to using some locally produced 100% un-dyed, black Alpaca yarn.  It was from a single Alpaca at 'Bird Farm Alpacas' in Ceredigion.  The yarn is super super soft and wonderful to knit with, if a little fluffy.  The result is very pleasing and it goes a long, long way.  The skein was 100grms and it was DK.  It produced two pairs of lacey fingerless mittens and a matching lacey headband, (see picture below).  The picture does not show the mittens at their best but I have included a close up of the lace pattern for you to see.  So as you can see a busy week last week and hopefully a good one this week too.  I am going to be using some yarn from a local company called Triskilion, I'll keep you posted.  Happy knitting everyone.

Hello One and All!

Hello one and all.  Welcome to my first blog.  The purpose of this blog is to talk about knitting and all things yarn related.  I love to knit and have done so for as long as I can remember.  During the last three years due to illness it has  become even more important in my life, therefore the items I have produced haved increased in number, plus I have expanded my expertise by venturing out into using  very fine and luxury yarns to do a lot of lace work.  I particularly like knitting vintage items and lace work though this is not all I do.  Recently I have produced baby items for a friend whose first  baby is due any day now - so I have used (at her requrest) man made fibres (she is a strict  vegan).  I have found that Stylecrafts 'Special' DK is a very good acrylic and is produced in a wide range of colours.  Two of the items in the photo below - the yellow and purple cardigan and the spring green baby blanket are knitted in this yarn.  The other - the dusky pink is knitted in King coles 4ply Bamboo, with lovely drapey results.

We have a superb yarn shop in my local town of Lampeter, here in West Wales, called 'Red Apple Yarn', (there page can be found on Facebook).  Here you can be assured of a warm welcome, lots of help and advice (should you require it) and an abundance of standard; luxury and local yarns.  If you are ever in the area and have a yarn fetish (don't we all),then Red Apple Yarn is definitely a place to visit.  Hope to see you there one day.  Until next time - back to the knitting.