Leverage...

We've started a group at school making story sacks, currently working on The Hungry Caterpillar which involves knitting a lot of green balls. Now I've always known I was a slow knitter, going for consistency rather than speed(!), but at the first meeting it got ridiculous. So I've been inspired to try to speed up my knitting, or at least make it more efficient.

After much envious watching of the Yarn Harlot on youtube, and after reading somewhere that if you do something every day for a month it will become a habit, I decided that my just-started cardigan was the ideal project on which to learn lever knitting. I'm knitting Common Ground, which starts with garter stitch (practise the knit stitch first), then has a period of stocking stitch (add in the purling) before doing a little light lace work and ending with the ultimate challenge, ribbing.

I'm now part way down the lace section and I can report that the knit stitches are ok, the lace a little more challenging, and the purling still rubbish. Still, I've got till New Year to practice, and I should get a bit more knitting time once Christmas actually gets here.

Advent stars

We went to visit a friend on the Glossop Christmas Art Trail at the weekend.  She's a stained glass artist but was busy making stars from dogwood twigs, so she taught us too.  The children were using them as magic wands, I went a bit mad and made quite a few and then wondered what to do with them all.  So now we have this:

advent stars hanging above the fireplace.  It must be nearly Christmas!

Grey days, or seaside?

It's a grey day today and we're back to normal after the weekend.  But we had a good weekend!  In amongst the usual stuff (and the odd party) it was time for the annual Amnesty craft fair.  So we all got together and set up our stalls.  The fair was twice as big this year, and for the first time we had two rooms.  There was lots for the kids to do to, including tile painting, corn dollies and face painting.  Hannah went down the traditional route and had her face painted as a butterfly, but Steph (as ever the individual) went a different way:

I don't suppose the face painting lady gets that many requests for 'the seaside'!  It did remind us all of summer though.

Mitred squares

I've just published my first pattern on Ravelry, it's a mitred phone cosy, and it's free!  While we were at BOB there was a lady sitting knitting mitred squares to make a waistcoat, and she'd made fingerless gloves, and we were all intrigued and getting a masterclass on how to do it.  I came home inspired slightly obsessed and have been playing around with the technique ever since. 

First there was this:

 then this (it's a work in progress, obviously):

then these:

 and finally the phone cosy was born:

and another one too, just to check the technique you understand.

So I thought I'd write up the pattern and offer it on Ravelry, for anyone else who might be similarly obsessed looking for something exciting and modular to knit.  You can download it here.  Enjoy!

A very colourful day

Much dyeing has gone on this evening, and yesterday (and before that too), all in preparation for BOB next weekend.  It looks like being a cracking show with lots of crafty goodies.  I've got some new colourways and new base yarns, and also (dun dun dah, as the kids say) I've being trying my hand at dyeing fibre!  I've got some gorgeous BFL roving dyed in some of my trademark colourways.  So come and see - you know you want to!

This afternoon we had a trip to a large Swedish furniture store, which turned into craft heaven.  Rebekah and I ended up colouring in on a tablecloth - yes, they have designed fabric to colour in! (I had words with R about colouring other fabrics when we get home though.)  And the bigger girls made houses with lots of fabric and ribbon and glue.  Lots and lots of glue.  Apart from fending off Rebekah wielding marker pens it was a very enjoyable time.

Shop update

I've had some more Peaknaze sock yarn in and been dyeing that up, oh, it is yummy yarn to work with.  I added a couple of new yarns to my folksy shop at the weekend - do go over there and take a look!  My Folksy shop.  I hope to have a few more up soon, and there are other developments in the pipeline, so watch this space..

Work in progress

Yay, I'm working this week (hospital appointments permitting)!  So I've sent Chris out with the children and I get to play with wool.  Hmm, who gets the better deal here?!  Anyway, a work in progress pic for you from yesterday:

These are all a new batch of Peaknaze sock yarn, in some new colourways.  They are currently drying and I hope to have them in the shop by the weekend.

Talking about the weekend, I and my yarns will be at the Spring Fair at St Andrew's Church, Hadfield on Saturday, doors open at 10am.  There will be lots of other stalls there too from pet stuff to cakes, as well as the usual delicious refreshments.  Please come and see me!

April already?

Uh, so how did it get to be April already?  Where has the time gone??  All I can do is apologise for the radio silence and say, in my defence, it must have been busy!  Easter has now been and gone so I'm looking forward to things getting back to normal again (and watching those little pink piggies flying past again).

But just before they do, my middle one will be four tomorrow, and I have a pirate party to organise.  Arrr, me hearties!

Happy St David's Day

As my eldest keeps asking, is it spring yet?  It certainly felt like it today.  We took a picnic lunch to Broadbottom and it was lovely and very warm.

 [Steph is dressed as a pirate for World Book Day, just in case you were wondering what she was wearing.  I have a better photo, but it won't upload properly.  Shame.]

And there were some very gnarly trees in the woods nearby, so I went exploring...

And then we went to the Whitworth Art Gallery while Hannah went to speech therapy:

 

 You can see what I was doing...

Shop restocked

Yes, I have finally finished restocking my Folksy shop - the yarns are different to those that are at the Smithy Studios, so please go and have a look!  Follow the link at the side to find my shop.

It's been a manic half term here but things are now getting back to something more resembling normal as the children have gone back to school.  It was lovely having them at home (and not having to do the school run!), but Hannah especially, after nearly a month off school having an operation, was ready to go back.  Anyway, I must dash as I need to pick up Rebekah because Chris has a funeral.  No, it's not his, nor anyone we know - he's an organist in his spare time.  It's that time of year for funerals, and he's being kept busy with at least one a week. 

Bye bye ice!

I’m so glad the ice has finally melted – the world has regained a bit of colour and lost a lot of slippiness!  I love snow, but I hate the thick sheet of ice that it inevitably becomes if it doesn’t melt quickly.  It makes going out so difficult, and it’s been around for over a week.  But for those of you who miss it, here are some photos to remind you what it was like:

New colourway!

Yes, I have a new colourway, Woodland Glade, which will be available online as soon as I can upload it!  I'm waiting on the weather a bit for some more pictures, but here's one:

This particular skein is available at the Smithy Studios (unless it's gone already!) and more are on their way.  In fact there is a whole new basket there so go down and have a look!

New stock!

New stock is coming soon to a website near you (and a shop as well)!  Look out for the re-stock, it should be up in the next few days, and there should also be more yarn at The Smithy Studios.  I've been busy - and here's a sneak preview:

The hospital wool room...

We've had a slight hiatus in life due to Hannah being called in at short notice for her op (which went well).  I'd just dyed some more yarn so I turned one corner of her room into a reskeining space, complete with swift attached to some shelves!  I did get a few funny looks - I was right by the window and it looks out over the main corridor of the hospital so there were plenty of passers-by.  I got quite a bit of wool reskeined over the week she was in so it was well worth doing.  I did some plain too from cones, so I now have plenty of wool just waiting to be dyed!  The break has put my restocking plans back a bit but hopefully I'll be back on track soon.

I also managed to get some bookworms knitted for my book group which were duly distributed at Thursday's meeting.  We call ourselves the League of Bookworms, so a bookworm each made sense.  Unfortunately I forgot to take photos before I gave them away, so I'll just have to make more; besides which, I need one too!

Back to the dyepots!

Yep, I finally managed to get a little dyeing done tonight, for the first time this year!  I was experimenting with a slightly different technique so we'll see how they turn out.  I'm still struggling with this chest infection (now on antibiotics) so I only did a couple of skeins but it was fun!  Mmm, the smell of wet wool...

Darkness and light: taking time to look

I took the younger two to the Whitworth Art Gallery on Wednesday afternoon whilst Hannah had an appointment at the hospital.  I love the Whitworth and especially for going with little ones, they are so family friendly.  The current exhibition is all about light and shadow and when we first went in I was a bit disappointed because it looked like there wasn't as much to see as usual (and I couldn't find the Art Cart), but then we got to looking.  Really looking.  It just shows how much we don't see in a first glance, and how rewarding taking the time to look can be.

The two exhibits that we really liked were one where there was a projection of white 'snow' on a dark background and when you stood in front of the camera you appeared in the snow - it kind of coalesced into an image of you.  The other was brass half-butterflies stuck into the wall and lit from above, so you got a whole butterfly reflected in light above and in dark below, depending where you were standing.  From a distance it looked like someone had left loads of fixings in the wall, but when you got your eye in it was beautiful.  [If you follow the link above, pictures 1 and 3 in the slideshow are of these.]

The children enjoyed running through the areas of light and dark, and watching themselves in the 'snow', and then we found the Art Cart so we were set for the afternoon.  And then Rebekah was sick, and that was the end of that.

Happy New Year everybody!