birthday hauling

Yesterday was my birthday, and to celebrate my lovely Boy drove me down to Yorkshire and treat me to a little wool hauling. I had planned to bring my camera along, and show you pics of all the lovely places we visited, but in the rush and excitement of the morning I forgot to pop it in my bag! But I did manage to snap the occasional phone pic…

So here goes. A snapshot wool filled birthday tour…

Giant needles at Texere. These things were ridiculously large!

Beautiful snowy Bradford on the drive to Coldspring Mill. It’s nice to see pictures of Bradford being beautiful because I lived there for 5 years as a student, and the area that I lived in by the university was thoroughly awful. I won’t bore you with the details, but needless to say my last couple of years there were miserable. Hopefully my bad memories can be overwritten with images as lovely as this!

More of the drive to Coldspring Mill, followed by…

a nice cup of Yorkshire tea at the Mill! And a lovely lunch of giant Yorkshire pudding, sausages, gravy, mash and peas (that I was far too hungry to stop and take picture of) for the utterly bargainous price of £3! I’m a bit of a sausage snob, so I was dubious when I saw the price, but it was completely delicious, and I still can’t believe how cheap it was.

We rounded it all off with a stop at Whitby on the way home, and an obligatory visit to the Magpie Cafe for fish and chips and mulled cider, followed by lovely moonlit walk along the pier. There really is nothing nicer than being wrapped up in deliciously warm handknits, staring up at the stars with the sound of the waves crashing against the shore, and the wind whipping around your face. A perfect end to the day.

Well actually, the perfect end to the day was coming home to the birthday cake that my Mum had baked for me! Vanilla cake with lemon buttercream is my Mum’s specialty, and it is delicious.

But I suppose the important part of this post is the haulage, so here it is!

Some King Cole Riot DK, which is touted as being a Noro dupe. This ticks (almost) all my boxes (grey? Check. Jewel tones? Oh yes.)

Mystery yarn from Coldspring Mill. It’s a beautiful rust colour, looks like a DK weight, feels like merino and I’m pretty sure it’s Debbie Bliss but I haven’t a clue what line it is. Might have to do some investigating one of these days. They had a larger pack of this yarn, and I’m kicking myself for not getting it because it’s such a lovely colour!

Chocolatey brown Debbie Bliss Rialto, in what I think is an aran weight.

According to the pack this is Extra Fine Merino 4 ply, so although I initially thought this was a Debbie Bliss yarn, I now think it’s probably Sublime Extra Fine Merino 4 ply. Yellow is not a colour I’m usually drawn to, but I love this. It’s not quite dark enough to be a mustard, not bright enough to be lemon, and not brown enough to be biscuit. It’s just lovely and buttery, and I’m surprised at how much I love it.

There was more haulage. I picked up a couple of balls of colourful acrylic for my best friends daughter as I’m giving her knitting lessons for Christmas, and a few balls of Stylecraft 4 ply for knitting dolls clothes and accessories. There was also a huge amount of fibre haulage!

I’ve been a little obsessed with dyeing tops at the moment, so I’ve stocked up on undyed merino as well as picking up a few other fibres and blends so that I can try my hand at spinning wools other than merino. It looks like 2012 is going to be the year of the wheel!

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Mooncalf made me do it…

I used to be a fairly prolific cross stitcher when I was a child, but I stopped because I didn’t know what to do with all the finished pieces that were accumulating in my bedroom drawers (plus there’s only so many times you can cross stitch Forever Friends kits before getting bored!).  I vividly remember the last thing I stitched; a panda that I’d designed and charted myself. I probably still have it shut up in a box somewhere since I never throw anything away.

But seeing all of Mooncalf’s beautiful makes over the past few months has inspired me to pick it up again. I stitched this last night whilst watching the first couple of episodes of Fringe (I’m a little late to it, but totally my new favourite show!). I think this is going to be addictive…

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Of necklaces and felted beads.

One of the Other Crafts I spoke of on Friday was this merino wool felted ball necklace.

I made a few necklaces with felted yarn balls a while ago, but I strung the balls onto ribbon and I was never happy with how they turned out. This time I used some ridiculously soft cotton, and I love it so much more.

I think the hardest part was deciding what kind of clasp I wanted to use. I knew I didn’t want a bolt ring because I find them a little clunky and ugly (not to mention the fact they can be ridiculously fiddly) so I was looking into alternatives. Lobster clasps are a little better, but then it struck me that I already had all the materials to try and make my own clasps.

I absolutely love how it turned out. The simplicity of the clasp and the necklace seem to really complement each other, and I think the handmade clasp adds a lovely extra touch.

In hindsight I wish I’d used the larger jump rings for both necklace ends, it would have looked more balanced. The larger ring is closed though, so I can’t add it on now but I have ordered a supply of open rings of the same size. I’m looking forward to them arriving so I can swap the smaller ring out and stop obsessing over how unbalanced it all looks!

 

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Not Knitting

There hasn’t been much knitting this week because I have been playing with Other Crafts…

39 little felted balls of colour on Wednesday.

(my palms still feel bruised.)

Silver plated jewellery clasps today.

I had a lot of fun making these clasps. I’m looking forward to making many many more!

More about what these bits and pieces are becoming at the weekend…

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a crafting disaster

I love macarons, and I’m currently obsessed with the idea of sweet little macaron stitch markers. It’s been years since I played with Fimo and I was rather pleased with how cute and pretty my mini macarons looked when I’d finished modelling them. They do say that pride comes before a fall…

I popped them in my little toaster oven to bake, turned my back for few seconds to get some zip lock bags for the opened packets of clay, and when I turned back around I was greeted with a smoking toaster oven. Not good! It seems my trusty little toaster is hotter than I’d thought.

The pink ones went all bubbly and brown around the edges, but that’s nothing to how the blue ones fared…

Yikes!

I still desperately want my little macaron stitch markers, but I think for now I’ll take a little break with some spinning and come back to them later. I’m too sad about this disaster at the moment!

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Knitting and Crochet Blog Week 2011

The fabulous Eskimimi has arranged the second Knitting and Crochet blog week.

It was a huge success last year, and I was so disappointed that I couldn’t take part because of exams, so I’m so excited to be able to join in this time.

Everyone is welcome, and if you want to find out more pop on over to The Blog Hub on Ravelry, or check out this blog post where Eskimimi fills you in on what it’s all about, how you can take part and a veritable smorgasbord of other info and tips.

  Enjoy!

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Spinning for spring

 

I seem to get more of an urge to spin in the spring when the skies are lightening and the weather gets slightly warmer.  I’ve even been outside twice this week without a coat on! It really must be getting warmer.

Back in June, the Boy took me up to Glasgow for long weekend, and I persuaded him to take us to New Lanark since it was only around the proverbial corner.

 

It’s a precious little place which  I wholeheartedly recommend anyone to visit if they find themselves in that area. I absolutely love the history of it, and after wandering around the museum and seeing the gorgeous plants and views from their roof garden, of course I ended up in the gift shop. And of course I bought several balls of wool. Several might be around thirty. Eeek! And then, in the corner, I spied some large bags of emerald green fibre which I pounced on and added to my loot. Because when you’re buying several balls of wool, what’s one more bag?!

The other night, in a fit of procrastination, I felt the need to dig out my hand carders and have a play. The New Lanark fibre (I wish I’d had the foresight to ask what kind of fibre it was at the time) seemed the perfect choice for carding, since the rest of my fibre stash are combed tops and this was more of a lofty  mass.

The carding went a bit easier than I thought it’d be. It’s still a little tricky, but I guess practice will take care of that. I’ve decided to give woollen spinning a try, since I usually spin worsted. It’s supposed to give you a soft fuzzy yarn, since you’re spinning across the fibre rather than with the fibre, but so far all I’m getting is uneven singles! Let’s see if I manage any improvement.

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Impatience is (not) a virtue

                     
So I was trying to keep casting on for Levens for the Ravelympics, but then a big delivery of yarn I ordered arrived, and one thing led to another and Levens just seemed to happen… What can I say, I’m just fickle like that.
Currently about a third of the way through. I’m using a much lighter weight yarn and therefore am obviously waay out on gauge so I’m winging it for now. My gauge is probably still too loose for the yarn I’m using, but I’m quite liking the light airiness of it. Right now however, I am torn between sticking with the 3 ruched panels and just working them for longer, or whether to add 2 more. Ho hum.
The other project currently on the needles (I’m not counting the tea cozy, it' seems to be permanently on the needles) is the toe up socks I cast on while I should have been revising. It’s my first pair knit toe-up, and to be honest my patience with them is starting to wear a little thin. Whilst I quite enjoyed the cast on (Judy’s Magic Cast-on) and the foot and like the idea of being able to try them on as you go, I seem to be stumbling at the heel. This will be the third attempt at the heel. The first time there weren’t enough gusset stitches so it was a bit too tight, this time it’s because it’s too big, presumably because I’ve started the gusset increases too late. Here’s hoping the third time is the charm, because frankly I’m starting to feel a bit like the Goldilocks of toe-up socks.

For the moment though, they’re banished to the naughty corner.
Ooh, as an aside I’ve been playing with my new needle felting kit, and have made the Boy a little Valentines card. Needle felting is rather addictive.
I think it’s safe to post a photo because I don’t think he reads this…


What a sap :P

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