Blanche hat, stashorama and other bits and bobs

In case you wondered, I'm posting at 1am because it's cooler this time of day (or rather night) :-) It has been incredibly hot in the UK this week with temperatures reaching the mid 90s easily, not weather we are used to or set up for. It has certainly been too warm to sit at the computer for long, so I've not really had a chance to post until now. Temperatures are still in the mid to high 20s, a lot easier to cope with but still hot.

Here's the Blanche hat I made for CFAC this week, it was very quick to knit. This is in Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece "Lovely Lavender" and I think it took a little under half a skein. This yarn was lovely to knit with, a slight tendency to split but it makes a gorgeous soft fabric.



I received a huge parcel this week from Lynne, look at the fabulous pile of yarn she sent me!



Left to right:
Patons Jet (wool/alpaca) in pink, and the beginnings of a scarf
Handspun in lilacs and pinks with a little lurex/metallic
A 200g ball of Bendigo woollen mills pure wool in bottle green, I think this is somewhere between 4-ply and DK?
Eyelash/boa in a deep red
More Patons Jet in a wonderful multi colourway
More eyelash/boa in pinks blues and greens
Mohair in pinks and golds
Some very fluffy soft pink multi boucle-type yarn
Four very pretty sparkly flower stitch markers

Lots of yarn there that would be great in boas or curly whirlies! Thanks again Lynne!

Stitch markers in more detail (not clickable):



As you can see from the picture I've started the Heart scarf from Knitty in the pink Patons Jet. This is one of the patterns in the Knitty print special themed around the fight against breast cancer. As soon as I saw the Jet I thought of this scarf. It isn't quite as chuncky as the original yarn in the pattern, so I'm using 7.5mm needles instead of 10mm and it will turn out at around 5.5 inches wide. This scarf will be sent to Hazel for the craft fair. I had started a "rockstar" scarf a while ago but wasn't happy with the way it was looking, and I think Heart will be much nicer!

An update on the Tulip top saga. I measured it and the sizing was absolutely fine until dividing at the arm holes. It ended up several inches wider than it should have been at the top. I have no real idea why since the size was fine for half of the item. After some thought I've decided I'm going to frog it and make Midwest Moonlight from Scarf Style with the yarn. That I would definitely wear, I have had reservations in general about whether I would wear a knitted top in summer, even in cotton. I did consider making the top from the latest Magknits but in the end, after seeing Tina's fantastic MM on Hazel's blog, I decided upon that.

I've also started the Ariadne corset-style top from the "Muse" pattern book, in Colinette Lasso. I've cast on tonight, using stitch markers at every 20 stitches so I wouldn't lose my mind recounting :-) It was a little difficult to cast on with as I found I kept catching the little loops on the shiny thread. The colours look really lovely on the needles though.

In answer to a couple of queries - anythingbuthousework asked about the Koigu yarn I used on Latifa. It was shade/dye P121287 and it came from Knit Happens in the USA. It was bought in Jan/Feb this year. I couldn't find an email address for you by the way so I hope you see this answer.

Mandy asked about the camera - it's a 6 megapixel with 3x optical zoom and a nice big screen (glass covered), and the model is a Fuji Finepix F470 which was on offer at PC World. I've used it for my latest photos and it's doing a great job.