Alveare

Alveare by Woolly Wormhead, knit in my own hand dyed Flamboyance Yarns Bailey aran (100% BFL). It took around 88g for the medium size. I absolutely love the decrease pattern, it creates a very distinctive pentagon shape. I didn't block this over a form, as I wanted to keep a little of the beehive look. The BFL knit up very well, with great stitch definition, and it also has a lot of "body" even after washing and blocking.

My current WIP is a Citron shawlette in Flamboyance Dashing 4ply (100% superwash merino), in a shade I named Tangerine Dream. I'm using 5mm needles, as the pattern is written for laceweight on 4mm needles. It's a simple effect to execute and looks good so far. It will be interesting to see how far the skein goes, I am prepared to use a toning yarn for the ruffle if need be!



I'm also currently trying to decide which book to read next. I finished "I Robot" a wee while ago, and it's in a volume with "Robots and Empire". The latter isn't inspiring me much though, so I'm going to start either the first True Blood novel, or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. I'm leaning towards the latter, no doubt partly inspired by the new series of Wallander on BBC4 - the original Swedish version which I do much prefer to the Kenneth Branagh adaptations. I've not yet read any of the Henning Mankell books but have found a useful website dedicated to the books and their adaptations.

Cloths!

Last month I knitted quite a few cloths. One was for a Dishcloth Swap on the CTnY forum, but I'd been promising myself to make some for a long time. I like to use them as face flannels - they are great as a lovely hot (or cold) cloth. My husband requested some so I made these two for him:



The standard Ballband pattern as found in the original Mason Dixon book, amongst other places. I used Garnstudio Drops Paris which is a 100% cotton aran weight yarn.

I made a Harmonic Mosaic cloth for the swap, yarn is the Paris again:



And also made one for me:



More cloths for me - firstly another Ballband using brown Paris and Anchor Magicline shade 1422:



Circle cloth, aqua Paris and Magicline 1504:



I also received two lovely cloths, one knitted Ballband and one crocheted, from Nevisknitter, thank you!



I've just completed a Just Enough Ruffles scarf, in Jaeger Shetland Aran, and will be blocking it shortly. It's a birthday gift and I'm very pleased with how it has turned out. The Jaeger is a gorgeous yarn, sadly long discontinued.

I had some lovely news this week, I won the blog prize draw on leafgreenknits! I chose the book Inspired to Knit as my prize, it arrived yesterday and is as lovely as I had hoped - thank you Linda!

Dancing with tears in our eyes

The past month has been slightly surreal, to say the least! We were looking forward to seeing the re-formed Ultravox on their "Return to Eden" tour, on April 14th at Manchester Apollo. As a fan from the early 1980s, who wasn't able to see them live back then, this was a dream come true.

We were not disappointed - the band are every bit as good now, after such a long break, as they were back then. The Ultravox "sound" is there, and with the advent of better technology allows them to enjoy the performance much more, without huge racks of equipment to nurse along and pray it doesn't fail! We were in the third row of the stalls, which at the Apllo meant you were extremely close to the stage, a fantastic viewpoint.





I was particularly glad to be able to see Billy Currie play his violin/viola solos live, something that inspired me to stick with the violin myself, all those years ago (and to eventually have the experience of playing many times as part of an orchestra, in front of audiences).



I took our compact digital camera along to Manchester, and while the photos it managed weren't brilliant, they were good enough for my own personal memento of the event. The Ultravox site linked above will have plenty of great tour photos and other material uploaded soon!

After Manchester, I decided that one gig wasn't enough - this may never happen again, after all! I decided to acquire a ticket for the Camden Roundhouse gig on April 30th, which was also being filmed for a live DVD. I had the most amazing day, and got very close to the front at the gig itself (the main area at the Roundhouse was standing). The sound here was hugely more rich and powerful than at Manchester, and much clapping, singing, and punching the air was the order of the day :-)

Afterwards I met back up with some people who were at the same hotel, and we went around the back of the venue to wait for the band to leave. To cut a long story short, I was lucky enough to get the autographs of Chris, Billy and Warren. This wasn't something I'd factored in to my plans at all, the gig was reward enough, so it was a wonderful end to an amazing evening.

All this excitement has meant that knitting has rather taken a back seat in the past few weeks! I'm now picking my WIPs up again, and have ordered some yarn for a Shawl That Jazz. I did manage to finish reading "Wives and Daughters" by Elizabeth Gaskell, and was rather surprised to find it was unfinished, as she died before completing it. It appears that only one chapter remained unwritten, and from notes we can glean the events it would contain. I did enjoy the book despite the missing ending! Last week I read "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman, which is just a wonderful story, highly recommended. One of those books that you really don't want to finish, and you miss it afterwards. I'm about to start "Twilight", which needs little introduction, but may switch to the sixth in the "Saga of Seven Suns" series by Kevin J. Anderson when that arrives.

Books meme

Found this over on My Knitting and Me and thought I'd play along:

Instructions:

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Underline those you intend to read.
3) Italicise the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list so we can try and track down these people who’ve read 6 and force books upon them.

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - J D Salinger
19. The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli’dolin - Louis De Bernieres Mans
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones’ Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

How Many Hats?

The post title being a tribute to a sketch from "Armstrong and Miller" last night, which had me in stitches. I missed the first episode last week (probably still in mourning as "Not Going Out" had ended), it's absolutely hilarious and one of the songs is still going round in my head.

Speaking of hats I do have one to show you. We are having a KAL on the Mighty Boosh group on ravelry, for the hat Vince wears in the episode "Tundra". Mine is knit in Jaeger Extra Fine Merino Chunky (Red Ink), fudging a couple of different patterns together and winging it to some extent. I did a single crochet (US terminology) edging all the way round to stabilise the edges and help reduce curling, and the cords are in i-cord.



This is pre-blocking, it's now blocking on the slightly precarious combination of glass head on upside-down bowl, with some bubble wrap to pin the flaps and edges to. Once dry I'll be adding pompoms, and then some needle-felting to turn it into a Glam Rock Ski Hat :-D

I've not really touched any other knitting since my last post, but there are a few things to show. First up a gorgeous skein of Yarn Yard sock in shade "Conker":



And Posh Yarn Laura in "Moorland":



I was lucky enough to win two prizes in terri's recent fundraiser raffle on the Crafty Threads forum - I picked a Kool Aid dyeing kit:



and the Amy Butler "In Stitches" book (which has all the patterns neatly stashed in a pocket inside the front cover):



In books, I've finished "Postcards" which I thoroughly enjoyed, and have now dug out Neil Gaiman's "Stardust" as it seemed timely! If you've never read any of his novels I definitely recommend "Neverwhere", which was also adapted for television.

I've also finally invested in a set of straighteners, in the end I went for BaByliss Pros instead of GHDs. These things are just genius. My hair is ever so thick and tends to kink and curl, the difference is incredible!

Smooch

Finally complete after being put to one side in the dismal summer weather:



Pattern: Smooch by Kim Hargreaves, from the Rowan All Seasons Cotton collection
Yarn: Rowan All Seasons Cotton in Pansy
Needles: 5mm and 4mm bamboo straights
Yardage: around four and a half 50g balls

Pattern amendments:
I realised one reason I was avoiding finishing this was the (in my book) fiddly way of making a slipped stitch edging on the armholes and neckline. I decided to simply slip stitches and to be honest it looks the same.

Very glad to have finished a long-standing WIP, and it's a good fit too.

I made this cloth/potholder as a gift recently:



The cloth is knit in Debbie Bliss Cotton DK, using this pattern from Caffina's Creations. The idea for adding some fabric backing and cotton batting came from the Easy-Going Potholders pattern from Magknits. I hand-sewed the backing, which was my first proper sewing for many a year. I was quite pleased with how it turned out, despite hand sewing not being my forte. Next step is tackling the sewing machine!

The remnant from the skein of cotton used above was just enough to make this Simple Lace Headband (not such a great photo I'm afraid):



Another Ribbed Noro Hat for a birthday gift, in Silver Thaw shade 13 (takes a little under one skein):



In books, I finished and thoroughly enjoyed "North and South" while on holiday from work recently. I've also read the new Terry Pratchett novel, "Making Money", which had me laughing out loud as usual. I've now started something different, "Postcards" by Annie Proulx. I believe it is something in the vein of Steinbeck's "Grapes of Wrath". I read quite a number of his works in my teens, and he is one of the authors I intend to rediscover. I'm also quite keen to re-read some of the Thomas Hardy novels. I know he is not universally liked but I loved books like "Far From The Madding Crowd".

As regards the Pay It Forward exchange, unfortunately hazy is not now able to participate, but I have decided to make a third gift as a surprise for a friend instead, rather than throw the field open again. I feel it's in the spirit of the PIF if not the letter.

A grand day out

Or rather, two grand days out. Yesterday we went up to Cumbria, firstly to Sedbergh and the Charter Market, and to meet up with the folks from the Sharpe Appreciation Society who had been invited to participate. Sedbergh is England's third Book Town, and as such has a number of specialist and general bookshops. The market was part of the Festival of Books and Drama. We spent a very enjoyable hour or so wandering around the market stalls and some of the shops. The "Sleepy Elephant" is a rather wonderful combination of books and crafts, and specialises in books about the needle arts. I found this inspiring book amongst them:



After my exploits in Noro I couldn't resist this, it's very inspiring, and I have plans to attempt at least one shawl, possibly something like this:



At one of the craft stalls I found this rather lovely project bag:



We also visited Westwood Books where I picked up three Elizabeth Gaskell novels, including "North and South". We hadn't planned to go anywhere else after Sedbergh but found ourselves with plenty of time to spare, so we headed north, firstly out of Sedbergh towards Kirkby Stephen along the most glorious route. The landscape was stunning and the weather for once was very pleasant and sunny. This time of year the heath/heather is out in full bloom and you can see the amazing patchwork of greens and purples stretching out in front of you.

We picked up the M6 again further north and headed towards Caldbeck. For a bank holiday, the traffic was light, although it did look very busy on the local roads as we passed under the exit for Keswick. The area between Windermere and Keswick does unfortunately become very busy at weekends and holidays, and probably most of the time in the summer. We have spent more than one occasion stuck in large amounts of traffic! Caldbeck is the home of the Wool Clip, and of course not far from the home of Woolfest. It is housed in converted mill buildings along with two other shops and a cafe. As you might expect, the shop is full of fibre! There are also yarns, handknitted garments, rugs, and all sorts of things. I've been thinking of getting a drop spindle for a while, so I bought a drop spindle starter kit, along with some Wensleydale locks dyed in rich sunset colours, and some dyed Masham fibre:



I got a needle felting kit for my birthday and I bought the fibre more with this in mind, but I'm looking forward to trying out spinning with the spindle! It came with some Blue Faced Leicester and Black Welsh Mountain fibre. There are some instructions, but I'm going to do a little more research before trying to spin!

Last Sunday we had another day out, although the weather wasn't quite as kind. We went to the VW Festival at Harewood House near Leeds. The rain had made the event field into rather a mud bath in places, but thankfully it did stop raining not too long after we arrived. Later on, we went up to the house itself, which is just incredible inside in the state rooms, and fascinating under stairs in the old servants quarters and kitchens. Outside in the terrace garden, the RSPB were stationed with binoculars, as this is one of the sites where red kites were re-introduced. The species was almost wiped out in Britain but is now staging a remarkable recovery. We saw two kites circling high above, and one a little closer over the lake. We've seen them in Wales, too, while travelling across Powys in the mountains.



More photos in the gallery.

Thank you so much to everyone who has commented on the Noro entrelac scarf. It's a really fabulous use for Kureyon in particular - each shade contains such rich colours, very saturated, and this I think is partly why it works so well.

In answer to terri's question, I do think entrelac is actually quite easy, once you get the hang of how it is constructed. It's very logical, and really only comprises of basic knit and purl, and standard increases and decreases. If you have a slipped stitch selvedge it makes it simple to pick up stitches for the next block evenly. Definitely give it a try - use a practice piece first time to understand how it fits together. It took me an age with my first go, but once I'd worked it out and found a good pattern, I was flying along.

This week I've been working on Yelena, and am not far off finishing the first front piece. It's not the fastest knit, being in 1x1 rib, but at least it's on 6mm needles! I'm trying not to cast on any new projects at the moment, but so many patterns are calling to me!

Flair progress, Charmed Knits, and playing with beads

Soundtrack for this post: The Very Best of the Eagles

Flair

I didn't post an update last week as I wanted to get a bit further along with Flair before showing a progress photo. In fact I've only knitted Flair for the past 2 weeks, not my usual modus operandi! As you're knitting the whole jacket including the sleeve caps at the same time, the rows are fairly long, and I figured it needs concentration to make progress. Add to that the large wrapover at the front, you have rows somewhat longer than for a standard sweater or cardigan:



The Blue Sky Alpacas organic cotton is a dream to knit with. It's very soft and doesn't seem to cause any aching hands like some other less flexible cotton yarns can. I'm just over 2 inches below where I joined the body under the arm holes. I think I'm going to add an extra buttonhole here too. The pattern relies on row gauge for a few things, and I think buttons would have been better placed with more intervening rows, not the 14 the pattern suggests (I'm getting 18/23 or 24 on average and the pattern asks for 18/22). The same goes for when to separate off the sleeve stitches, the pattern gives you a number of stitches which equates to a row number - I added four more increases (8 rows) plus another 4 straight rows before I did that. This is the beauty of knitting top down though, you can try the piece on as many times as you like and you won't get any nasty surprises! I can just add on extra lengths of cord for this, as shown, the Denise needles are working really well with this pattern.

Another modification I've made is 8 stitches for the front button bands rather than 7. Seed stitch, according to the books, should be done over an even number of stitches, and I was in danger of messing it up with 7. It sounds daft but sometimes the simplest things are the very things that can go wrong! I've ordered some olive-wood buttons from a haberdasher on ebay, I had a yen for wooden buttons for this piece and these look lovely, I should have them to show next week.

Beaded book thongs

I've been up to some other crafty things apart from knitting, during last week's Bank Holiday I got my bead stash out (acquired over several years) and made some knitting book thongs. I made some more a couple of nights ago too, they're quite addictive! Click on the photos to see the detail, apologies for the flash as we've got quite poor light this afternoon.

First we have a gothic version for DH on 1mm cord, with pewter bat and skull charms, silver beads and a glass "wingnut" bead; and a purple one using 2mm cord and various glass and wooden beads:



Next one uses green lampwork beads from a wonderful set, plus wooden and silver beads, on 1mm cord:



I have several more but these will be sent as gifts, so I won't put the photo up just yet!

Charmed Knits

This wonderful book arrived yesterday from The Book Depository:



I've been looking forward to this for months :-) Alison Hansel of the Blue Blog has put together a great collection of Harry Potter themed patterns. If you're a Potter Knitter you'll have seen some of them online before - the year 1/2 and year 3 scarves, the Quid-socks, Hermione's cable and bobble hat & mitts. However there are a lot of brand new patterns alongside these established favourites, including a Weasley sweater designed in chunky yarn to knit up nice and quickly! You can also find hats, gloves, Dobby socks, knitting bags, Mrs Weasley's housecoat, and more quirky items like needle cases, pointed hats and even Errol the owl! It's a very nicely presented book and a great price for all these patterns together. I was particularly pleased to find this:



The Quidditch Sweater! I've had a cone of yellow merino aran waiting for this for a long time :-)

Yarny goodness

A couple of weeks ago I was alerted to some wonderful laceweight yarn at handpaintedyarn.com. You have to see the prices for yourself! The company's shipping policy is also very good, they don't ship right away to save undue cost, but my parcel arrived via DHL in approximately 10 days. Since shipping only cost a few pounds I was mightily impressed that they used DHL! I got three different colours in total, but as one is intended as a gift I'm only showing two of them here:



At left is "Mustard", a gorgeous bright green, and at right is Laguna Azul. The yarn itself is very soft and just incredible value. Each skein also has 850 yards in 100g. I bought two of each which gives plenty for large shawls or wraps.

This week I discovered Lane Borgosesia Cashwool, another lovely laceweight yarn. Here's a skein of olive from Pavi Yarns (ordered in the afternoon, arrived the next morning!):



Another very soft yarn, with an amazing 1375 yards per 100g. I can see more of this yarn in my future, at £8.95 it's an excellent buy.

In other news, it has been quite a busy week or two. We picked up our new (to us) car yesterday, another VW New Beetle :-) Our original one is in black, this one is a reddish colour - the colour of Pimms, I have decided after some thought! We went up to Windermere in it today to give it a run, and saw some interesting sheep along the way - jet black lambs, black sheep with white faces, brown sheep :-) I don't know the breeds but it's always lovely to see all the lambs bouncing around :-)

Yesterday we had to do some extra food shopping, as I'm going to be starting this next week:



I'm really looking forward to this, as I already eat a lot of the foods he uses in the plan, and it will hopefully help me stop snacking too much on chocolate! I can imagine it would be quite a wrench for many people to start though, especially if you are fond of tea or coffee (I don't drink either). Hopefully this will help me lose some weight and give me plenty more ideas on what to eat, and in the correct proportions. It's a sensible approach to eating and there is no rationing involved of the kind that would leave you hungry! I'll report back on my progress during the four weeks of the plan :-)

Tank top in Twilleys Freedom Spirit

Pattern: Tank top from "Knitting" magazine
Yarn: Twilleys Freedom Spirit shade 501 "Soul"
Yardage: 5 balls plus a small amount of a sixth
Needles: Brittany birch 4mm, metal 3.5mm and Denise 4mm circular
Modifications: made the armholes slightly deeper

This was a nice easy knit, despite the pattern in the magazine having various parts missing - mostly near the end - but they were easily worked out. I also got to practice picking up a dropped stitch for the first time from about 5 inches down on the back piece. Not quite fully dropped, more of a hole with stitches above, so I unravelled that stitch back down and picked it back up with a crochet hook. I'm very pleased with my picking up of stitches on this piece for the neck an armholes too. I made sure to follow the same line and not deviate and it seems to have worked. I worked my decreases one stitch in from the end of the row in all cases too so you can see them on the arm curves and neck.

The pattern makes a long-line tank and has shaping to accomodate hips and waist. Not sure that the horizontal stripes are quite the most flattering thing on my figure at the moment, but here's a photo to show that it actually is a very good fit:



Now that I've scared you all, here's some lovely yarn to take your mind off it :-) This is Socrates 4ply from Violet Green, and is for a Shoalwater shawl. After seeing murdo's lovely WIP on the Crafty Threads forum I had to dig the pattern out, then I saw this which is named "Seascape":



I can't wait to get started with this. I should probably attempt to finish Spring Things first though. After some thought I decided I won't be doing the nupps on it though. KSH is not a yarn I would choose to work with again, it feels lovely but is so fine and fluffy I do have trouble handling it. After a few troubles with decreases I decided the last thing I want to do is invite disaster with p5tog! I'd attempt it happily with a different yarn though.

My Blue Sky Alpacas cotton arrived from kpixie yesterday, it took barely 6 days to reach me, and it's beautiful yarn. The picture doesn't do the green justice, it's more olive than it shows, but it does show some of the lustrous softness:



This is of course for Flair, and again I'm itching to get started!

After mandella's excellent review and hearing good things all round, I bought "No Sheep For You" by Amy Singer. I've been reading the first few chapters and have learnt a fair bit already about fibres (now I finally know what modal is!). The patterns I've looked at so far are lovely too.

I also picked up several Colinette pattern books for half price from the ongoing Knit Tin sale. I'd wanted Wayfarer in particular for a while so was happy to find it at a bargainous price.

Some great news this week for a knitblogger friend, Hazel's pattern for a beaded jacket is published in the current issue of Simply Knitting! It's a lovely 6-page spread and a very pretty piece indeed.

I'd also like to mention Sunflower Swifts and Sublime Spindles who now have a blog to showcase their wares. I bought my swift from them earlier this year and am very pleased with it, it's a beautiful piece of work.

Finally a mention to the lovely Piglottie who has an ongoing sale of her excellent hand-made cards, in aid of a friend's charitable trek. Please pop over and take a look!