It's official ...

... I have startitis at the moment. I've kept it reasonably under control so far but I can't guarantee that will continue. It must be Spring and the extra daylight adding a little more va-va-voom in the knitting department :-)

My first WIP is Alhambra mentioned in my last post. I had a 55g skein of Eva 2-ply in stash that I decided to use for this, as it only really asks for 350-ish yards. I think a solid colour would be better for this pattern but I like the way the Eva is knitting up into curvy diagonal stripes of colour.



I'm quite pleased with my progress on this, as previously I'd been a little put off knitting with finer yarns. This was down to using KSH, which is of course incredibly fine AND fluffy. The Eva is lovely to knit with and I think I've now grasped the various directions of yarnovers. Not to mention doing the p2togtbl correctly. It seems I was not doing it correctly at first, and I struggled away, and ended up messing up the stitch counts by one on a few rows in the first repeats. It doesn't look disastrous though andI decided to leave it as something that showed a learning curve. Strangely I had looked up p2togtbl some time ago, and found some directions, but when I checked the video on Knitting Help I found it was being done differently - and more importantly in an easier way!

I finished off the second sleeve on Alexandra on Friday night, and that is now blocking. I did short slightly puffed sleeves in the end, as I thought I'd get more use from it to wear over a long sleeved top in the colder months. Besides the fact I don't have 6.5mm DPNs, or even 2 circs, and using one Denise set wasn't exactly fun!

Having done the above I happily cast on for the Flutter Sleeve Cardigan from Spring 08 IK. I'd originally wondered about using DB Cathay but I should have remembered this really is a thinner DK yarn and doesn't make a suitable fabric on 4.5mm needles. The swatch confirmed this, so I had another think and finally hit upon Rowan Calmer, from stash. The swatch performed perfectly and I'm now up to the ribbing at the waist on the back piece:



I'm still trying to find time to sew up CPH, and am keeping my fingers crossed for this coming Bank Holiday weekend.

I could really have done with blogging last weekend too, after our week off, but it turned out fairly busy and I reluctantly deferred it a week. We did get plenty done around the house though, and managed a couple of days out too.

The first trip was to Coldspring Mill and Haworth:



You can see some cones of yarn through the windows in the picture. As usual there was plenty of temptation to hand inside. I came away with 2 packs around the 500g mark of Twilleys Freedom Spirit, and a cone of DB Cathay in pink. The latter was intended for Flutter Sleeve but as noted above, wasn't suitable. I've got plenty of alternatives to use it for though.

It was a lovely day weather-wise, quite breezy but not overly cold. You can see how bright and Spring-like it was in these photos of Haworth:



The Parsonage, taken from the churchyard



The main street

There was a lovely exhibition of historic photographs of Haworth and its environs, in the old school rooms near the parsonage. This was the original school built by the Rev. Bronte. One photo showed the day the Parsonage opened as a museum, in 1928 I think. The narrow street leading to it was literally jam packed with people, and everyone was wearing a hat. Well, I did spot one man in the middle of the picture who wasn't!

A couple of days later we went to Farfield Mill near Sedbergh, on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park. This was originally recommended by Donna, and we thoroughly enjoyed our visit. The mill was rescued some yeas ago and some of the original looms were also saved. They now weave on those very same looms as a commercial venture, and you can watch them in action.



The building is divided into four floors, and we started on the top floor, which is a lovely exhibition of hand looms and spinning wheels. On all of the floors there are studios for craftspeople, there was no-one working or demonstrating there that day though. I didn't get any photos of the looms up there, too busy looking at them!

On level 2 there is a big display of the history of the mill, and some of the older looms that were used to weave cloth:



Level 1 houses a lovely cafe, and also the commercial weaving rooms. We sat next to the window through to the weaving room and watched the weaver winding yarns from large cones onto smaller ones. I managed to snag a photo through the glass doors as were were leaving:



Apologies for the slightly blurry photo as I was using the camera on "museum" setting, this is in the room next to the looms, but I'm not 100% sure what was being wound onto what!



They use yarn made from the fleece of the local Rough Fell sheep. I believe this next picture, taken of the field just outside the mill, is of those same breed of sheep. They were not at all impressed at someone getting out of a car to take their photo, and set up quite a noise!



We've not long since finished watching the Spanish Grand Prix, quite an interesting race and another one with a high level of attrition. I'm somewhat gutted for Nick Heidfeld having to serve a 10 second stop/start penalty, as he had no choice but to pit during a safety car phase. I guess that is a risk they run if they leave pitting until the last possible moment, but all the same he did manage to regain a reasonable placing. Well done to the winners, and all the best to Heikki Kovalainen who had an awful crash due to what sounded like a foreign object that caused a tyre to blow out.

When chaos comes to visit

Long time no blog, or so it seems! The day after my last post I had a double vaccination, flu in one arm and pneumonia in the other. Nice! Thankfully the effects didn't last too long but last Monday (9th) saw me off work trying to see off the aching. I also had trouble knitting for a while as my hands and arms were sore. And they say these jabs are good for me :-)

A day or so later the real drama began. One of my two chinchillas stopped eating. This is a serious matter in chinchillas, if the gut stops functioning completely it's usually fatal. We took him to the vet and to cut a long story short, he had to go under anaesthetic last Friday (yes, it was the 13th!) and they found sharp "spurs" on his molars which had to be filed away ("burred"). Now again, giving an anaesthetic to a chinnie is a risky business, however we are fortunate to have a vet not too far away who is reasonably experienced with chinchillas. They used the safest gas to put him under, which has a quick recovery time and isn't absorbed into any vital organs.

Basil is now recovering, he has had a check-up and another injection to help his appetite etc, but he obviously still has a sore mouth and isn't keen on chewing at any hard foodstuffs. I've ordered some specialist recovery foods and probiotics today, but following excellent advice I commandeered the liquidiser tonight and ground up some pellets and hay. I made this into thickish paste and tried him with it, he was really keen to eat it which was a huge relief! We have been very worried about him and life has been rather topsy turvy around here, but the fact he has an appetite and wants to eat is excellent news. It can take quite a while for them to fully recover from this type of procedure, especially where they had stopped eating beforehand.

We really didn't have any clues as to the teeth problem until early last week, chinnies are very good at hiding discomfort and pain and even though I watch them like a hawk, there was nothing to indicate this problem developing. It may well reoccur, but we can help guard against it to some extent by ensuring he eats enough hay (which they use their molars to grind down). DH is now looking for a small grinder/combi tool so we don't have to use the huge liquidiser!

Aside from the worry for the past week or so, there have been some lovely things arriving by post to brighten the day. Firstly, I won a draw on Mary-Lou's blog for one of her lovely bag charms. This has lobster claws which hold stitchmarkers and is a lovely idea, especially if you are taking your knitting with you on a trip.



Thanks Mary Lou! Please visit MLQKnits for more charms, stitch markers etc!

I also ordered one of the snazzy row counter bracelets from Knitz & Glitz, this one is made in wooden beads:



On Sunday we assembled the Ashford rigid heddle loom:



In the interim I had ordered the full-colour Ashford book for rigid heddle weaving, which arrived today and looks to be very useful indeed. Hopefully I will have a chance to warp it up this weekend. My first project will likely be a bag, and I'd like to make a lovely big wrap once I get the hang of things.

I did manage some knitting, mainly a scarf in a lovely soft chunky yarn, wich will be for the craft fair. I need to tidy one end and sew together the rose corsage pin that goes with it before I take a picture.

Finally I can show the secret project I mentioned last time, a pair of "Fetching" fingerless gloves in Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk aran. These were a birthday present for a good friend :-)

Garlic bread - it's the future

Short of any form of witty title for this somewhat delayed posting, I turn to "Phoenix Nights" for inspiration :-)

I was all set to blog last weekend. I'd finished a hat the previous Sunday (that's nearly two weeks ago now) but it needed washing and blocking before being photographed. However I was also working on another project which shall remain secret just for now, so waited to block both together. Without further ado, here's the hat:



Pattern: Lace Edged Hat by Julie M. Hentz
Yarn: RYC Cashsoft DK
Yardage: around three quarters of one 50g skein
Needles: 4.5mm 12" Addis (pattern suggests 4mm)

This is my September hat for Caps for a Cure. I decided to go with a slightly larger needle size in case the hat turned out too snug, it's fine and doesn't actually cover the eyes on a person, in case anyone was wondering! The head form is not quite to scale for an adult human head. I also did only two repeats of the lace pattern rather than three.

Next up, I've been working on my Bergere de France jacket this week. One front edge is complete and I'm half way through the second. I've turned the completed one back on itself to give an idea of how it will look when hemmed:



All of the cream edgings are folded double and hemmed on the right side when finishing. Just the hood to do after this then it's down to the seaming.

Here's some gorgeous yarn that arrived recently, Twilleys Freedom Spirit in Fire:



I'm still waiting for the pattern book, I'm planning to make the shrug/bolero with this yarn.

Speaking of yarn, I've embarked on a small yarn diet. No yarn to be bought for the month of October. Hopefully I can continue that into November too. It does give me a chance to knit up all sorts of projects without trying to fill the house with yarn at the same time!

Hopefully some of you listen to Carrie Anne's excellent BritKnitCast. If you do you'll know that in the episode before the current one, she was talking about her new loom. I'd already seen the first items to come off the loom on her blog, and they looked fantastic. Listening to the podcast convinced me that a loom would be a great acquisition and a whole new area of fibre arts to learn.

I've been interested in spinning for some time having seen many many bloggers who both knit and spin. However we are a bit short of floor space here, and a wheel with all its accoutrements wouldn't really have a "home", we'd end up falling over it! It also seems to be quite a learning curve to spin yarns well, and adding together my limited free time plus some coordination/dexterity issues, it isn't something I'll be taking up any time soon.

To cut a long story short, I ordered a 60cm Ashford Rigid Heddle Loom from P&M Woolcraft, and it arrived around 36 hours after ordering, how's that for speedy service! The loom comes with a 10DPI heddle (suitable for DK yarn), and I ordered a 7.5DPI heddle for aran weight as well. Sadly I didn't have time to wax and assemble it last weekend, but I'm determined to do that this weekend. Here's the loom in its box, it has been unpacked and checked then put back in the box:



There is a nice welcome pack included, with a copy of the Ashford knitting/weaving/spinning magazine, and various documentation. There is even a piece of sandpaper should you need to smooth any sharp edges! From what I've seen the wood is beautifully finished and unlikely to need the attentions of the sandpaper.

Hopefully I'll be able to post pictures of the assembled loom some time this weekend :-)

As to the fate of the KSH scarf - it has been frogged and I will make it in garter stich this time! Thanks to Mary Lou for the insight - no, I don't really like moss stitch, especially with yarn so fine :-) Also frogged this week was Sgt Pepper. In common with several others I just didn't like the fabric the Cathay gives at the stated tension. Any suggested projects for the black Cathay (9 or 10 skeins) gratefully received. I'm sure I'll find something for it.