A busy week

Last weekend Miss B and I went to the Spinners and Weavers open day at Little Hampton with Miss A and Tigers.

Dispite the yarn and ready made knitwear on offer, I found most of it just wasn't me. I did find myself fascinated with the bits and pieces in the stall offering shawlpins, tapemeasures and earing holders though.

What did others think of the offerings???

I finally got Miss B to stand still for 5 seconds and model Black Black Black.




She loves it.



The Bendigo Classic seems to pick up and hold every bit of fluff and fur possible. It probably would have looked better knitted at a tighter gauge and I really don't like the neck. It's what Miss B wants though so I guess for now it stays.




I finished my fetchings.

Yarn: Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran in Black - 1 and a bit balls leftover from making Tubey.

Needles: 4mm dpns.

I had a discussion on Stash with a class mate.

Hi Marcus :)

His mother is a quilter and therefore he totally understands the concept of stash.

There is no such thing as too much stash, there is only the question of having enough for a particular project.

Usually you don't have enough of a particular item and therefore purchasing more stash is entirely appropriate.

Marcus's Mum has taught him well!!!!

I started Elbac

and I received an Options Folder with I managed to snaffle in the Destash Thread on Ravelry.

Thanks Barb!!!

FO FO FO!!!

Mainly due to distract myself from how much I had just ripped back on the ribby pulli I finished some other projects.

Pink Striped Beanie

Pink Striped Scarf. This used the same yarn, same dyelot - very different results from the two balls of yarn.
One side has very long repeats of colour and the other stripes frequently as it did in the beanie.

And Patonyle socks. I love these.

Bright and happy and so, so soft.

I think I can face putting the Ribby Pulli back on the needles now :)

Is it holidays yet???

I feel as though the most I have seen of any knitting lately has been to wash a bathtub full of knits and have them sitting all over the house taking their time to dry.

If I am not going to get much knitting time I can at least have some new yarn to look at.
Sock yarn found in Lincraft yesterday in a sneaky visit on the way home.




June's Project Spectrum projects, Irish Hiking Scarf and Mittens.

Both made using cleckheaton Country 12 ply, % balls for the scarf, two for the mittens.





The hat in the middle is the Newsboy cap made in Paton's Jet.
Miss B is trying to claim this. She hasn't succeeded so far so has put in her demand, uh, request for one in black.

Letting go

Sometimes a knit just isn't working, you know it but you keep trying anyway. You knit a couple of rows here and a couple of rows there. But the whole time you really aren't enjoying it.
You don't like the look of it, you don't like how it feels and working on it has become a chore.

Yet if you put it aside and work on things you enjoy, you feel guilt. You know it really wouldn't take long to finish if you just worked on it.

The knit has become more than a chore, it has become a burden.
Something that sits quietly in it's basket niggling at you and taking away the pleasure of knitting.

Realistically this is only my own expectations of what I should make, should finish and how long something should take me to do that is niggling at me.

Yes, I could work on that scarf, I could finish it and it probably wouldn't take that long.
But I am not enjoying it and knitting is meant to be fun.
I really don't know why I have so much trouble admitting when something isn't working, why I have to keep trying and trying.

Yarn can be un knitted.
It can be rewound.
It goes back in the stash all too easily. Once you start. Bye Bye lace scarf.


So winding and placing yarn back into the stash happened yesterday creating space for something I want to work on. Something I have wanted to make since I first discovered blogland.

The Irish Hiking Scarf.

More FO's

My So Called scarf is done amd I love it. Unfortuantely so does Miss B.

The only good thing about her liking it is that I have an excuse to make another one for myself.
That would involve buying more yarn, what a pity.




Also done are Dashing.

These I'm not so sure about.
I think it's the extra length on the arms , it feels weird.



Slowly my WIP list is going down and it feels good to not have so many projects hanging over my head.
As much as it was fun to cast on the second I found something I wanted to make, having so many projects going at once became a burden.
I felt pressure to work on this, and then, no I should be working on that.
It just took all the fun out of knitting and I found that really hard to accept.
For me knitting has always been fun and when it wasn't....... I felt a bit lost.

So for now I will keep working on those WIP's and add a frogpond item to the rotation every now and again.

Although I really, really would like to cast on for the Ribby Pullover.................

Funny things happen in school holidays. All the projects I have been thinking about casting on all term suddenly demand that I start them now. So of course I pick something. Something called "My So Called Scarf"

It feels really good to be working on something new.

Then something else happens. We have a few cooler nights and requests start sneaking in.

A brown beanie for one person. A beanie is a pretty small project, I can deal with that.

Miss B decides that if I can knit for that person, then it's about time I started her Central Park Hoodie. She is right, so Central Park Hoodie gets started.

Nanna looked like she would really like to run off with a pair of fetchings last time she was here, so she gets a pair made especially for her, colour chosen by Miss B.

We visit Nanna and drop off her Fetchings . Big grins and squishy hugs follow.

Nanna definately knows how to recieve a handknit and has ensured a place in the "people to knit for" list.

Later that night we speak to Great Grandma, recipitant of the Green Tree Frog Socks ( also on people to knit for list), and she explains that since having knee surgery her knees ache. The Doctor has recommended she keep her knees warm and could I please make her some knee warmers.

Of course I can.

Well, I could if I actually knew what they were.

Something like leg warmers I was imagining.

And this is where I love the internet so, so much.

http://www.sarahpeasley.com/freepatterns/philskneewarmer.pdf

A pattern. Already there. Exactly what I need. Perfect.

And that is how the WIP list grows.