Did you have fun guessing for the contest? I didn't know the answers myself when I posted, so it's been interesting to find out.
First up, for the Lorna's Laces, I have, wait for it, 20 sets of dpns. As Beth said, they're not just for socks, I have some in larger sizes for hats and sleeves. There were a few of you who got that right, but the first past the post was domesticat - congratulations!
Now for the Margaret Stove laceweight. This took a bit more time to figure out. I have quite a lot of sock yarn so I enjoyed the opportunity to get it all out and have a play. How many pairs of socks could I make? Well let's see...
5...
10...
15...
20...
25...
30...
35...
40...
45!
Yes, that's right, 45 pairs of socks in waiting. Plenty to keep those dpns busy aren't there? No one guessed right on the mark, but the closest answer was Cheryl with 43, so the laceweight goes to you Cheryl.
Cheryl almost caused a major upset as she was just one off coming in at 1900th comment also, but that honour went to Pat K. So Pat, the Limbo DK sock yarn goes to you!
Congratulations to all the winners, I will be in touch with you all via email very soon to get your mailing details. Thanks to everyone else for playing along. Normal knitting content should resume tomorrow.
It's been grey and wet here pretty much all week. Even the horses have on their raincoats.
Let's brighten things up with a look at my lovely Ally Pally colour shall we?
Lovely Lorna's Laces from Get Knitted. Vera, Baltic Sea and Black Purl.
Also from Get Knitted, Koigu KPPM in a rather Halloweeny colourway.
Cherry Tree Hill had their own stand this year. I got one skein of the Potluck sock yarn, in the Water colourway.
Fabulous Kid Mohair/Merino laceweight from Touch Yarns. I also got a couple of their scarf kits, which are great for exchanges.
Last year my father requested a knitted slipover, as he finds them hard to get hold of in the shops. I bought a great pattern from the Wensleydale Longwool Sheep Shop, which has sat unused for the past 12 months. This year, I went ahead and bought the yarn to knit it.
This stuff is wonderful, so soft and such a beautiful sheen. I can't wait to start knitting. Even the fact that I am knitting a slipover for a 6ft 4in man isn't putting me off.
I also bought these absolutely fabulous buttons. No plans for them, I just love them.
I bought a couple of skeins of silk from Habu but the photo came out so blurry, there's no point in showing you. You'll just have to wait until I start knitting them up.
Which could take some time.
There hasn't been an awful lot of knitting going on around here lately. Life has been keeping me very busy, plus it has been very hot. If you break out in a sweat when you start knitting I think it's time for a break don't you?
I have been working away on my project for the Rowanette exchange. I am rather late in finishing, which is very bad, but hopefully my recipient will like what she gets.
It looks like a strange blob but is in fact the Aqua Swirl cushion awaiting felting. This was knitted in Lamb's Pride Worsted - definitely not a summer yarn. Having this sitting on my lap last night while I watched Big Brother was not pleasant. I'll give you a full project report when it's finished felting.
Now that the exchange project is nearly done I gave myself permission to start something else. I think hot weather demands lace.
The beginnings of the Diamond Fantasy Shawl (am I the last person to knit one of these?) in one of the STR my mother brought over with her. The shade is Flourite which looks rather alarming on the skein, being a mix of grey, maroon and flourescent yellow. However it all comes together well when wound up and I like how it's knitting up. I am doing the scarf size and I see it working well with denim and dark colours in the autumn.
And finally, if you fancy a laugh, take a look at this blurry picture of my endeavours with a spindle.
2 singles, plied together. It is very uneven but I wanted to have a go at plying to see how things turned out. Much more practice is needed I think, both at spinning and plying.
I'm off to do a bit more on the shawl before I have to go to work. Keep cool!
It's almost so late as to be inconsequential now, but here are my spoils from Woolfest.
All the photos are taken with a new camera. Not mine, but Sam's. I'm trying not to mind that his camera is better than mine. I'm also trying not to worry that Toby has taken my camera away on a climbing trip, hence my using Sam's.
Next year I will be better prepared for Woolfest. When I look at other people's blogs and see what they bought, I have no memory of those stands even being there. Or rather, I know they were there, but I just wandered past them in a daze. Case in point; I am itching to knit some lace and was cursing the fact I didn't have a particular Fiddlesticks pattern but then remembered I looked at it on the KCG stand at Woolfest but was too overwhelmed with sights and possibilities to actually get it together to purchase it.
So here's what I did manage to come away with.
A drop spindle and some tops to practice with. I spent the first three days after buying it absolutely entranced with spinning. Now I want a wheel.
A niddy-noddy and some Ashford dyes. I think these were from Scottish Fibres, but I am not sure, could be P&M Woolcraft.
Addi Naturas and a tape measure from KCG. Why didn't I buy the pattern too?
I fell upon this 2 ply lace yarn from Jamieson & Smith. There were 10 balls but another lady made a plea for one ball which I couldn't refuse. I saw this shade at Ally Pally and didn't buy it - I wasn't going to make the same mistake twice.
I also got this hand dyed cobweb weight from them as well. Apparently when they changed their yarn from skeins to balls (which incidentally, I think is a shame, as I much prefer looking at yarn in the skein to in a ball) they had a go at dyeing the leftover stock. It was such a success they thought they would sell the results.
I also succumbed to a few books.
At one point I was clutching all 3 of the Barbara Walker Treasuries that I don't own but I realised it would be madness to buy them all and have to carry them round all day. I'll get number 3 at Ally Pally and leave number 4 until next year.
Of course I couldn't leave without some sock yarn, so this ball of Lana Grossa came home with me.
However, news of my low level purchasing of sock yarn must have spread. When I got back to London I found my mother had stepped into the breach and ensured that sock yarn levels remained high.
And just so you know, it's only 3 months until Ally Pally. Better get knitting to make some space in the stash chest!
It wasn't all bad coming back from holiday. I had a couple of packages waiting for me.
Amazon had tried to tell me I'd have to wait until August for Mason-Dixon Knitting but I wasn't having any of that, especially as when I placed the order they told me it was available within 24 hours. Amazing what a couple of emails to customer service can achieve.
My usual routine with Amazon packages is to rip them open when I get in from work, have a quick flick through while I'm checking voicemails, emails etc before rushing off to pick up the children from school. With Mason-Dixon Knitting however, I somehow found myself sitting on the sofa, everything else forgotten, simply devouring every page.
The thing about the book isn't just the patterns and the way its written, although these are all good, great even. It's that it's talking about something that I feel part of, an era in knitting in which I've been involved, albeit in a very small way. When Ann & Kay talk about the Rowan International forum, I know what they're talking about. I was there too - thrilling in finding out that there were other people out there who loved knitting and could talk about it for ages. This was before the Liberty knitting group and before a lot of people had blogs. I had been hanging around the wool departments in Peter Jones and John Lewis for a couple of years, trying to figure out where to go to find other knitters but it wasn't until I bought my first Rowan magazine and then made the leap to subscribing that I found the online community.
Is it too dramatic to say that Rowan International changed my life? Well, my knitting life at least, which is a big part of my life. Without that forum I wouldn't have met up with other knitters, including Dawn and Yvonne, at Sam's house, way back in 2001. It was members of that forum who started the Liberty group and look at that now. Emma was (and still is) an active participant on the board. Hers was the first blog I ever read and I followed the links in her sidebar and discovered blogs all over the world. Then I plucked up the courage to join in myself. Now I not only have knitting friends in London but others around the country that I correspond with regularly and even more around the world that I have met, either in person or over the Internet. If someone had told me in 2001 that in 5 years time I'd be meeting with knitters from Florida, Norway and Virginia all in the same month, I would probably have backed away from them slowly, thinking they were very strange.
The other thing I think Ann and Kay have done brilliantly is get across how it feels to be part of the knitting community on the Internet. They talk about their readers, include patterns from them, comments they've made. It's all the good bits of blogging summed up. How there's always someone out there to offer advice if you're stuck, show you new techniques and amaze you with their beautiful creations. How over time conversations move on from knitting and before you know it you've made a whole new group of friends who can still help out with knitting problems but are there to support you with other areas of your life.
So here's to Ann and Kay for a great book and to Rowan International for getting me started in the online world
PS. I love the Fiona Ellis book too. Just in case you were wondering..
I have managed to swim out of the sea of paperwork and am now on holiday until after the Easter weekend. Hooray!
What better way to start a holiday than meeting up with a knitting friend? Caroline was in town yesterday and we met up for a spot of sightseeing, some yarn therapy and a long, leisurely lunch. I was a bad blogger and didn't take any photos, so you will have to wait until Caroline's return to see proof of our activites, but I can assure you it was lots of fun.
What wasn't so much fun was my struggle with the mitred squares blanket last night. I sewed one of the strips of squares together and wasn't happy with the end result. Two things are bothering me. First, I think I've put too many colours in it - they look fine as individual 4 square blocks, but when sewn together they are too busy. Second, matching up the stripes is a pain. In fact, the whole thing is annoying me so much I've decided to put it away and knit something else for the baby's arrival. Pack it away, move on and hopefully get some knitting inspiration back.
Still, it's not all doom and gloom around here. Spring is here at last - daffodils are everywhere, inside and out.
I'm going to pack up all the DK cotton and break out the baby books. Look out for a new project on Monday.
