The binge knitter

The Cockerel hat

2012-01-11T20:10:00.000Z

photo (c) Brandy Fortune

I've got no recollection of ever seeing my grandma knit. But judging by the state of the drop-spindles that once belonged to her, she spun yarn often. The yarn that was used to knit with, obviously. I still own a hat that she knit when I was little. I loved that hat so much, that I took it with me a few years after moving out of my parents house*.
It's has been tucked away for at least five years now after being worn by my own kid, but after bumping into a photo of her wearing it I got it out to admire a little more I thought the world wanted more Cockerels. Even though it didn't know about it yet!

I was very glad that Petite Purls liked the idea and wanted to include the pattern in their Winter 2012 issue; and so, without further ado, please welcome my take on the family heirloom.

The pattern comes in 3 sizes to fit head circumference 16 [18, 20] inches / 40.5 [46, 51] cm with a little negative ease. It's worked in a soft Cascade Yarns Pima Silk, which is a cotton and silk mix in worsted weight but is knit to a slightly tighter gauge of 22 stitches to 4 inches to get a nice dense fabric.
The hat is worked flat and shaped as a kerchief. After the main part is finished, the ruffle is knitted onto the slanted sides of the kerchief. The back of the hat is then joined together to form a tube of sorts. And lastly, the neck opening is trimmed with an I-cord to prevent the edge from curling. Instructions are provided for a buttonhole and a button placement. Alternatively you can make ties instead of the button closure, by working a length of I-cord before and after the neck opening.

Enjoy! on Petit Purls website ------ on Ravelry

photo (c) Brandy Fortune

* there is a pair of socks from dad's mum and this hat from mum's mum - I am very sentimental this way.

Winter hols

2011-12-20T12:02:00.000Z

I am feeling so incredibly chilled this Christmas, enjoying the lay-ins and Gingerbread house* (yesterday) and truffles (today) making and going to see friends in between. The baking this year is just as chilled = all experimental. The Gingerbread house was our first attempt at both baking it and putting it together and the truffles.. Well, lets just say there's more than one recipe in my box that goes something like: mix chocolate with very hot cream and honey; without quantities, time or temperatures given. It rarely goes very wrong, just different every time.

In other news, I started working on the second book and knowing how much there is to do after the Boys' Knits, I am trying to pace my excitement. The follow up is on accessories and is going to be inevitably bigger in the number of projects I want to include to cover a whole range of wearables. #4 was cast off yesterday, #5 cast on today but there's still so much to do.

knits accessories 2011

2011-12-12T12:18:00.001Z

Knits Accessories is out and I am so excited to have two patterns in it :)
One of them is the chevron stitch headband - Dryad - with a button closure that was inspired by a hat I designed a few years ago. If you ever worked with chevron stitch you would know that it tends to shape itself following the order of the increases and decreases lengthwise. It proved tricky to have it point outwards along the same line but not impossible as you can see!

The second design is the Elusive bias sock. They are worked in a mosaic stitch pattern, where you only work with one strand of yarn in any given round and the stitch pattern is achieved by slipping some of the stitches from the previous round unworked. I am a little too happy to have this baby out. First, because it's a man sock through and through; designed for men, sized for men and with men in mind and I think there should be more of those. And second, because it took them nearly 3 years to see the light* and that is a very long time by anyone's standards.

*or the print date

the jelly roll

2011-11-21T13:09:00.000Z

I had this dream of making a quilt for our living room to replace our off-white fleecy blanket that I despise so much. It felt horrid and it stunk*. Doesn't matter how many times it was being washed, whenever I brought it anywhere near my face I'd catch this horrid musty smell that makes you go eugh!
So a couple of weeks ago Wendy of Knit and tonic, the blog I absolutely adore, was brandishing one of those jelly roll quilts on her blog that are apparently so easy to make. I didn't need much convincing. I found some lush fabric on Etsy that's been discontinues now and once I figured out how to attach the two strips together at an angle it all went swimmingly. Part of the quilt is indeed a jelly roll and the strip you see on top is just plain fabric with its pattern set perpendicularly to the jelly roll strips. I even found a very nice backing fabric to match the Volumes theme.

Was I surprised to hear :"Yeah, this one's pretty but where's our nice *woolly* one?" yesterday. Woolly? Woolly!? I haven't got any words!

*but apparently not everyone felt about it like I did.

The polka dot shawl

2011-11-15T15:58:00.003Z

It is no surprise that when you submit something to a magazine it takes around a year from the time you start fleshing out the idea and matching a yarn until knitters see the pattern go live. One of the perks of self-publishing is meant to be a very quick turnaround, which sometimes is true but not always. It took well over a year for this pile of squishiness to see the world.

The shawl starts in the centre and is worked out towards the curved edge with the pattern simultaneously shaping the shawl. When the full depth is reached, shawl wings are drawn out with short rows and the long edge is then finished in short row garter by working one tooth at a time.

Size
Shawl's depth is 18in / 46cm as measured between the outer edge and the centre point;
The wingspan is 60in / 152cm
Yarn
2 balls of JC Rennie's Supersoft 4ply, substitute with approximately 525 yards (480 m) of 4ply/Fingering weight yarn.
Needles and Notions
US 6 - 4.0 mm circular needle, stitch markers and tapestry needle.
Gauge
16 stitches and 23 rows = 4 inches in Stocking stitch
Difficulty
Intermediate: Stocking and garter stitch, yarn overs, short rows, simple decreases and increases and finishing

£3.50

Boys' Knits patterns preview

2011-11-08T21:56:00.000Z

I am working my way through entering all the patterns into Ravelry at the moment, but here is a little preview. I've been waiting so long to share it with you :)

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Preorder Boys' Knits

2011-11-04T00:11:00.003Z

The excitement at chez moi was building up and up for my ~~baby~~ book over the past month, I sometimes feel like if you let it carry on like this for a little longer I will explode*.

The book is here to preorder Cooperative press website

and I can't wait to see it in flesh :)

*what with all the haphazard needles laying around everywhere

Bambeanies Blog Tour & Giveaway

2011-10-25T09:12:00.008+01:00

Sometime last August I had a pleasure of spending a whole day with Woolly; walking, talking, drinking beer, talking, book shopping and more talking. I knew she was finishing Bambeanies then and was really excited to see one of the proof copies of the book*. Leafing through its pages I was curious to know how she picked the patterns for the book, whether there was a plan to it or they just happened to fall into places as felt right for each yarn? And it was interesting to learn that the first criteria was to have a variety of crown shapings with a range of techniques close behind it. All of those techniques are conveniently gathered up in to a separate section at the front of the book. Everything you will need to perfectly finish a hat, from a particular cast-on method to I-cord and short rows with step by step instructions and illustrations.

But what about the hats themselves? There are 20 gorgeous designs in a range of sizes from a wee babe to a small adult. Whether you like knit and purl play, cables or bobbles there's something for everyone.
These are some of my favourites:

Quatra

Nupkin - I think this one takes a particular kind of genius to create, such a clever use of variegated yarn

and Tripeak

But you know, while making hats (or anything else for that matter) for kids it would be much more helpful to ask them what they want to wear, right? And, so I did. Inevitably their choices were different from mine. We even went a step further and I had kids pick the yarns for their hats (trying hard not to influence their choices one way or another). The results are here***
Beamish

and Queenie (lovingly named the bishop hat around here)

Already much loved and worn a good few times as the weather has turned rather cool recently.

Which brings us to the give-away. There is a print copy of Bambeanies heading my way to be passed to one of the commenters! All we would like to know is which hat your kid picks. Have them look at the photos, pick a favourite, and leave a comment letting us know which one. If you haven't got a kid on hand and would like to enter, you're welcome to leave a comment as well. You've got until 31 October and the winner will be picked at random the next day*****. Good luck!

* apparently with a typo [gasp]

** there are even illustrations of crown shapings! at the end of each pattern to make things crystal clear
*** I won't bore you with the account of me screwing up Queenie's crown the first time because I didn't swatch****
**** because I knit a lot and just recently worked with that yarn I thought it'd be alright. But you might like to know that Woolly scolded me for that already and told me that I should know better and thus it was reknit properly.
***** you have to claim your winnings within a week after the draw.

ETA the comments for this post are now closed.
~~The winner is kjt - could you please contact me with your postal address so I can send you the book~~
The bad news is that kjt did not claim the book and although I tried to find kjt through various routs and websites, I couldn't do it. I run the random number generator again, which came up with 14 = Megan. Good news for Megan :)

Show and tell - Interweave

2011-10-17T21:54:00.000+01:00

The quaterfoil cups from Knits Holiday Gifts 2011.
I had a little light bulb moment when this idea came to me. A simple garter project that is completely seamless, it is worked in flat portions of garter oblongs. The bottom of the cup resembles the log-cabin (I'll dig out some photos that I took before sending it off to Interweave for you tomorrow), with perfectly seamless garter at the top. The beginning and the end are grafted together when the cup is finished (with the kitchener instructions provided too).
It's a great project if you would like to learn the said log-cabin technique or to practice the garter kitchener or simply need a gift holder. There are three different width cups in the pattern, but the idea is so simple that it'd be easy to up or downsize it in both width and height.
I find it so interesting how the simplest of ideas sometimes bring the world of satisfaction to me :)

The Gathered Collar Pullover from a new Interweave publication called Knit.Wear. Did you see it yet? Knit.Wear is chock-full of staple garments, and a couple of accessories, with accent of form, silhouette and stitch details.

My jumper is worked seamlessly from the top down in Aran weight, the collar and the pleat are added on at the end and are done in some fine kid-seta mohair that's worked to the same tension. There are some truly beautiful sweaters in there, go have a look.

All photos are courtesy of Interweave.

it looked so nice, I used it twice thrice

2011-09-25T09:57:00.000+01:00

Yesterday night when I was at a friend's house for a fairwell party for another friend, she mentioned that she was looking forward to starting her Dash*. It took a moment to realise what she was talking about and it hit me that I completely forgot to mention my Dash beret here.

After making the Gemini cardi for Interweave (now, a while ago) and falling in love with this stitch pattern so much, I had to implement the idea somewhere else. I love working with stocking stitch, which you can probably gather looking through the stuff I design. Its smooth face is perfect for playing with design elements and for adding wee details that create texture. Like this little purled dash that fashions in to interrupted concentric circles

all the way into the crown.

The yarn is Lorna's Laces semi variegated. I love the way its short repeat enhances the stitch pattern.

* really is the best compliment one could ever expect to get

PS There is a third dashed garment too, with a slightly different effect to the fabric although I can't show it just yet.

Mothproof

2011-09-16T21:41:00.001+01:00

Mothproof. That's exactly what it said on the ball band. I never heard of such a thing before and it made my brows go up a little. I obviously never thought of running a lab test to see whether it's actually moth proof or not. If you think about it it's a big claim to make, but who would be crazy enough to check, right? There would be all sorts of trick decisions to make like: how far should you place the moth from that ball? should you wrap it in plastic first (the wool, not the moth)? should you hide all your other yarn? and what if you have an infestation afterwards? There is no way a sane person would bring a moth into the house. And so we are left to trust the ball band - moth proof it is.

Anyhow, I am thrilled about having contributed yet another pattern to Interweave. It was out earlier this month in their Fall issue and was fun to work on. It's a classic fitted raglan style that works up seamlessly from the bottom up with a little twist. It was an interesting challenge to design a collar that's shaped and finished differently on left and right sides and I am hoping to whip up one for myself before this winter ends.

September

2011-09-11T14:51:00.000+01:00

It's been quite a busy week of getting back into our regular school routine, cleaning, unpacking, email catching up since we got back last Monday.

Our trip to Bonn went brilliantly, it was really nice to see mum and dad and cousins. We got to do something fun every day and the weather was very summery so the kids enjoyed the trip immensely too.
Here's a view from our hotel room early one morning while the kids were still sleeping and I was trying to amuse myself [re: no internet for six whole days]
Dad's health has given us so much worry in the past year that it was quite a relief to see him being ok and find out that he, after all, doesn't need an artery bypass but only extra stents. Which was still stressful, but obviously not as big a deal as the bypass surgery would've been. I don't think I quite realised how much it all affected me until I saw him last week. And it was nice to see that he's not as poorly as I thought he might be. Breath.

While we were gone the builders put the opening through the outer wall to connect the extension with the main house, lo and behold, the amount of dust waiting for us was absolutely shocking. Luckily they had sense to tape the bedroom doors beforehand, but the downstairs was just atrocious. Still, it means that all will be over very soon!
So, much of the last week was spent cleaning and dusting but I did manage to squeeze in a little gardening today too.
I think apples are ready to be picked.

Blueberries

Potato tops were so brown and crooked I was absolutely convinced that those were taken up by some sort of a disease or something. But turned out that maybe it was just a natural growth stage.

Dinners

And as promised the purple goodness that I started on last month. My flowering plum pullover from last year's winter Knits. I am reversing the colours so that the main colour is the silver grey and the stripes are in purple.

Purple

2011-08-30T21:01:00.000+01:00

I had planned to post some photos of purple for Project Spectrum this month, but having planned to do it at the end of August I was thinking that there would be plenty of time to do this. Does anything ever go to plan? Obviously not!
While in London last week we booked tickets for me and the kids to go see my mum and dad, because dad had a heart procedure done and although it wasn't the bypass that he needed, as we feared, but only artery stents we thought he still needed cheering up. So everything is kind of rushed. Mountains of washing in between the trips, unpacking, packing again, house cleaning, uniform shopping. The fact that school starts the morning after the night we come back isn't helping of course. I was trying to sort everything out in the couple of days we had between London and Bonn while keeping my cool but there is this nagging feeling that I already forgot something.

Purple*! I have been working on two purple things this month - one's a shawl that is finished, the other's a sweater that's not. I'm afraid I haven't got any photos of either one because 1) it's evening and I only remembered that I wanted to take photos of them about 15 minutes ago 2) the lights are on, re: it's evening 3) the camera's upstairs charging up. Everything is kind of telling me that it's not the right time for running around trying to take photos of purple when I need to concentrate on what I could've already forgotten. I'm sure it will come to me once we're on the plane.

*Purple is obviously not what I have forgotten, it's more of that annoying element trying to make sure I don't remember what I've forgotten before it's too late.

PS I did remember passports and boarding passes. And my credit card.

My dirty secret

2011-08-26T11:08:00.001+01:00

When I was 17 and just moved out of my mum and dad's house one of the things I did was start wearing all my tops inside out. Growing up in the house where everything had to be ironed and later folded or hang in the way that created the least number of creases this seemed very momentous at the time. And so the rebel in me cut off the labels and wore the tops, both T's and cardigans and all, inside out. I lasted for about a year, until I got it out of my system. It was strangely liberating.

A few days ago, when I was on my way to see the lovely Woolly Wormhead, I saw a girl on the tube wearing her Tee inside out. She was of around about the same age as I was when I was doing it. For a couple of seconds I wondered if it was done on purpose or not. But either way it put a smile on my face. Although I don't do it anymore, apart from when I'm at home and definitely know that I am not going out that day, I love exposed seams. Not the mock kind they put on the T-shirts now where you still have the real seams on the inside, but the perfectly finished ones. Those seams that are most often overlocked and are always stitched into the collar or the hem on their edges.

Later that day we got talking about finishing of your knitted garments*. And it occurred to me that although I weave in and join and kitchener and whatever other technique you would use to make the garments look perfect and seamless when I work for a magazine, if it comes down to the ones I wear myself I leave the ends hanging. Of course it's not always possible, with the woolly sweaters for example because those yarns can be felted together and it would be rather silly to leave the only two ends free: one at the hem and the other one at the collar. Silk and cotton on the other hand, especially the ones with good yardage on the ball are ideal to be my perfect imperfections.

I still weave in the first end and the last, leaving all of the body ones to hang free. This way the right side looks impeccable and the wrong side is there to indulge that 17 year old me.

*we don't always talk knitting, but it obviously is an unavoidable topic.

Apparently..

2011-08-25T22:27:00.000+01:00

.. while I was busy being offline and not following twitter and not reading my blog reader I missed some really interesting (and witty) interviews by Harry Bollasockyarn*.

*If you click through to Franklin's youtube page, there are more episodes there to amuse you.

Boys sizing survey

2011-08-10T18:18:00.002+01:00

Cooperative Press has put together a kids' sizing survey to help us make sure the sizing is accurate throughout the book. Boys or girls are both fine, but you have to let us know if the data is from measuring a girl.

So, if you could spare a few minutes and have a willing kid aged 4 to 14 on hand I’d really appreciate your help!

Thank you very much in advance, but apart from my eternal gratitude Cooperative press is throwing in a little prize draw where "you can win a copy of the book and also possibly appear in the book too".

SURVEY

ETA a measuring guide

We're lucky our toilets don't run off electicity

2011-08-07T10:07:00.000+01:00

As it turns out, when it rains so much that your gutters get busted because all the moss comes off the roof to clog them which in turn causes the water run down your bay window flat roof and then through an invisible hole that you didn't know about and into your house - it makes you swear a lot. Mostly, at the window fitter. Also it looks like when people express genuine surprise that you're staying in your house while the extension is being built, there's probably a reason behind it. Something like, previously experienced shed load of inconveniences caused by the building site that's virtually in your house.

On Saturday we were meant to be going to a BBQ at our neighbours. On Friday, the usually unreliable BBC weather forecast changed the pretty "white cloud" picture to the "thunder" picture. They do that a lot. BBQ got moved to today (Sunday).

The weather forecast was right and it rained a lot yesterday. First we watched the water build up on the street to about 2 inches within half an hour. Then, a little puzzled, we watched too much water running down the bay window. Then there was some running with a bucket and towels. A little later the water started making its way through the outer wall, because *that* gutter was taken off in order to join a new roof with the old one [see half the house IS a building site]. Blah blah blah. Wet walls and a streaming window due to rain.

Meanwhile, boiler felt a little left out by all the attention the wet stuff was getting and decided to break.

This number of breakages make me think crazy things. Like, "bad luck comes in threes".

1. window

2. walls

3. boiler

Or is the window and walls all the same #1 because it was caused by rain?

Then the light fitting that was too close to the wet wall got wet and half the electrics in the house went. So:

1. window & walls

2. boiler

3. electrics?

Unless, the window, walls AND electrics are all #1?

Except there isn't much left to be broken. Halp, I'm going mental!

Kids asked this morning if they still can use the toilet or does it also run off electricity? Umm, yes the toilet is still working.

1 August

2011-08-02T16:30:00.000+01:00

Two weeks into our holidays and I already seem to have maxed myself out on going out. I'm so used to being at home all by myself most of the time that this an-outing-a-day-into-a-crowded-place thing became so difficult to deal with. Emotionally. And dealing with your anxieties when you're around children is tricky. Especially because I don't want to show them that I have any anxieties. A conundrum.

So yesterday was a welcomed day off. We stayed in piece and quiet at home*. And since the builders weren't doing any dusty sawing, we could get out into the garden when it wasn't raining.

It's amazing, how much change had happened to it during the past two weeks. The apples are growing nicely. There are 15 left on the last count and they are pretty.

Most of the soft herbs have unfortunately bolted, but I am keeping them until the seeds mature so that there are plenty left for next year.

dill

coriander
And here are some random pretty flowers too.

poppies with many many bees around them

yellow lillies

a mini fuchsia with ginormous flowers

Almost makes you think that the whole garden is just so. Except it's not. Most of it is looking so empty, with either bare ground or covered in overgrown weeds. In fact when I got out to cut the 2 foot long grass and weeds at the front a couple of people from the neighbourhood stopped to have a look (probably in disbelief that it's actually going).

*apparently it was the worst day ever. According to my children.

off the needles

2011-07-16T20:51:00.000+01:00

Even though last week I've been pretty busy hopping in excitement because of the book preview and freaking out that there's only one week left before kids break up for holidays because I'm pretty sure there's no way in hell I can tick all the points off my to-do list* before next week ends - I also managed to finish three things. I would love to say garments, but the third one is only a sock. Singular.

First up is the Ambrosia cardi from last summer's Interweave Knits. I am very pleased with the hook and eye tape finishing you can see there that I tea dyed to match the cardigan.

Next is the Sherbet cardi from 2009 (I think) from, now seems to be defunct, Yarn Forward. When did that happen?

And last one up is the sock that's now only one stitch away from being in a naughty corner. Over the past three weeks it was knit and reknit at least twice from scratch. It was frogged and the number of stitches readjusted at least twice too. The needles keep coming out of the stitches, gauge chaning mid sock too much to comfortable with. It just doesn't want to work and I don't know why. To top all that, yesterday I asked husb to try the sock on, and it seems to be too tight. I took a deep breath and thought - fine, I am not reknitting the little sucker, I am going to make another one and keep them for myself. Then the second sock's leg just kind of happen to appear while I was watching a movie. After three weeks this is crazy fast. Heel. Gusset. I went to recount my stitches this morning while kids were swimming and alas! I'm a stitch short and I can't see where it could've been dropped at all. Oh, the drama.

*I am very much ~~hoping~~ dreaming to have both cardis out, republished, next week.

Just a quick note to say..

2011-07-11T20:13:00.001+01:00

..Guys, it's official*! Go check out the book preview at the Cooperative press website. My heart was pounding this morning when I saw Shannon's** tweet this morning with the little preview. I am excited, also nervous because I definitely have to finish writing the text now and I think writing is not my strongest trait, but mostly excited!

If you haven't yet clicked through to the preview, the book is on knits for boys, all garments sized up from 4 to 14 years old. Simple, wearable boys stuff.

xoxo Katya

*well, almost, because we haven't got the date yet.

** publisher and editor extraordinaire, a woman of many hats and an all-around nice person.

Green

2011-06-30T23:37:00.000+01:00

So June was a green month, and at the beginning of the month I thought that green being the colour of virtually every single thing I can lay my eye on it would be very easy to capture. One way or another, June is over and I hardly have any photos of green. I do have a few that I must share before tomorrow.

First up is from today visit to the beach. Seaweed covered rock pools were gorgeous.

Second is my second favourite omelette*. It's made with a whole bunch of dill and since my herb patch (is that an equivalent of veg patch?) is doing very well, I used my own. Dill, beaten egg, parmesan. Best thing ever. Well, second best thing ever. When it comes to omelettes.

*my first fave omelette is the bread one. A fried bread version of where there's more egg than bread. Don't ask. But I love very much.

ps my Sherbet cardi is finished, photos coming up soon.

Stage two

2011-06-22T11:41:00.000+01:00

The only thing I regret about the house renovations we did last Autumn is that I haven't got any photos (apart from one, tricky, corner of the kitchen that the kitchen planner asked me to take) of what it looked like before the builders started. So, as soon as I knew the dates that the builders were coming back for stage two I got the camera out because I did not want to make the same mistake twice. Luckily it was raining for a little bit extra drama. But then again, it was raining through the whole winter so you get the idea of what it's really like.
We're doing up the garage and extending it a tad at the back, to make it level with the house and the extended bit can house a downstairs loo and a little utility room so that we can have the washing machine out of the kitchen.
Up until now, the garage was empty and a pretty scary (I'm not exaggerating) place to go into, for more than one reason, and I am so excited now that I can hardly wait for the lot to be finished just so I don't have to even look at it ever again*. Anyhoo, here's the old garage in all it's glory:

Electric's board with some plastic over it held by a brick. Rotten leaky roof.

A puddle just about a foot away.

Door into the kitchen and the other one out into the garden. More water.

Anyone's surprised to see more water? This was by the garage door and the only reason for opening that door in the winter was to let the water out.

*I'm probably just as excited to see it go as about the new extension.

Squeezing that ball harder

2011-06-16T14:08:00.000+01:00

I was sitting and feeling very smug about my on going cardi last Monday. There was almost a whole ball of yarn left and because there is nothing else I could do with so much, yet so little of fingering weight I thought that longer sleeves would be a really good idea. Something like a 3/4 length. I like them so much better at that length. First sleeve was finished last night. I tried it on, the length was good. The ball got smaller and smaller and I wondered if I would have enough to finish the second one. You see where this is going, right?

But this yarn? It goes a really long way, so no big panic; I was knitting and still feeling smug. And just as I cast off the second sleeve this morning, it hit me: there's a whole Peter Pan collar left to do! Holy !@£$%^&*() How come it didn't occur to me earlier? Then I would've done the sleeves an inch shorter, or at least didn't cast off, or even better - worked the collar first. But then that would've been smart.

I think I'll still have a go at knitting the collar rather than tinking the sleeves tonight. Keeping my fingers crossed that I can stretch the yarn even longer but it's off to the naughty corner till tonight.

The book

2011-06-10T09:58:00.002+01:00

I was bursting to tell the world, someone other than family and friends kind of world, about ~~the exciting project~~ the book I've been working on for nearly a year! Both working on it for nearly a year and sporadically bursting to tell about it for just as long. Like the times when yarn kept arriving at a rate frequent enough for the postman to remember my name, or when the first samples were finished, and the last ones. But being the sort of person who's afraid of getting excited about nearly anything; just in case it doesn't work out and I have my hopes up and don't want to be disappointed afterwards, it took me almost as long to convince myself that it is going ahead.
We are at that time where everything seems to finally fall into place: the garments are knitted up and finished, their patterns are at the tech editor's and out of my hands, I've got a few hundred photos to sift through; in moments that aren't filled with self doubt I start feeling excited about it again.

Since I tried to keep myself free of tight deadlines while finishing the samples for the book and pattern editing, now it feels odd not to have 2 or 3 or 4 sweaters on the needles with armholes or collars needing figuring out. So, I'm knitting myself a cardi in light linen/wool mix from one of my old patterns that was published in 2009. About time to republish methinks.

The twirly skirt

2011-06-08T10:27:00.000+01:00

On the last day of hols I made this skirt for my girl. She really wanted something bright with large flowers on it and this fabric seemed perfect. The skirt was super easy and it only took about an hour, including the ripping of the mobius elastic that I sewed together extra strong first time round.

It's a regular twirly skirt with a yoke and elasticated waist. The gathers are just below the yoke and a little more where the elastic was inserted to break the fullness slightly at the top but you still get the enough width at the bottom for the right twirl factor. Obviously it's the most important one!

Chocolate's always good for making them stand still for the photos.