yum

the colours are a little washed out here. the first batch will be the lengthwise-striped wrap, there’s enough in the second for a striped jumper, i think. these last ones don’t appeal so much to me, although the sparkly black is kinda cute. i think i will end up with a lot of orange swatches.

and i’m waiting with baited breath for the postman. kid silk haze and colourmart cashmere. in lots of colours

when my friend saw madam’s scarf she said “oh you finished something!” in a rather surprised tone. i feel i must protest. she has been witness to wip on an interminable crochet blanket that has rather stalled because the cotton yarn is completely unforgiving when it comes to wandering tension. some of the squares are so out of whack they will have to be frogged and reworked which has rather put me off . also, it’s a summer blanket so i appear to have already missed the boat for this year.

but progress is indeed proceeding apace on my 2 current xmas projects. the fair isle stocking is positively romping along. i’m loving it, it makes me feel so clever - five needles and two yarns, all at once! and it’s really pretty i’m hoping some of the puckering will block out, although there is some major bunching that i may consider cutting and knotting if it looks feasable. although i am fully aware of how much a 3 year old is likely to notice when it’s stuffed full of presents

i’m also working on an amigurumi doll, inspired by ElisabethD’s work, which is a lot of fun. she has legs and a body and half a head so far. oh and one shoe.

not at all, doesn’t make me think for a moment about a trip to a&e

it’s a so called scarf, which has been lurking at the back of my mind ever since i first came across it. it turned out to be a fab watching the telly knit, nicely methodical but never quite boring. the yarn is around 8-9wpi, with a fair bit of variation, which happily worked well on the chunky 8mm inherited wooden needles that i’ve been itching to have a go with for ages.

the stitch pattern works really well at obscuring the variegatity of the yarn. i didn’t quite manage the very short stretches of colour i was aiming for, as you can see on the mitts (stocking stitch, smaller needles) it’s giving around 3-4 stitches per stretch of the darker and lighter colours, set on a broader mid-pink background. i’m over the moon with the colours, lots of pinky variations, shot through with occasional flashes of the most fantastic intense blood red where the dye was most concentrated.

as soon as i realised there was plenty for a scarf i decided to have a go at making a cut-down version of the mitts she covets. i wound the ball back onto the skeiner and knit the mitts from the other end. they weren’t quite as fiddly as you might expect. i worked them on 5mm dpns because that’s what i have and the gauge seems good. my tension increased significantly on the second mitt (something to do with watching pirates of the caribbean?) and it’s noticeably tighter/smaller than the first, but not a show stopper. i worked the pattern at around 70% size, rounding here and there, in madam’s absence with only a rather stretched out old glove of hers for reference. happy to report they’re a perfect fit