Not only is it free but there is a contest for a free skein of yarn to go with the pattern. Follow the link and read the blog to find out all the details.

I always get so excited when I see my yarns knit up. I love them in the dye pot and skeined up but it’s particularily thrilling to see what someone’s creative mind and nimble fingers can knit with them! Hunter’s sock patterns are lovely. They are so knitable and wearable.  I’m anxious to get started on my own pair of Gramery……..Thanks Hunter!

Off to knit-

P.S. – This is perfect timing  since new stock of Sock Plus 8 is on its way in larger 120 gram skeins.

Tosh Sport in Earl Grey

will become this:

Carnaby Street Pullover

And this:

Tosh Merino Light

will become this:

Georgia Cardi

But for now, all I seem to have time for is this:

Bunny's First Day of Grade Three

And this:

Monkey Summer

What am I making first?  A hat!  Shocking really (Sorry…I do make a lot of hats, especially for the baby monkey.  They’re just easy & they look cute on her and I have trouble rationalizing spending money on baby hats when I know I can make them myself.)

Specifically, I’m making the Inca Snowflake Hat from Itty Bitty Hats by Susan B. Anderson.  I’ve made several other hats from this book and loved each one of them (I believe I mentioned this & another book in a previous post too).  Some have been given as gifts and a couple my little girl wore all last winter.  The patterns are super easy to follow and come out great every time. 

As for this particular pattern, I’ve been wanting to do it for a while but I hadn’t been able to find the right yarn.  I fell in love with the color scheme of the hat in the book and had never seen anything that seemed to compare….until I went to the farm market a couple months ago.  There was an alpaca farmer there and he was selling yarn made from his alpacas.  So soft & pretty!  As soon as I saw the colorway I knew I found the yarn I’d been looking for to make the Inca Snowflake Hat.

Soft and Pretty Alpaca Yarn

Then I didn’t have time to make the hat. 

Boo!

But now I do!

Yay!!

I’ve been trying my hand at baking lately. I made so much batter I had enough to make 2 batches of muffins over 2 days. The first lot were banana and maple syrup and the second were blueberry.

I’d really like to make some cakes now, but I don’t think my waistline would appreciate the constant supply of baked goods!

I went to Loop the other day. I love the new shop. It’s so bright and comfortable, and the range of yarns is just too tempting.

I gave in and bought 5 skeins of Berocco Ultra Alpaca for the boy’s Christmas vest. I figured I’d buy more just in case because they told me I can always bring back any unused skeins which is handy.

I’m thinking I’ll do Dr G’s Memory Vest to jazz up the more basic colour choice. I should probably start this quite soon to make sure I get through my Christmas list.

Here is the link.  I can’t wait to get my copy. I always love seeing Handwerks yarns knit up and Barb’s designs are gorgeous!

Anyway, I went back to Knit Nation on day two, for an all-day sock design class with the very legendary Cookie A. I thought this class was really, really fantastic. The morning session was mostly theoretical, looking at the maths of sock design and how to adapt stitch patterns such as cables or lace to make them suitable for use in a sock design. We also looked at a load of Japanese stitch pattern books to choose a stitch pattern to use for our own design, and had one-to-one sessions with Cookie for her to check what we were doing.

Anyway I merrily went ahead with my sock but to get ahead of myself a bit, I realised when I got home that the stitch pattern looked a bit familiar… so I looked through the patterns I own on Ravelry and realised it was the same stitch pattern as the Golden Dahlia socks by Kirsten Kapur. I’d been meaning to knit them for ages. I thought about what to do for about 4 days and in the end I ripped mine out and drew myself a new design. I could have carried on, but I just wasn’t happy with doing something I knew someone else had already written a pattern for! But my new design is going really well, pics will be up here soon.

I did go back to the marketplace during my lunchbreak, and came away with some lovely purchases:

Dazzle sock yarn from Natural Dye Company. This is their stall:

I also got:

Some natural coloured aran 100% wool (plus two skeins marled with a dyed purple ply) from John Arbor, and

More aran wool dyed by Babylonglegs in Whispering Grasses.

I also kinneared a photo of Ysolda (way too shy to go and ask for a photo, yes I know, I’m useless):

One of the highlights of my day though was going to the Ravelry Talk, with Jess and Casey the founders and owners of Ravelry. They talked about the history of Ravelry right from when they first had the idea, through all the challenges they faced in setting it up, right through to the newest and future developments. I wish I could explain the atmosphere in the room but it was just incredibly happy, positive, grateful and full of appreciation of these people who have helped so many knitters and crocheters across the world, as well as designers and independent companies. I don’t think there’s any way knitting would be as big or popular as it is today if it wasn’t for what these two people created.

They do look a bit like a ghostly hand is coming to get them in this photo. Sorry Jess and Casey.
I summed up the courage to ask a question at the talk (about whether they had plans for an iPod app; Casey said there’s one in development – hurrah!)

It was a fantastic day and I went home with a big smile on my face.

After such a great day on Saturday at Knit Nation (see knit nation pt.1 and more to come!)  and a hilarious trip to Greenwich Picture House to watch Toy Story 3D on Sunday evening, I had planned to spend my Monday and Tuesday knitting. Unfortunately, this wasn’t to be and I spent most of those two days in the bathroom or fast asleep in a feverish sweat (sorry, but I have to set the scene)!!

I am working on a few knitting projects at the moment. One is a birthday snood for my mam, a new design for a pair of knee-high socks for my great friend Mackie and a warm and cosy hooded shawl for my sisters baby, due January. Having two days to focus solely on knitting was going to be a treat, so I am pretty miffed about the whole thing, as my plan was also to get some great photos up today of what I have been up to.

So instead of lovely WIPs, I am going to finally get the photos up of the great yarn stash I received for my birthday! Yay!!!

First on the list of birthday joys are these two skeins of  bright and squishy BFL  from Nimu Yarns.

I fell in love with this particular yarn, ‘Striding Edge’, last year and have been dreaming about it ever since! It has such a bounce to it and so much depth of colour!

My first ever skeins of Wollmeise were given to me by the wonderful Emmms! Thanks Emmms!! (Hurry up and post about your amazing Wollmeise trip!)

Such great colourways and a perfect start to what should become an amazing stash!

This next little beauty I found on Etsy at Wanderlustcrafts. The crazy cool Emily has just started selling her hand-dyed yarns and this particular one caught my eye because of its bright blue streak!

It is a superwash new wool/nylon blend and will be perfect for a pair of socks for my dad!

I bought this Midnight Blue Mulberry silk off the Internet shop knitshop, with some birthday money given to me, without realising that the store was about a 15-minute drive from where I live! A trip there is in order I think!!

Last but certainly not least are these two skeins of Fyberspates Scrumptious 4ply in what has to be my favourite colour combination!! I just love their silky soft feel and the delicate twist!

Since I am doing a yarn post I might as well add the great finds from Knit Nation!!

To continue my Wollmeise stash I picked up two skeins of the Twin in Limone for the knee-high socks I am designing at the moment and a skein of the Grashupfer for some baby stuff for my sister.

I have been eyeing up Old Maiden Aunt’s Kelpie for a while now and when I saw it on their stall in the merino/bamboo blend I just had to buy it. The colourway looks great online but in person it is even better. It has a HALO!!

After speaking to the girls, it turns out that this is the only colourway they do that turns out with this ‘aura’ around it; something to do with the particular dyes and how they sit together on the fibre. Just pure genius if you ask me!!

Next, a British merino superwash sock yarn in a bright shocking pink with subtle hints of coral — this yarn is literally edible. The twist gives it such bounce and elasticity and makes it perfect for a Cookie A sock pattern!! Thanks Sparkleduck!!!

Unfortunately, this yarn has not photographed very well, which is a shame as it was my favourite buy of the day!

So there we go, a whole heap of  fantastic yarns and all from European dyers!!

I’ve had a bit of a hard week this week. I had some surgery to remove a cyst in April and after ignoring increasing pain for over a week, I went to the doctors on Tuesday to find out that the surgery wasn’t successful and my cyst was growing back. Faster than before. I’m on strong antibiotics which are definitely helping but I’ll have to have the surgery done all over again, which makes me unspeakably depressed.

Enough of that.

It’s times like these that knitting really helps me out. It can be incredibly soothing, thought-prokoving, distracting, creatively fulfilling and sense-of-achievement-giving, all at the same time. It’s a repetitive motion that I can do with my eyes shut but I can concentrate on it as much or as little as I feel I need to, in order to take my mind off other things. (although obviously I’m not implying that I frequently knit cobweb-weight lace shawls with my eyes shut whilst thinking of something else. Sadly.)

So I went to Knit Nation today feeling really excited and ready to be completely cheered up, ready to meet people and talk to people and take photos and gather material for this blog, and I epicly failed! I didn’t have any classes today (those are tomorrow and Saturday) so I just went for the marketplace preview. I didn’t buy very much (although what I bought I love; I’ll post about it over the weekend). My main problem though was a giant version of the crushing shyness that I appear to get whenever I walk into to any kind of knitting group! It is incredibly weird because I work as a reference librarian which means my job is meeting and talking to people, and I love it. Anyway. I talked to a couple of people, nervously fired some questions at Ysolda about her new book in the manner of a person with zero social skills, managed to give someone else the impression I was stalking her, and left feeling very awkward.

I also totally to failed to take more than 3 measly photos, all of the Wollmeise stall, at which I didn’t buy anything. The colours were arranged amazingly though. I’ll try and force myself to take more pics tomorrow.

On an unrelated note, here’s what the postman brought me yesterday…

Madelinetosh Sport in Mansfield Garden Party. I’m still thinking it wants to be Audrey in Unst… another version.

Wish me luck in my sock design class tomorrow! Good night.

Look – another quicky project completed! I made one of these for my Mum earlier in the year out of cotton sock yarn and loved the pattern so much that I wanted one for myself.

As with a lot of things I’ve been working on recently, this was made with stashed yarn that I bought in a sale quite some time ago, so it was partly a “using up” project and partly just because I wanted one. It’s a super-easy pattern and works up really quickly, so a very satisfying gap-filler between bigger projects.

Pattern: Queen Anne’s Lace Scarf (the pictures don’t seem to work on this page, but scroll down and the pattern is still there)
Yarn: Debbie Bliss Cathay
Colourway: 12007: Teal/Turquoise
Hook: 4mm

And now, as a change from using up stashed yarn, I’ve been shopping!

Some lovely squishy balls of Rowan pure wool aran-weight yarn for my next project. I’m busy swatching at the moment — something I don’t normally bother with, but I want everything to be just perfect for this project — so nothing much to show’n'tell just yet. I’ll keep you posted.

Top picture is Soprano. 4.5 oz, 284 yds, DK 50% Merino, 50% silk. Shown here in Sweet Pea, Glenn Jackson Bridge, and Mousse.

Middle picture is Temptation Sock. Shown here in Burnside Bridge (L) and Mt Hood Rose.
3.5 oz, 440 yards. For socks, use a US 1 or 2 needle. 80% Superwash Merino, 10% Nylon, 10% Cashmere. YUM! I am doing a Concentric Shawl with Valentine (way bright mostly pink) and Mousse (tonal browns.)

The last picture shows Alto, in Opal and Marionberry. It is 100% Superwash Blue Faced Leicester, 4.5 oz, 392 yds, so a sport weight.

I’ll be dyeing and posting it in small 5 skein batches, 4-6 colors every 3-4 weeks as time and stock permits. I got a great deal on this yarn and am able to offer it at a great price to you!

Sneak peak of some of the colors - 

Tosh Sock (Rav link) – completely wonderful fingering merino, 100% machine washable. Almost 400 yards per skein, so it’ll get you a whole pair of socks or a good-sized shawl like Ishbel.

Abstract Fiber (Rav link) – two new-to-the-world yarns and a whack of roving! Matisse is a fingering weight out of Blue Faced Leicester long-staple wool – which means it’ll wear really well! Christa knit a pair of socks out of Matisse as a store sample. Hepburn, a laceweight in 80% merino, 20% silk, is great for those featherweight sweaters everyone’s doing this season, like the Geodesic Cardigan! And last but not least, three different roving blends – some two-tone BFL roving, a 50/50 merino/silk in several colors, and some chocolate 70% alpaca, 30% silk. Delicious!

Dream in Color (Rav link) – Baby (laceweight), Classy (worsted), and Smooshy (fingering). Dream in Color dyes their yarns with a technique they say makes them guaranteed not to pool – and they’re ALL machine-washable wool! Perfect for baby blankets and clothes -

Supercashmere Fine from Karabella (Rav link) – completely luscious laceweight 100% cashmere. Perfect for cowls or shawlettes. Although you’re DEFINITELY not going to want to give them away!

Silky Alpaca Lace from Classic Elite (Rav link) – 70% alpaca, 30% silk makes a light, warm, strong yarn that blooms beautifully.

So get your butt over here and grab it before it’s gone!