In the Making...

I’ve made a start on my Fazed Tweed jumper but my attention span at the moment is very short. I keep on moving from project to project. And it gets worse, more yarn… I do have a project in mind. With my pattern being in the latest Knitty, I had a good look at all the other lovely designs. Nachtfalter in particular – it has garter stitch for starters. This lovely colour of King Cole Baby Alpaca DK is going to be ideal – the colour is called meadow. So hopefully you’ll see a pair shortly.

My pattern Ticklepenny , that is in Knitty Deep Fall 2014 issue, uses knit to purl yarnovers. See the panels of leaves down the side of the socks... The normal way of doing this can make a yarnover which is larger than a purl to knit yarnover. When they are near one another then it can make it look a little unbalanced.  There’s a little trick you can do to make them neater – basically, wrap the yarnover clockwise around the needle instead. This does mean you have to remember on the next row/round and either re-seat it or work into the back of it. The bottom leaf has normal knit to purl yarnovers and the top leaf has the neater version (there's not a huge difference in this example but it can be more obvious depending on the yarn and your knitting style). I’ll explain in more detail. A normal knit to purl yarnover is made by bringing the yarn under the right needle, then… ...over the top of the needle and back under again and because it is worked by...

Some very exciting news. I have a pattern in the latest issue of Knitty.com . I’ve known for awhile and been desperate to share the news. Here's the Ravelry page . The pattern is called Ticklepenny and it’s for a pair of socks. The yarn weight is not one that is typical for socks. Instead of using a standard fingering/4ply sock yarn; it is worked using a light fingering / heavy laceweight yarn. The yarn used is Tall Yarns ‘n Tales Soliloquy™ Sock Lace, available here . The socks are a unisex design and the idea came about when my Mum requested a pair of socks that would fit easier in a pair of shoes. The socks are worked on a 2mm needle and at this gauge allows for a lot of detail in the design. The socks are worked from the top down. The panels down the side of the sock are mirrored for each sock. There is an eye of partridge heel flap and the feet are plain, so they are easier to fit inside a pair of shoes. The model is my lovely sister-in-law ...

This lovely shawl has just come off my needles. The yarn is a new one from Debbie Bliss – Fine Donegal. The colour is Heather 10. I am absolutely in love with this yarn – I enjoyed knitting every bit of it. Ravelry Project Page I was in too much of a rush to start the shawl to take a photograph of the balls but they are lovely and big. I want to use the word dumpling to describe them for some reason. Fine Donegal is a 4ply weight yarn and it comes in 100g “dumplings”. It’s a single ply yarn and very reminiscent of Rowan Fine Tweed ; however, it has 5% cashmere content which seems to have increased the strength of the yarn. The rest of the yarn is 95% wool. It feels soft and with nice body to it. The little flecks of tweed in the yarn are really beautiful. The shade I used was a heathery purple but with flecks of bright pink, green, blue etc. They are a similar tone to the main colour so they give the yarn a lovely depth of colour. The pattern is from the book...

Oh dear, look at that. More wool came home with me…and quite a lot of it this time. I managed to bring 17 balls of the new Rowan Fazed Tweed home. It’s a chunky weight yarn and it’s very soft with some lovely colours in the range. I did have a difficulty picking my favourite colour but thought I’d go with something classic and went with black. The plan at the moment is to make the Plum Creek Jumper by Sarah Hatton, which I’ve been eyeing for awhile and thought the yarn and pattern would make a nice combination. I did make another purchase recently. It’s this nifty little thing from Hilltopcloud. It’s a wrap per inch (wpi) tool with a difference. It’s more of a useful tool for a spinner rather than a knitter but there are times that you don’t know what thickness the yarn is as a knitter too.  Normally, you wrap the yarn around an inch space and see how many wraps there are. You can still do that on this but you can lay the yarn across the lines at the...

The Rico Creative Cotton Aran that I bought last week has transformed into a dishcloth. It is the same stitch pattern that I used for this cowl , which was perfect as it is made on the bias. This meant I could stop increasing and start decreasing when I’d used half the yarn – so the dishcloth was as big as I could get it with one ball of yarn. I do love the colour but it is quite a psychedelic blast for the eyes.