Do sunshine and crochet mix?

That was a rhetorical question.  In my, not at all humble, opinion, they most certainly do not.  I made decent progress on my striped beach tunic, but today the sun came out and, well, not a single stitch so far... 

I'm not ashamed.  This is Ireland, which means that you have to make the most of rain-free days.  There aren't that many. 

I'm in the process of filling my brand new raised beds.  As you can see from the picture below, this is a slow, gradual process.

At the moment, I can't quite afford to buy topsoil, so I have to do things the hard way.  In a far corner of our new property, there is a small hill covered with grass and nettles, and once you strip the greens you find plenty of topsoil mixed with building rubble.  Once again, this is Ireland, rural Ireland, so by 'building rubble' you can substitute 'stones'.  Lots and lots of stones, big ones, small ones, mixed with some rubbish and even bits of broken glass.  I sift through it all shovelful by shovelful and then trawl buckets of topsoil across the garden and into the beds.  See?  Slow process.  It takes me about two days to fill one bed but hey, I'll get there in the end. 

I'd get there sooner, but someone keeps scratching my precious soil away. 

I didn't catch the culprit red-handed but I'm 99% sure it's the chickens*.  They act fast, the little monsters.  I finished filling less than an hour before taking the picture! 

Anyway, there's still some crafting planned for the evening.  I'm a few rows away from finishing second part of the tunic.  At this stage, I have to juggle between four balls of yarn which drives me up the wall.

Just one thing worries me.  It's hard to see on the picture, but the tunic looks very, very small.  A child's garment, rather than adult woman's.  NOT funny.  I'm putting a lot of faith into fabulous stretching qualities of cotton - how much do you think it will grow in blocking? 

I have a plan B up my sleeve - crocheting little inserts on the sides to make the tunic more roomy - because no matter what happens, I am NOT frogging this thing.  I never had a chance to tell you (what with the Internet starvation and the Big Move), but this is my fourth attempt at this design and I simply can't stomach another.  No can do.  Whatever I end up with this time, stays.  Please send stretchy thoughts my way.

* Or neighbours' dog.  But since he's probably the only thing standing between our chickens and Mr Fox during daytime, I won't hold grudge. 

Wanted: project bags

Before I say anything else, let me quickly explain that I'm not going to steal beg for ask you to share your precious collection of project bags.  I'll make them myself, my soon-to-be-recycled fabric drawer is overflowing anyway.  I just badly need a few, and the urgency chimes well with the idea of a wanted poster.  I'd make one such poster if I could draw but really, stick figures are the peak of my artistic ability in non-fibre media, so the dramatic post title will have to do. 

You see, I used to be a faithful knitter.  I would take one and only one project onto my table, and then I would plod away at it until it was finished, even if the very sight of the same yarn for (e.g.) three weeks running made me sick.  Among other things, it meant that projects got finished - if only because I so badly wanted to work on something else, or get my hands on some new yarn or whatever.  Something about the neatness of such strategy worked for me, and when I say 'neatness' I mean this metaphorically and, well, literally.

Just look at this mess.  Here I am in the new house, trying to keep it as nice as possible, and suddenly I find myself with three projects going and yarn/fabric/thread/notions EVERYWHERE.  Skeins keep falling on the floor, rolling happily in my dog's hair (which, I am convinced, hides somewhere whenever it sees the broom and resurfaces happily after the danger's passed), and there's no free chairs anymore because, well, yarn sits there. 

A long time ago, I started a lace shawl for my Other Sister.  I'll be frank - I was sick of it almost instantaneously.  The pattern is simple but so. damn. boring.  I have this much...

...and I'm adding a few rows now and again but on the whole the project is not exactly speeding by. 

No wonder then that when a friend commissioned a crocheted beach tunic, I jumped with joy and forgot all about the blasted lace.  I'm improvising the pattern, working in the general direction of a picture I was shown but I was given a free rein so the piece is definitely going to be unique.  I do hope it's also going to be wearable...  but that's another story. 

The tunic is worked in two pieces and today - oh, glory! - I finished the first one.  

As you can probably guess from my tone, by now I'm slightly fed up with project no.2 as well.  Hey, it's a big one.  And there's a mountain of new sock yarn in my stash, singing siren songs to me. 

For now I'm resisting and socks will wait.  However, another project jumped the queue and changed status from 'I'll deal with it one beautiful day' to 'need to finish soon'.  You see, about a year ago I designed and knit a dress (I will show it to you one day, I promise).  I had some yarn left over, so I added matching boot cuffs.  Yarn still there, so I crocheted a tote bag to finally use it all up.  The bag turned out rather nice, but it needed lining and I'd rather knit than sew so I packed it up and forgot about its existence. 

Last week I had my sister here for a few days and she sewed some 80% of the lining for me (thank you!!!).  I'm a few hours away from the bag being done, dusted and usable.  It would be a sin not to finish it now.  So there you go, project no. 3.

With all this, various tools and pieces are slowly taking over my living space.  Project bags, guys, I badly need project bags!  But - and this is a huge but - sewing project bags would mean starting even more projects and this is simply too much mayhem for me. 

Deep breath in.  Finish what you have.  Sew project bags.  THEN go to socks and the myriad other projects that float through my mind.  Become a faithful knitter again.

That's the plan.  We'll see how it goes. 

Happy days

Happy days are those when there's a lot of yarn coming in. 

My postman (postlady, actually) was busy recently, delivering load after load of woolly goodness.  Let's take a look at my haul.

This pretty thing...

is a mixture of alpaca, merino and mohair, with a tiny bit of synthetic thrown in for durability.  It's very thin, somewhere between lace and fingering, and the jury is still out on whether it's scratchy or not.  I bought it for next to nothing, together with this fiery baby:

It's just as thin, but less fancy - half wool, half synthetic.  The best part?

I have plenty of both!

Seriously, that's a lot of yarn in there.  Both red and cream clock some 350-400m per ball, so we're talking of kilometres of yarn here.  Now, what to make?  A shawl (or five)?  A light sweater?  Decisions, decisions...  Maybe I'll ask my Puppy for help.  She seems interested:

The second package is a belated birthday present from my Mum and I smile at the very thought of its contents.  Look at this gorgeous mountain of sock yarn:

There's enough for 9 pairs in there.  9!  Plain colours are destined to become Fireweeds - the pattern has been haunting me for almost a year now.  One colour is chosen by and booked for my Other Half (guess which...) and one will become socks for my purple-loving sister.  The rest?  The rest is all mine, mine, my precioussssss.  For now. 


BTW, you may have noticed how I don't mention specific brand names when talking yarn.  I do this on purpose.  I don't mind sharing fibre content, weight and other details, but I have this thing against brands in general.  If you recognise the make from the picture alone, good for you.  If you don't, but you really really want to know, send me a quick email and I'll tell you.  But I'll let people do their own advertising.  Unless, of course, they persuade me otherwise :)

A spoonful of sugar

Just a quick one to add some cuteness to your day.

The promised picture finally arrived and now I can show you the three piece baby set I made a while ago, modelled by my smiling niece.

Ain't she something?

Back online!

I'm back after a (longish) break. 

You see, I moved.  Remember, a while back, my bitching about landlord putting our house up for sale?  Well, he sold it.  And, by the most amazing twist of fate, I moved to a little piece of paradise that I never thought I would live in. 

My new house is situated on a mountain in Connemara, with Lake Corrib a stone's throw away.  The scenery is smashing, the area peaceful and the house itself much better suited to our needs.  I hear pheasant's cry more often than car engine!  I could wax lyrical for ages but suffice to say I can hardly believe our luck. 

Due to some tech complications we were offline for over a month - it's not so easy to bring broadband up a mountain! - and let me tell you, this was quite a challenge.  All is resolved now, blogging should be back to regular schedule form now on. 

You haven't missed much, with all the move-related rush I didn't feel like knitting much.  Still, I have some WIPs to report, some new yarn coming in...  Any day now :) 

Stay tuned for updates. 

Shawls, shawls, shawls

They say that good things come to those who wait and once in a while this is exactly what happens. 

I knit a shawl for my sister's birthday back in September last year, and another one to put under her Christmas tree.  I happily posted them off to her address, together with a request to take some pictures for my blog when convenient.  It took a while (could it be that hatred of photography runs in my family?), but the pics are finally here and they are gorgeous!  You will have plenty of opportunity to see for yourself, because for once I'm going to publish a picture-heavy post :)

Without much further ado, here's shawl no. 1:

This is Krokus by Sue Berg, although to be honest, for some reason mine looks somewhat different than the original.  'Some reason' should probably be replaced by 'me not bothering to read the pattern properly' but nevermind, I'm happy enough with my version (and so is my sister!).

It was a lovely, speedy project and I was surprised by how much fun I had working on it.  The whole thing was ready in four days or so and, if my memory serves, consumed a little less than 100 g of fingering weight yarn. 

While not particularly big, it is very versatile.  You can wear it like this:

Or like this:

How about this styling?

Who says shawls have to be worn on your neck?

The other shawl was a bit more fiddly and time-consuming.  Think 'weeks' rather than 'days'.  You've already had some sneak previews (here or here), but now you can see my version of Ardrum Scarf in all of its modelled glory:

I admit, some weeks into the knit I was mightily sick of the pattern.  It's pretty monotonous and seemingly endless, especially when you're in the middle of the project.  Take a look at the detail, though.  It's 100% worth the effort!

Edging is knit at the same time as the body, which saves you from multi-hundred-stitch rounds at the end.

I used some very posh, wool/silk blend yarn.  Being the yarn plebeian that I am, I can't say I'm completely in love with it.  Efficient, yes.  This massive shawl used up just a tiny bit over one (100g) skein.  The fibre is smooth and soft, but it's also a real bitch to knit.  I had to watch my hands constantly to ensure the yarn doesn't split and in general working with it was less joy than I thought it should be. 

Admittedly, the drape in this piece is wonderful and probably worth the occasional curse when the yarn was misbehaving.

 

I worried that the needles I used (2.5 mm) were too small.  What do you think?

Regardless of how stunning it looks, turns out lace knitting is not my favourite technique.  Not with lace weight yarn, anyway.  Lace details worked into a pullover - sure, but scarves or wraps in what is essentially a thread - waaaay too boring.

Having said that, guess what I'm working on at the moment? 

After all, I have two sisters and an almost untouched skein of lace weight to use up...

More details coming soon.

A story of one unexpected hat

I don't do hats and that's a rule.  I grew up in a place with proper winters and as a child I was forced to wear one.  It was an endless source of arguments with my parents, and I have quite a lot of unpleasant hat-related memories.  To add insult to injury, my head is massive and finding a hat to flatter is almost impossible. 

Having said all that, here is my brand new creation:

Yeah, I know.  When it comes to rules, I'm a sticker, aren't I? 

To be quite serious, I don't know how much wear this hat is going to get, but I simply had to make it.  Serendipity works like this sometimes, at least with me.  I get an idea, however improbable, and I can't get it out of my head.  The pattern writes itself in my mind, almost as if it grew there on its own rather than being in any way created.  It started with me wondering what to do with sizable Amaryllis leftovers and hey presto, the Unexpected Hat is the result.

Initially it was to be a brimless, slouchy beanie, but once I had knit enough to try it on I realised that brimless hats make me look like a total moron.  I was this close to ripping the whole thing up!  Fortunately, I decided to try the rolled up look and it wasn't quite as bad.  I still don't qualify for a magazine cover but at least I can wear it in public. 

The question is - should I add a pom pom?

I thought my Puppy might be a better model than me, but getting her to stay still for more than a second is a bit tricky.  Still, she's cute, ain't she?

Pattern:

My own.  5 mm needles, circular, aran weight yarn.