10 August: Small projects

The current large knitting project is a jersey for my Dear Husband - this has been ongoing for a looong time, partly because it's a big item and I'm making it up as I go along, and partly because it was obvious soon after starting that there wasn't enough yarn to complete it. So it sat aside for a few weeks until we went to Woolfest and bought another kilo of fibre, and then that fibre was spun.

Meanwhile, the smaller projects continue. Here are a couple that are just finished - perhaps they need names?


These gals are fun, though the pattern is rather fiddly to knit. The stitch patterns are from my collection of notes, where I store ideas picked up in passing through books, the internet, and other people's knitting.

I liked the stitch pattern on the grey and green puppet so much that it's also become a hat -

10 July: Knitting Photos

Some FOs.

These two have been made as samples for a spinning demonstration tomorrow, to show what can be made from handspun yarn -


They are made to the pattern for Estonian Hand Puppets by Anu Kotli and Carol H. Rhoades, with stitch patterns from Scandinavia. The eyes are buttons.

The latest socks for DH - the cat normally only investigates shoes, but this time he got up close to the socks.


They are made from Yarn Yard sock yarn, in the colours Housebrick and Agatha.

And lastly the Hallowig (in acrylic yarn from the local market) I made a few months ago, and have only just got round to photographing -

I knitted it for fun, but it looks really awful on me, and it's hellish hot....

27 May: Bank Holiday

We took advantage of the weekend sunshine, mostly in the garden and around the house, but we did get out for a walk round the Botanic Garden and through Blaid's Wood on Sunday.

There were still a few bluebells out.

After I struggled with repairing a saucepan lid, having trouble finding the right tools and a space to work, we decided to re-arrange the garage, so that there is a workbench and improved storage. We got a very posh tool chest from Halfords, and now all the tools have their own place, and we can find them straight away. It was much easier to do the next job, putting bar ends on my bike.

And we took the opportunity to clear out masses of rubbish and odds and ends that have been stuffed onto the shelves, in case they came in useful.

I caught up with some gardening, recognising that the wildflower seeds that were sown earlier have probably all been eaten by the birds - at least they haven't come up - and planting out some violas and lilies instead.

And of course there's some knitting going on. There's been a series of hats made, and this little sheep - in Blue Faced Leicester, of course.

13 April: Squid and socks*

Recently knitted this little creature -


I also have patterns for 2 octopuses/octopi, and a cuttlefish.

And socks continue to emerge from the TV knitting basket, even though not much TV is being watched -


These are slightly subversive ones for DH. When worn with shoes and long trousers, only the grey bits will show. He wouldn't think of wearing them any other way, of course.

* Not a recipe currently popular?

7 March: Clanger?

The amusement of the past day or two has been knitting a Clanger.

But not a pink one - a purple one. I used the pattern by Mr and Mrs Oliver Postgate, but the result was not quite like the TV characters.


OK, it's purple, and it's wearing a striped pullover instead of felt armour plates, but the legs don't look right, and the nose points straight up, while the ones I remember on TV were at least able to look at each other.

Mine doesn't stand unaided, either. In the picture above, the wall is holding it up , and in the picture below, lying on the sofa, it looks more like a flying pig than a Clanger.


I didn't wire the ears, and I improvised I-cord fingers and some hair. The eyes should have been "shiny shoe buttons", but I just used a couple of buttons from the box.

Oh well, at least it's individual.

18 February: Surprise! more knitting

Wool-o-phobes look away now!

DH is now wearing more hand-knitted socks - here's a pair of dark brown ones that I call Choc Block Socks:


The felted bag came out so well that I used some more of the itchy yarn to make another, larger one. The smaller one nests inside it when not in use.

And on Ravelry I spotted a snail knitted by this blogger, and made a similar item -


You will note the realism of the beady eyes, and of the button-off shell.

12 February: Plenty of fibre

Happy Birthday to DD, and for yesterday to DDIL!

Greens the other day, now it's fibre - you can't say blogging isn't good for the digestive system.

Some BFL has been the subject of experiment with food dyes - the stuff used for cake icing - and came out like this -


I recently met another blogger who was de-stashing and had some sock yarns from her. Some of that yarn has become these socks -

Some handspun yarn which irritates my skin has been used to make a felted project bag -


And I made that nautilus. Mottled purple seemed a likely colour, and by chance I had just bought some buttons which made good eyes.

I don't really do cute, but this is dangerously close.

13 August: Another one finished

The little character I've been knitting is finished. And here it is, relaxing in the garden -

And here with one I made earlier, whose name is Jo Jaffa.

You will observe that the feet are properly knitted socks, the mouth is made from a sock heel shaping, the top of the head is shaped as a sock toe would be, the eyes are buttons, and the hands are properly constructed glove/mittens. Boredom set in after the first one, and as the eyes aren't identical either, why should the hands match?

But the poor creature doesn't yet have a name to call its own. (There is already a doll in the house called "Who Shall Remain Nameless".)

It needs to be something gender neutral - ideas please.....