Happy stripes

Dearie me! I'd completely forgotten to blog about these other stripey gloves I was knitting. I think the last time I posted about these was last november - crikey! I didn't realise they'd been on the needles for quite so long! Well, about time they were finished and had their ta-da moment:)

They are based on the same pattern as the previous stripey armwarmers but I decided to make more work for myself and add fingers as well. And I do like how the little blocks of colour have worked out visually. The fingers are a little neat on the stitch count using the given pattern but as I have small hands anyway it worked for me. If you wanted to add some more sts, you could cast on a few more on either side of each finger as you start to knit in the round. Will work out nicely that way.

The yarn I used for these is Wendy's Happy - capricorn colourway. The colours are lovely and it self stripes so not too many ends for changing colours on the whole. I had to cut the colours for the fingers to get much smaller sections of colour so lots more ends to sew in around the fingers - which with this being a bamboo and nylon mix isn't so good at hiding the threads. I also found it made the fingers feel a little constricted where the threads were too. Not so happy with that aspect so something to watch out for next time.

As much as I love these colours, I don't think I would use a bamboo mix yarn for a gloves project again. It seems obvious that gloves need a little elasticity to fit but also to hold them up on your arm and with bamboo that nice give is missing. In fact, it's annoying. I'm finding the gloves have a tendancy to slide a little down from the elbow and after a good bit of wear look a little baggy. Not the desired look really! A wash would reshape them or a damp spray and shaping but I've been warned that this yarn has a tendancy to lose a lot of its colour intensity in the wash so I'm reluctant to try! All that lovely colour down the drain - I think I'll try a damp spray just in case! That and some hidden elastic thread around the cuff;) Just a thought!

Despite all that, they're still going to be fun to wear this winter. I still have 2 x half balls left so maybe a scarf in the pipeline? Hmm, maybe a textured chevron stripe? Suggestions anyone? Righty-ho, off to have a gander through Ravelry to see if anything takes my fancy.

Back soon! elaine x

Hmm, what next?

Well the Brea bag is off the needles, sewn up and waiting the lining, handle and button. Fabric and button are sorted and should be here in a few days but I lost out on the belt on e-bay so I'll have to hunt around for something else instead - hopefully quickly so I can call this christmas present finished! I'll take some photos tomorrow in daylight but now I have to consider what's next on the needles?

© Wollschnegge

I'm thinking that this lovely rectangular version of the Gail shawl I found on ravelry will be up next. The designer Jane left a comment for me to say that there is a written up rectangular version already called Spring Leaves - yay! I'm so glad I found that out before I started improvising :) And doesn't it look lovely? I am thinking more of a scarf width than a larger wrap so I will probably reduce the number of leaf repeats - 3 instead of 5? But it's so lovely I think I'll be returning to this one again when I have more time for a full wrap:)

But I'll need a tv watching project as well  - I know I'd better not be distracted with detailed lace till I get into a flow again - so what else?

Well, I'm still thinking about the lovely red and white bird mittens but an alternative to them is Ysolda's lovely snapdragon flip-top mitts and matching beret. The advantage with choosing these instead is that I've already knitted the beret:)) but I don't have any more matching yarn for the mitts in my stash - oh dear, what a shame! I'll have to buy more yarn:)



© Sapphire2001


And if I'm going to be buying more yarn, I may as well get some for the lovely skew socks :) Yes, I could dye some but I want to try out the regia sock yarn that has stretch in it - if I can find it online. I just think that's such a cool way to stop socks getting baggy. I know they look cool but after a while socks, well, kind of s-l-i-d-e :)) Either that or I'm not knitting them tight enough:)

And lastly today, the gorgeous cable 'Gordian' gloves designed by Julia Mueller. These have been on my to-do list for ages too. I love the complexity of the fine cabling - even on the fingers! Such attention to detailing make these such a special pattern. But I can't do them all so these may have to be saved for another time as I know how long gloves take me:))

So there will be lace knitting soon and there will be gloves/mitts/mittens  - I just haven't decided which ones yet:)) Anyone else knitting along for christmas?

Just checking in:-)

Hello, hello! Been computerless for a few days and unable to blog - did you miss me?:-)) The result of all this DIYing  and changing rooms we've been doing is that I've been moving my computer and all my stash from the workroom - yikes! - and that's taking a bit of time:-) We are in the interim stage, where everything hasn't quite found it's home and is piled everywhere around the house. (even in the bath!) It looks worse than it is - well, that's what I'm telling myself. Don't disillusion me:-))

Despite all this, I have been doing a little knitting. My green knotty gloves have been finished off, yay! - and I am knitting away on the second of my little minx socks. Unfortunately, my camera and cable are somewhere in the mounds of 'stuff' so maybe we can have new pics of both soon.

Thank you for all your kind and helpful comments/ideas for the magenta yarn. I still haven't made a final decision but I have decided that the Vivian I was intending to knit for my sister in a lovely dark teal colour (since last year-oops!) should probably be first on the needles:-) S'ok, she knows I'm knitting it so no spoilers:-)) so I can keep both you and my sister updated with my progress. So without further ado....

Knitting progress check; 

Vivian - not on the needles yet but I have knitted the gauge swatches so it's getting close! Once I can get to the yarn and the needles that is:-)) Watch this space!

Limone twist - new sock pattern by Karen Scott to test knit. Really looking forward to this!

Little Minx - on the way to the second heel and then the home run to the top. Yay!

WIP's - slowly but surely:-) Keep checking the sidebar.....

Now, back into the fray of sorting, chucking, recycling and generally trying to make sense of the chaos:-)) What I really need is a Mary Poppins never-ending spacious cupboard that stores all my stuff invisibly and keeps the house looking neat and tidy. The only other alternative is to rationalise.... and I'm not very good at that! Back soon.... I hope!

Stripey Zauberball

A new knitting project is going on this week,  full of yummy colour - remember this lovely ball of Schoppel-Wolle Zauberball? Tropical fish is the colourway and I just love it. It's just been sitting in my basket and has actually been started a few times but I just didn't like or want this yarn knitted up in anything that didn't show it off to its full yumminess. So, back it went waiting to be knitted, and it has waited, and waited.....:-))

Till last week when I was looking for a bright yarn to knit some armwarmers or possibly long gloves with a bit of pattern altering. Pattern needed fingering weight and I wanted coloured stripes so the tropical fish just jumped out at me and before long was on the needles.

The pattern is 'Armwarmers' by Brigids Hearth and is an easy knit pattern for elbow length armwarmers. I decided to split my one ball for contrasting stripes and I am fully expecting that the colours will merge just when I don't want them to,  just like my noro socks - which still aren't finished:-) For a bit of variation this time, I chose to have unequal widths of stripes - 4 rows of the red and 6 of the blue/green. I thought it would work quite well for a longer length of st.st knitting.

I chose to start striping right from the beginning including the rib cuff. This was maybe a mistake - from a distance it keeps the stripes looking even right to the edge but when you look at the knit close-up, the rib distorts the orange colour band and doesn't look as nice - to me. I decided to leave it but next time, I'll start striping after the rib detail.

Overall though, I love how these gloves are turning out - yes, I think these will be gloves as I can't resist putting stripey fingers on them;-)) I have stopped in this picture where the pattern ends for armwarmers, so you can imagine just how they could look. Nice! I did have a little issue with the colours merging around the yellow area but I was strong and 'broke' the thread, took out a bit of yarn till the colours contrasted enough again and restarted knitting.

(You know how I hate breaking yarn! But if its going to spoil the gloves.... then I have to be strong -but its just so permanent!  - and I like yarn to find its own way usually, that's part of the challenge. But I have knitted my noro socks too many times trying to solve this naturally, that I'm resolved just to be practical and concede it will never work without intervention!!)

One thing that is a major issue is that these are a VERY snug fit. Usually fingering weight gloves have a circumferemce of around 60sts at the wrist. These start at 70sts at the elbow and decrease to 48sts at the wrist. That is quite neat! Feels more like those arm support bandages;-)) I think the best solution for this would be either to knit the exact same pattern with a thicker yarn like sportweight or DK/light worsted weight or stick with fingering weight and alter the numbers for a better fit. I think I will end up trying both as I like long gloves and if I have time may knit more as presents for christmas so I'll let you know how I get on.

Question is, do I keep this rather neat fitting one or rip it back and start again? Zauberball isn't known for its durability and does get a bit fuzzy so will it damage the yarn by taking it back? It was a bit splitty to knit with too. Maybe I'll wear it for a little bit and if the circulation gets cut off on that arm then I'll have to admit defeat;-))

Knotty sweetgrass

Oh, its been a bit busy this week -unfortunately not as much making as I'd like but then sometimes, somethings gotta give:-) And this week, it's been more about stripping wallpaper and lifting floors than dyeing yarn and watching films knitting.

But last night, I put that right and sat down exclusively to knit and watch a film. Just knit. Nothing else for a little bit. And I managed to get something done to show you.

I've been meaning to knit up some of my variegated yarns to see if they are too 'busy' for cables and lace. Some yarns, like this one, Sweetgrass' are very subtle with the variegations so I was thinking it may just manage a cable if the pattern is definite enough. And these Knotty gloves by Julia Mueller (Laris on Ravelry), are just the thing to test this out.

When I first started in 2x2 rib, I was thinking 'nope, this is just too bitty and broken up,  no flowing lines of colour, but I'll just knit a little bit more, just to see....' Then I got to the cable, made a mistake watching Poirot on tv, ripped it back, fixed the mistake, carried on. Got to end of cable chart and admired my handiwork. 'Nice', I thought. This could work.....

Then oops! Was so busy following the chart I forgot to follow the instructions for the thumb gusset back at row 29 - rip, rip, rip. Thumb gusset now included. Really shouldn't watch tv when I'm tired and knitting something more than stocking st. I really should learn, it's not as if I haven't made that mistake before:-)

And I am now knitting away on st st!! Hurrah! I can just go round and around for a bit until I get to the fingers. And I do like the yarn in st st. The gloves are about 60sts circumference so it's easy to imagine this knitted up as a pair of socks too.

I modified the pattern slightly as I know from knitting gloves before that I need the pinkie lower than the rest of the fingers (stripey tonks). I knitted the pinkie and then knitted about 8 rows till I divided the remaining stitches for the final three fingers. And once the maths was worked out (and re-checked:-) just in case!), I sat down last night and watched 'Pirates of the Caribbean' - the first one - and knitted round and around the fingers and thumb till each finger fitted and then cast off.  

Still have the ends to sew in but technically one glove down, one to go......

The veyla mitts are finished!

I finally made a decision on the buttons for the Veyla mitts and plumbed for the small victorian style buttons. They fit the buttonholes very well and suit the delicate lacy style overall I think. Although it took me a while to decide which ones to eventually go for, it took me even longer to get around to sewing them on! - as I said its been a lethargic week...:-) So as promised, lots of photos of the finished Velyas for you.

So a pic of one mitt off, then one mitt on. I love how Ysolda really thought about how the buttons would sit on that curve - very nice design detail.

And just for you, a tricky picture taken from my viewpoint by John - he had to stick the camera pretty much in front of my face for this one:-)) Thank you for being patient enough to take these pics!!

I think I'll get more chances to wear these now its getting a bit colder. I really noticed the difference in the air today. Time to pack away all the summer clothes, I think and bring out all the layers. I've been thinking more about crochet and stripes and I think there will be more stripes in my future! Stripey scarves, gloves, mitts - and socks of course! Maybe its my antidote to winter coming. Colour, colour, colour!!!!

Oh, I've got to look a bit more natural in these photos:-))

Buttons for Veyla

At last all my buttons have arrived for my green Veyla mitts. It's quite hard to gauge online whether the greens will accentuate or get lost in the lace detail and some that seemed small enough on paper, now seem a bit too big for the cuff. I got a mixture of plain and funky - well, you can never have enough buttons;-)

These first ones fit the buttonholes well and are solid but relective in colour. I quite like these as they are small enough but the shine keeps them interesting. Subtle for me, I know but with these the lace is more dominant.

Next up, not so subtle nice, bright daisy buttons. They are certainly funky and not too big for the cuff but they don't lend themselves to an elegant feel:-) These would have to be decorative only as they get caught in the buttonhole but I think I can slide these mitts on without undoing the buttons anyway.

Next up, these lovely apple buttons. These are super funky but a bit bigger. I can only realistically get three on without squashing them up close together. Again, these would have to be decorative rather than functional. I'm thinking the paler green colour isn't working and the lace is obscuring the apple shape too much to make everything gel.

Ah, the green flower/star shapes. These are a no-no straight away. Gorgeous buttons though but the green flower is totally lost and the sparkly centres look like little dots. Waste of a lovely button on these. I have enough to use them on a larger project so no worries.

Hmm. I like these buttons a lot but they are a bit bigger again - maybe verging on too big? Enough pattern without killing the lace and the right tone of green though. Running near the top of my list these.

These lovely buttons arrived late and are a lot bigger than I thought but lovely. Looking at them on the glove, they are maybe a bit too busy or weighty/heavy looking for the cuff. But they are so nice... Maybe I should keep them for a funky cardigan, or something instead.

The last idea I tried was to move away from green altogether and try white. Although they are more pearlescent than in the picture, the white is just too bright and has too much tonal contrast to work, I think.

So, that leaves the little green buttons in picture 1, the bigger green buttons I liked, the japanese ones and the green and white daisies..... What do you think?

Green Veyla Mitts

Over the weekend, I've been knitting up these fingerless mitts by Ysolda. The pattern just came out friday and I've been just dying to try this pattern since we got a sneek peek of the mitts on her blog. The mitts are knitted up with fingering weight yarn and only use up to 185yrd/170m of yarn. This worked out overall about 28gms of yarn!! Amazing! These green mitts are knitted up using a 50gm tester of semi-solid green supersock yarn. I think I dyed it at the same time as the green stripey for week 2's giveaway.

The pattern is a very cleverly constructed glove with a lace cuff knitted flat then cast off. You then pick up the stitches for the 'hand' of the glove from the side of the lace. Very neat and elegant. You can see in the cuff close-up the lace is now sideways. There are meant to be buttons for fastening and added detailing as you can see in the top picture but I didn't have any that worked very well, so I had to hunt on Etsy and Ebay to find some I was happy with. Problem is I'm still waiting on them to arrive. I really thought today was the day but, no. Maybe tomorrow.

To knit both mitts only took me a weekend, and not solid knitting at that. Visited a car boot with high hopes of quilting material or books but only found a few little things this time - a long bright burnt orange skirt and some nesting dolls, which are lovely:-) I'll try and take some photos of the dolls to show you when it brightens up a bit. But we have been promised 4 days of sun!!! 4!! No cloud, dull days or rain - apparently! So if that holds true I can get on and get my shed transformed into my dyeing workshop.

This has been an ongoing saga this summer:-) and I have some progress photos for you but as we haven't made that much progress, don't expect the Ritz or anything quite yet! I'm just really pleased we have a door and windows for now! It still needs electrics, dried and painted inside and out but this will just have to be as and when I can afford each step. But it will be weather tight and the rain will be back soon, I'm sure!

So, there may not be quite as much knitting going on with all the DIY needed this week but I am hoping to squeeze in some dyeing experimentation for new colourways so I'll keep you posted on those and you can tell me what you think:-) HA, see? I've now committed to a deadline:) Best way to keep my ass in gear!! See you soon!

Grande Final giveaway!

Well, we have arrived at the last week of the giveaways and this week is going to be slightly different - a grande giveaway:-) ie, lots of prizes for you to win! So many of you have entered my competitions and have given such thoughtful answers, thank you, and I feel bad that only a few can win, so this week I am giving away 5 prizes so there is a much better chance of everyone winning something!!

But more on that in a minute. First, let's announce the winners from last weeks competition, picked totally at random by John from the textile blog:

The winner of the Aquamarine semi solid yarn is..... Kate!

And the winner of the Deep Orchid is..... Purple-power!

Well done to you both and if you could contact me at labellehelene@btinternet.com with your contact details, I will get the yarns off to you in the post as soon as possible.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, this weeks competition is going to run a bit differently. Instead of everything being listed today, the 5 prizes will be listed one a day from this monday to friday so you can leave a comment on all or just the ones you want to enter. If you want to enter all, please leave a comment on all. As this will mean a lot more comments, I have kept the question simple for this week. All you need to say is what you think each particular yarn would look nice knitted up as - or woven, crocheted, etc, - and maybe a link to a pattern? That's all.

'Peacock Blue'

And today's yarn is called 'Peacock Blue' - 100gms of fingering supersock yarn 75% merino, 25% nylon. This is a rich mix of deeper blues and greens that will knit up in a much softer variegated yarn. With the tones being so similar, there will be less tonal contrast of lights and darks with this yarn but the colours will blend nicely, drifting from blues to greens and back again.

This would be lovely as a rich wrap or shawl, like Ysolda's new Damson shawl or the Feather Duster shawl by Susan Lawrence - who designed the forest canopy shawl I'm still knitting:-) My personal favourite is the Peacock shawl designed by Jae Koscierzynski - just lovely but requires an awful lot of yarn to make and I imagine you would need a lot of free time too! Gorgeous though and well worth it! It's on my to-do list - sometime!!

I've also been meaning to try the lovely glove patterns by Julia Mueller such as Gordian, Entangled stitches, and Glows. Somehow a deeper, richer colour for Autumn seems more appropriate as the weather changes.

'Gordian' by Julia Mueller

Although I just love the red, I can imagine these in a lovely petrol or peacock blue too - all that complexity of the cables - mmm! Yes, another one for my to-do list! You can see the subtle tones in the reds so a semi-solid or subtle variegated would work well for this. Maybe the peacock would be a little too strong in variation but maybe not. It all comes down to personal taste:-)

All this weeks competitions finish on sunday night - 6th September - and I will draw all the final winners first thing monday morning. You can enter all or as many as you like, remember, so good luck to everyone!

Stripey gloves are finished!

Got the stripey gloves finished a few nights ago - aren't they nice? Just very fun and funky! I love the mad way the colours go at the fingers:-) Matching the stripes on the second glove was a little tricky - well more finicky than anything else - and I did have to take a few fingers back to get the right proportions of colour to match the other hand. Funny how you can use the same amount of stitches, the same amount of rows and tension and still it's not exactly the same for each glove. One of the mysteries of knitting that bugs me:-) But not enough to stop me knitting another pair!

These are for a present so I will have to reluctantly part with them but I can always knit more! The pattern is really good for sizing - XSmall, small-medium ladies size and medium, large mens sizes. So something for everyone. All knitted at 4ply/fingering weight. It came free with my ball of Opal sock yarn but you can buy it here at the Get knitted pattern page if you are interested. It's a very easy pattern to follow with clear, precise instructions - just what you want.

They took about two-thirds of the ball to knit and I added an extra inch to the ribbed cuff as I like it to be a good snug fit to keep the cold wind out. I could probably get one sock or one glove out of the rest. Maybe I can keep it for jazzy heels and toes on a solid coloured sock:-) Or for variegated stripes with a solid in a scarf or hat.....

Or maybe I can get another ball and make a matching pair of gloves and socks!! I'll be all Tonked out!

Stripey gloves on the go!

Weyhey! The stripey gloves are on the move! At last they are knitting up and a lot better for changing yarns. The Happy yarn was lovely but just not right for self-striping gloves. The Opal however, is just perfect. It's got a good combination of solid and speckled stripes to give enough variety.

Not how I imagined it knitting up though, I must admit. On the ball, it looked more striking, as in punchy, more saturated colour but it's actually turning out softer and well, heathery. Mottled colouring rather than over-saturated. I don't mind this look at all, it just surprised me. But then, I do like being kept on my toes:-) That is why I love self-patterning and variegated yarns - you never know how they are going to knit up from the ball or skein.

In keeping with making my life easier, I decided to use stitch markers to keep track of the gusset for the thumb. Do these look familiar? Yes, they're my new stitch markers made by Marcie that I got free with my yarn from Needlefood.

Don't ask me why I haven't bothered to use stitch markers before now because it was a hell of a lot easier and one less thing to have to check as you knit along. I think it's that 'of course I don't need stitch markers. I should be able to knit this without them' attitude. Like not using a lifeline in a complex lace pattern - but you'll be absolutely stuffed if you drop a YO stitch!! Ha! Well, I've decided to tell that little superior voice that I'm quite happy to use any technique that will make my life any easier, so tuff!

This yarn is knitting up well and I've made a lot of progress in a few evenings. One glove is done and I've just cast on the second one - even remembered to match the stripes:-) Hopefully a little tv watching this evening will get me on my way again...

knitting mojo.....

The snow has decided to stay for a while after all. Yesterday, we had reports of heavy snow and much of the UK being at a standstill but we had glorious sunshine. So, I thought 'nah, we won't get any or if it flurries, it won't lie' . So I went out in the afternoon to pick up my new car and it started to flurry and flurry and flurry. I'm now thinking ' Will I get home in this? In my new car? Down backroads I'm not that familiar with?' Of course I will - with forced positivity.

Having missed the white roadsign on a increasingly white background - twice - I eventually got home just before the flurries decided to be really serious about flurrying. So instead of being able to show you a picture of the car, I can only offer you this.....

......... a car shaped snow mound but it is there somewhere, honest. It's only about 3-4 inches deep, so not that bad, but there are no deliveries, buses and the schools are all closed. So, I'll have to wait on my sock book from Amazon. It was recommended by Claudia on her blog and as she is pretty much a sock queen, I followed her recommendation. You can find the book 'Simple socks, Plain and Fancy' by Priscilla A.Gibson-Roberts here on Amazon. (UK).

Meanwhile, as the weather has decided to play cold and chilly, I'd better get on with the other chunky glove I was knitting early January. I fell into the trap of not starting the second one so it got kind of sidelined by the socks. I should have it finished by the time the snow melts:-)

The Opal socks are ongoing. One finished and the other nearly ready to turn the heel. This cold more-like-flu thing has made me lose my knitting mojo. No energy to knit for long stints. So sad, isn't it?! Let's hope I get back into the swing of things as I'll be needing woolly socks to keep my toes warm!