And Finally For Today.....

As its my birthday tomorrow (yippee!!!) I thought I'd share the yummy strawberry birthday cheesecake I made over the weekend to celebrate - sadly there is none left now. It was just too delicious to last very long!

Dyeing to Meet You - haha!

This is what I've been wanting to do for ages - dye my own yarn. Its part of my master plan and I finally had a go yesterday morning. I used food colourings and the undyed dk I got in my little starter kit. I divided the yarn up into 3 different skeins to be able to experiment more with the colours, soaked the yarn in vinegar over night and then got cracking in the morning. These were the results - one thing though...the smell of the wet yarn and vinegar was nearly too much for my delicate tum! I've now been given the advice to wash the yarn in fabric conditioner afterwards to make it smell nicer. A tip I will be carrying out! I've ordered some acid dyes and some sock yarn now and I can't wait to have a go next week.

Adventures in Felting

I have been a busy girl recently! My latest knitting creation is this...my first booga bag. This was a first in quite a few ways - I'd not knitted a bag before, I had to pick up about 70 stitches and then knit in the round and it was my first attempt at icords and felting! I'm very pleased with the result. The felting was acheived by putting the bag and icord separately in the washing machine in net bags and putting 2 pairs of old jeans in to help bash them around a bit. Two washes on 60 degrees later et voila! A lovely little felted bag.

Stitchmarkers

I've been busy making stitchmarkers - great fun! I'm going to be selling them on ebay and maybe etsy - if you're interested click on the title :-)

Booga Bag Progress

This is the first bag I've ever knitted - I'm learning more skills every day! I've learnt how to do an icord (see previous post) on 2 double pointed needles, bit tedious though. I have to do 6 feet (!) of it for the handles for the bag. The bag itself I had to pick up about 75 stitches and I'm very proud of the results so far :-) I'm hoping to have finished it by the weekend (ha!) I'll post more pics then, the before and after of the felting.

Recent Finished Projects

I've just finished another of these blinky blanks made with Blue Skys Alpaca Organic Cotton - Its lovely to work with and the blanket is a pleasure to knit - luckily I bought enough to make me one when I get round to it!

The hat and the mittens were made with Jaeger Baby Merino DK.

Tiny Sock Yarn Stash (It will get bigger!)

Booga Bag

Clapotis

Baby Blankets

For Knitting Baby Stuff

My Stash in Pictures

I've been on a self-enforced stashalong for nearly 2 months now. I've had one day off, last Friday, when I bought some gorge Debbie Bliss cotton angora for a cardi from my new Fitted Knits book. I've made a resolution only to buy yarn for projects I have in mind now so I don't have lots in the stash that I don't know what to do with. Anyway, to prove the boyf wrong - who believes I have far too much yarn and don't know what to do with it - I've taken pics of all my stash and will have along side the projects I aim to use it for - ha!

Baby Hat

This is my latest finished project - another hat meant for a one year old child but in fact nearly fits me! Its from the Debbie Bliss How to Knit book (which incidentally taught me to knit, about 18 months ago now) I've changed it slightly - I'm not brave enough to work in two colours yet. This is my first project using two circular needles and knitting in the round - I'm extremely proud. Got a bit cocky at the end and tried to knit an i-cord with dpn's (double pointed needles) but still can't work them out!

Poor neglected blog :-( (Half years resolution - must try harder!)