I began yesterday’s newsletter telling subscribers how we had started the year drinking a cup of tea on the patio at first light, with a warm breeze blowing. It was unseasonably warm then and the weather seems to have caught up with itself today, as there is currently hail bouncing off the garage roof!
One disadvantage with this return to colder temperatures is our current need to keep the windows open as much as possible, as ours is a Covid house. Not me (I’ve managed to dodge it so far), but my lovely wife. She is on the mend now and we are trying to do all the right things to contain it, but it isn’t half chilly today. It’s just as well there are a lot of woollen things around here 😊
The main image on today’s post is Cleo, my mum’s cat, somehow sitting on my lap whilst I was knitting the Water Dragon Shawl by Red and the Wolf Designs. She didn’t seem in the least perturbed that there was a ball of yarn by her back that kept turning. I’ve never known her do this before (and neither has Mum!).
This morning saw the (re-)launch of Nevern Throw. It’s the biggest piece I’ve designed so far, yet being made in individual squares means you aren’t carting a double bed sized blanket around with you while working on it. This is the first square being blocked. Once I done that one I drew lines joining up the dots of the pin-holes in the back of the blocking board so that the other 23 squares would all be blocked to exactly the same measurements.
Not until the latter part of the making up stage, anyway. At this point it definitely stops being a portable project!
It’s been on our bed for most of the past two winters and is wearing *really* well. I’d not used Knit Picks Wool of the Andes Superwash yarn before making Nevern and I am truly impressed with it. When you’re making something on this scale, you want the yarn and all your hard work to look good for as long as possible! The colours in the blanket I made are nearer to the image below than in the one above.
I’m also looking forward to designing more charts from carvings on the Nevern Cross in the coming months as an ‘expansion pack’ to the original Nevern Throw pattern. There are so many more designs on it still to explore.
Before Christmas I mentioned that live workshops are back on the agenda (Covid permitting). With the support of Yarn O’clock, there will be a day of two classes on Saturday 22nd January. We are using St Mary’s Church Hall in King Street, Mold to give plenty of room for everyone (classes are still limited to six). I think there is one space left in the morning workshop and I know there are spaces in the afternoon one. Each workshop is £30 and can be booked directly with Anne at Yarn O’clock (she re-opens 11th January).
I have been busy prepping the materials – I’ve done four of the 14 squares I shall need since yesterday!
Finishing Techniques 10 – 12.30pm
Learn to block and seam your knitting to give fabulous end results. Learn to pick up stitches, make neat buttonholes and how to choose the right type of increase and decrease for your project.
You will be supplied with 2 pre-blocked pieces of knitting to seam which you will turn into a knitted purse by adding a buttoned flap.
Skills required: cast on, cast off, knit, purl.
Equipment to bring: 4mm needles, tapestry needle, everything else will be supplied.
Introduction to Sock Knitting 1 – 3.30pm
Learn all the steps of knitting a top-down sock on double pointed needles: Cast-on, ribbing, leg, heel flap, heel turn, gusset, foot, toe, grafting.
We will be working on a scale that means you can complete the whole sock in the workshop!
Skills required: cast on, knit, purl, k2tog, ssk.
Equipment to bring: 3mm short double pointed needles (you can buy these from the shop if needed), tapestry needle. Everything else will be supplied.
These little socks are so cute that I’m also planning on turning them into an advent calendar. Not like a yarn advent calendar where you make one a day during December, but one you make in advance and hang up with sweets in for Advent. There would be 24 small socks and a slightly larger sock for 25th December. Patterns and possibly also kits will be available in September.
Now look at that! It’s January and I’m talking about September already. That’s because I actually sat down at the weekend and started planning what I want to do this year with my design business and even began mapping out a publication schedule! Not every month has some in it yet, but it will I hope.
I haven’t made resolutions this year, but I have set some goals. How’s your year shaping up so far?
Stay safe and keep knitting, K x