Today has been good – despite the apparent chaos of my desk!
I got an email this morning that made me VERY excited and I can’t wait to share the news with you – soon I hope!
Also, after several days pondering the front neck shaping and the armhole depth on my current sweater design I was able to spend some serious time crunching numbers and playing with the coloured pens again. It’s taken several hours comparing lots of different size charts and sweater designs of similar construction, but I now have something I’m really happy with. (There will be a saddle shoulder above this, so knitters please don’t worry if it looks a little short to you!)
It does mean there’s a knock-on effect on the numbers for the sleeves – and my spreadsheet for the sleeve increases was a thing of beauty, but there’s no reason the new and improved one can’t be too!
My secret knitting is all finished and blocked and I love it. Just the ends to weave in now – and because it’s structured with the stripes going along the length, rather than the width, that means there are only 34 ends! My latest socks had more than that!
I also got out into the garden this afternoon and FINALLY sowed the courgette, squash and broad bean seeds. The broad beans have gone straight in the ground, while the courgette and squash seeds have gone into multi-cell trays in the mini-greenhouse. I even dug its plastic cover out of the garage. The cover has to come off in autumn and winter as, living in what we still believe to be one of the windiest towns ever as we do, it does try to make the whole structure take off or blow over. And that’s with the bottom shelf weighted down with every heavy stone and brick we can find! It was good to get outside in the sunshine and do something that will hopefully bring us some food in a few months!
Speaking of the sunshine – we did get our trip to Prestatyn. In fact we went twice and had a lovely time. We had a very chilly paddle on the second visit (having been more organised and brought a towel that time), Ronnie (our Rhino) practised his gymnastics and dancing and we really enjoyed the peace and the sea air. We also discovered Rhuddlan Castle – though sadly it was closed to visitors. I also completed a lot of my hat and I am still pinching myself that I made this yarn!
And here is the top of the finished hat. That is the beauty of a 12-point right-leaning spiral as designed by Woolly Wormhead. I love how the stripes gradually get wider as the number of stitches reduces.
On Sunday I am going to Wonderwool at the Royal Welsh Showground in mid-Wales. I am both excited and a little nervous about this as I haven’t been to an event with so many people attending since ‘the before times’, but I was pleased to see the organisers saying they would appreciate it if people wore masks in the exhibition halls. The great thing about Wonderwool is that the halls are so big there is always a good sense of space – not something that can be said about all the yarn shows I’ve been to, as some are really constrained by the limits of the building. I hope to have lots to show you and tell you all about next week!