Tag: Blocking

Posted on by — Leave a comment

A Slice of Lime?

I’ve been working on an updated version of Elinor Hap Shawl (one of the reasons I’ve been knitting a new sample of it) and it was fascinating to see how I used to write things. It’s funny how when you go to update an old pattern you suddenly notice how your standard ‘house style’ has gradually changed over the past six years! I’m now so used to writing patterns with capital letters for a lot of the instructions (for example: K2, K2tog, yo, K3, yo, SSK), that seeing it all in lower case apart from the first instruction feels strange (that previous example would be: K2, k2tog, yo, k3, yo, ssk). It’s a fairly niche thing to be interested in, but that might be why I’ve signed up for an introduction to tech editing in October!

We took lots of photos of Elinor Hap Shawl yesterday and I’ve added some of those to the updated version of the pattern, as well as tweaking a few things that needed to be phrased better. The updated version of the pattern will be live very soon – probably tomorrow! By the way, isn’t the colour incredible?! The colour is called A Slice of Lime and it’s dyed by Ripples Crafts. It’s the finest yarn I’ve ever used at 1200m per 100g and the shawl uses approx 2000m (yes, 2km!) of yarn, yet it only weighs about 165g!

Over the weekend we also made a video of the process of blocking the shawl on the hap stretcher and also one of putting the hap stretcher together. The versions of the videos on social media came out really small for some reason. I sped them up in iMovie so they each last just over 1 minute. In reality it was about 20 minutes for each part of the process. I figured no-one wanted to see that! I had to remove the sound anyway as there was a lot of background noise and I wasn’t saying anything particularly useful! It was more along the lines of “Oh heck, we’ve put this piece on upside down…” or other words to that effect!

Here are the videos in case you missed them:

We also took lots of photos of Draig y mor (that’s Sea Dragon in Welsh, there should be a circumflex on the ‘o’, but I can’t work out how to do that in WordPress), including one of it flying in the air and it really does look like a flying dragon!! This new design is currently with my tech editor and I’m hoping to get it ready to launch at one of the shows I’m attending in August. The yarn is a gorgeous 100% Tencel DK dyed by Penny Stitch Craft.

See that photo in the middle of the top row? See the big black dot on my head? That’s a massive bumblebee that was playing around. I’ve got a zoomed in shot of it where it seems to be looking right at the camera!

I’ve realised that even with my reactive glasses I find it hard not to close my eyes outside when I’m having my photo taken!

We’ve had rain for the most of today and I am so grateful that I finally picked the blackcurrants yesterday. To be honest, nearly half of them were already on the ground when I got to them and they were so ripe they were falling from the bush as I touched them. So they got picked, picked over, washed, washed again, dried a bit and then frozen. I realised they were so ripe that they would just go off if I didn’t either immediately freeze them or make jam. It was way too hot for jam making, so into the freezer they went. If I’d delayed picking them any longer and left them out in today’s rain they would have been ruined! So, yay to yesterday morning getting up early and picking them before it got too hot. Boo to waking up this morning with a really stiff and sore back… Must be getting old!

I’ve finally started a 4-ply version of What Do Points Make?! I’ve been thinking about doing this for a couple of years now and it’s coming on a treat. I’ll get proper pics to you next week, but for now, here’s the start of it, doing a very good impression of a top-down triangular shawl. I’m using three skeins from a five skein set of gorgeous yarn from LottieKnits. I’ve had it for seven years, so I doubt she’s making the same colourway now, but she still has lots of lovely stuff! Go and have a look!

Right, that’s all from me for this week. Take care, stay cool and do something that makes you happy this week. K x

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Finishing Touches

I finally heard back from the car insurance people today and I managed to get them to reduce the renewal quote by £75, mostly by saying to each new (lower) figure I was given; “Well, that’s better, but it’s still a lot higher than last year’s premium”, and finishing with “Is there any way it can be less than £400?”. The answer was yes – phew! The final price is *still* over £80 more than last year, but I feel like we at least split the difference.

I have much more fun admin in sight for tomorrow – an application for a yarn show I’ve not done before, and would really love to be accepted for. I’m not going to jinx it by telling you which one, but if you could just generally keep your fingers crossed for me, I’d really appreciate it!

This week has been very productive. After deciding I needed to redo the neckband of my Lichfield cardigan (do you remember, the stitches I’d picked up on one front corner didn’t match the other, and was making it pull in too much?), I ripped it out and re-knitted it. I also followed my plan for the top of the sleeve caps and knitted one to my original length and one with the additional four rows added by the tech editor. I pinned them both to the body of the cardigan (unblocked, but that was the best I could do at the time) to see which looked and felt best when worn. The extra four rows helped with the fit on the shoulder, so they stayed and I added them to the other sleeve as well. I’ve now blocked the whole cardigan (on Saturday – and I am STILL aching from those 90 minutes kneeling on the ground…) and it’s nearly dry and ready for seaming. Blocking is often thought of as one of the ‘finishing touches’ that can be done (or not), but I maintain it is an integral part of the knitting process as it makes such a difference.

I think the extremely high humidity with this heatwave slowed the drying process as I would not have expected it to take this long as this time of year. The part that is still damp is the shoulder shaping and collar on the body as the fabric is doubled at that point. By the way, that cardboard box in the background is not a moving box – though it looks like one! We’re not going anywhere, it’s just useful storage.

Once the cardigan was cast off, I knitted one final sock sample for Bodelwyddan (that’ll be 8 socks I’ve made in total, across the five sizes). I gave them all a wash this morning and one pair got the treat of going on the sock blockers! They’ll be photographed by next week and I’ll share them with you in all their glory.

Bodelwyddan will be launched at the start of October with 50% of the pattern price throughout the month going to Treasure Chest YGC, a charity that aims to support and raise funds for patients who have had/are having surgery or treatment for Breast Cancer in Glan Clwyd Hospital (Ysbyty Glan Clwyd in Welsh, hence ‘YGC’), Denbighshire. I will post a weekly tally of the total raised through sales of Bodelwyddan during October and hope you can all help get the word out about the pattern and other fundraising that will be taking place at the same time.

I’ve also knitted something else, which I’m not going to tell you about yet, but it’s very very cool! And there is something else extremely exciting happening in early October that I should be able to tell you at least a little about next week.

There are now only four days until Yarn Gathering and I’m very excited to see it all come together again. We have such a lovely selection of vendors joining us and they are all based within an hour or so of Mold!:

Do join us if you have the chance. Sunday 17th September, 10am – 4pm, The Daniel Owen Centre, Mold, CH7 1AP. Free Entry.

I’ve been making some things today on my sewing machine in readiness for Yarn Gathering on Sunday: four zipped box pouches. The first pic is of the two I’ve made before (the first in a workshop with the lovely Jo Paloma Makes) so you can see what they’ll be like. Today’s pouches are all half made so far, as I decided it was far easier to do them on a mini production line, rather than work on one at a time. They’ll be finished tomorrow – I’ve even left the sewing machine out on the kitchen table!

Speaking of workshops, I had a great time last Wednesday teaching my “Absolute Beginners’ Knitting” workshop.

Tomorrow is the follow-on workshop, “Next Steps Beginners’ Knitting” and the same two ladies are currently booked on it. If you have some experience of the knit stitch and you’d like to learn more, there’s still time to book a place!

Next Wednesday (20th) is “Working with Colour – Slip Stitch Knitting“. This one is loads of fun and the results look far more complicated than they actually are to do and you’re only using one colour at a time!

I’m sure there’s more to share, but if I don’t press ‘publish’ soon, it’ll be tomorrow! Take care, have a good week, and get yourselves over to Mold on Sunday if you can. Kx