Saturday’s workshop at Bakewell Wool Gathering was great and all those attending made excellent progress with their first ever brioche knitting.
My lovely wife drove us over to Bakewell – it was our first opportunity to have a look at the town so we had a wander around in the late afternoon sun and bought a couple of vegan Bakewell tarts. The town was incredibly busy so we stopped at Buxton for a meal before continuing home.
Tonight’s Zoom workshop is the follow-on to the Introduction to Two-Colour Brioche Knitting workshop that I taught on Saturday and two weeks ago on Zoom: it’s Next Steps in Two-Colour Brioche Knitting. There’s still time to book a place! It runs from 7-9pm BST (that’s GMT +1) and we’ll recap the increase and decreases covered in the Intro workshop and add another one of each for good measure! If you are confident in your basic brioche stitch and want to extend your brioche skills this is definitely the workshop for you.
As well as my current patterns and kits, I will also have copies of Prynhawn Da with me – available in individual printed format for the first time.
It seemed silly to be at an event in North Wales and not to have one of my Welsh named patterns there!
I highly recommend coming along to the Designer Day – it’s not a ticketed event, just turn up to Ewe Felty Thing, 24 Castle Street, Conwy 10am-5pm this Saturday.
My current commission knitting is coming along and I’m nearly halfway through the second colour. Once that’s done, I’ll need to block, measure, finish and check the pattern and get it all sent off.
If you can’t get to North Wales this weekend, I’ll also be at Stollen & Wolle with RiverKnits and several other amazing creative folk on Sunday 17th November at the RiverKnit studio in Weedon Bec and at Wool-in Garden City on 24th November at Oaklands College, Welwyn Garden City. See my events page for all details and links for tickets.
Take care and do some stuff that makes you happy this week if you can. K x
The North Wales Wool & Fibre Festival is this coming Saturday, June 1st. It’s being held in the Deiniol Shopping Centre in Bangor, with some vendors being in empty shop units and some being in the shopping mall itself. I’m going to be in what was the BrightHouse store, along with a wide variety of other woolly artists and creatives. Entry to the event is free, so if you’re in the North Wales area on Saturday between 10am and 4pm, come and say hello! Considering the current weather, it’s also a bonus that the whole event is under cover!
I’ve been swatching for a new brioche cowl design, specifically for knitters who might not have done two colour brioche knitting before. It will be simple, attractive and include some increases and decreases to build the knitter’s skills. Interestingly, the more I simplified the idea, the more I liked it!
Although it’s a cowl, it does not have to be knit in the round. I will include knitting in the round instructions, but I will actually be recommending folk knit it flat and seam it as this will help them learn the rhythm of the different stitches and colours when working each side of two-colour brioche. This decision comes after demonstrating brioche knitting to folk at yarn shows and seeing them have lightbulb moments in understanding, often having tried brioche in the round previously and found it confusing. It will also stand someone in good stead for when they come to knit something larger, such a shawl, thatwill be knitted flat.
Following on from some conversations I’ve had at the past couple of yarn shows we’ve been at, I’m also going to be running an Introduction to Brioche Knitting workshop on Zoom in the next couple of months! There will be a couple of date and time options and numbers will be limited to maintain a true workshop feel.
If a brioche knitting workshop via Zoom sounds like something you’d be interested in, make sure you sign up for my monthly newsletter and keep an eye out on the website.
I usually send out one email per month at the start of the month so your inbox won’t be bombarded! You can sign up from my homepage (scroll to the bottom).
If you happen to see the latest copy of Knit Now (issue 168) in your local newsagent, there’s a design from me inside! A set of lacy circular coasters and placemats knit from the centre outwards using a Pi shawl construction (albeit on a much smaller scale). I knit them using mercerised cotton for the magazine, although you could definitely use wool. Pleasingly, the design is included in the little inset pics on the cover around the main cover image. I named the set Prynhawn Da, which means ‘Good afternoon’ in Welsh, and relates to the brief of Afternoon Tea that was sent out to designers when the magazine asked for submissions last year.
Sue’s socks are coming on well. I’ve completed the leg, heel flap and gusset on the first one and now I’m heading down the foot towards the toe.
It’s amazing how quickly projects seem to grow after you’ve been working on a really big design for a long time.
Last autumn I began singing again after a break of several years. Singing was always ‘my thing’, and my main instrument when I did my music degree and while teaching music. I was quite rusty to start with, but I feel like I’ve got my voice ‘back’ now along with regaining a greater level of confidence. That may be linked with how I’ve really gone for it with the yarn shows this year: I think the grand total is something like 9 or 10!
I’m singing in a church choir who do concerts as well as services with some really uplifting music, and I’m also leading our local community choir who sing a range of songs from pop, show songs and children’s classics. Last week for example included Nellie the Elephant, This is Me from The Greatest Showman, Zadok the Priest by Handel and Rutter’s For the Beauty of the Earth! Quite an eclectic mix! Also, if you’ve never heard ‘Insanae et vanae curae’ by Haydn, do yourself a favour and have a listen. It’s bonkers and highly invigorating! I first sang it years ago, but I still don’t know what the words mean. I must look it up one day!
Right, that’s all from me today. I’ll let you know how Saturday goes next week and I may have a complete sock to show you! Take care one and all, and remember to do something that brings you joy this week if you can. K x
Not only did I make progress on my small version of Petulia this week; reader, I finished it! It still needs to be blocked and have the ends woven in, but I may even have it with me at WonderWool Wales!
As you can see when comparing the pictures, the small version is symmetrical, starting and ending with just one leaf, whilst the large version starts with a single leaf and just keeps on getting wider! Becci from Riverknits who commissioned Petulia (along with Tiffany and Agnes) is modelling the large version.
You will only have been able to buy the pattern (and kits!) directly from RiverKnits so far, and that’s because they have exclusive rights for the first six months. Having knitted the smaller version as well now I have found a couple of typos, but they’ll be updated very soon and if you want to get the pattern from RiverKnits they’ll have the latest version by the end of this week.
The rights are returning to me now as well and I will also have the pattern for sale in the near future. You’ll still be able to buy it from RiverKnits as well which is ideal if you want a kit.
The small version of the pattern uses 100g of Chimera (2 x 50g skeins) and 100g of Nene 4ply. The image of the small part balls shows how much I had left, so you won’t be in any danger of playing yarn chicken if you have a slightly looser tension than me. The large version used 3 x 50g skeins of Chimera and 2 x 100g skeins of Nene 4ply – though about half the second Nene skein was left over.
I’m looking forward to blocking this and seeing it bloom into its full glory! It’s a shape that you can wear draped around your shoulders with the widest part over your back or wrapped around your neck like a scarf with the widest part at the front and the points hanging down at the front. There will be photos!
I also did some more crochet, working on my Persian Tiles blanket, designed by Janie Crow (Jane Crowfoot). I’m cheating a bit here with this photo as most of the triangles had already been completed. Again they need blocking, as at the moment you might be hard pressed to identify them as triangles. However, once they’ve had a soak and spent some time on the blocking board they’ll look a lot tamer!
The circles are the centres of all the remaining octagons. I completed one in full in January to find out how the patten worked, but I rather like the production line approach – it means I don’t have to fish about in the bag for the next yarn colour quite so often.
I had thought I’d finished working on a design in alpaca last week, but I learnt something else about this fibre once I’d pinned it together and popped it on – it flows like water! This meant that there was no knitting sitting around the neck, where it was intended to be. However, I managed to come up with a solution that I think works well, and just adds a small section on, using the original cast-on as a stabiliser. It’s rather like when you cast off the back neck of a jumper and then pick up those stitches to knit the collar – the cast-off gives stability to the shape of the garment and helps it keep its shape.
Fortunately the next new design I’m working on that also uses alpaca (100% this time!) doesn’t need to stand up in any way; the flowing draping nature of the yarn and the fabric it creates will actually work in this design’s favour. Phew!
If you are a member of my FaceBook group or receive my monthly MailChimp newsletters you now have access to April’s discount codes for patterns beginning with G-H. Actually, it’s just patterns beginning with H as Gnarly Roots hasn’t yet been launched online. But, you could still get a discount on any of the individual Heart in my Hands patterns (Mitts, Hat or Cowl), Honeybun Cardigan or Helena Rose Stole. Want the code? Join my Facebook Group or sign up for my newsletter!
I’m away next Tuesday and will probably only have secret knitting with me, but I will do my best to put a post up, even if it’s just a short one. For now, take care, look after yourselves and those around you and do something that makes you smile. K x
Last week I introduced you to Gnarly Roots (Gary…) and yesterday I received photos of the moebius version knitted in HeartSpun DK (the yarn I knitted the regular cowl in) and it looks glorious!
Helen from Woolly Chic Designs will have this sample and some printed copies of the pattern with her at The Sodbury Yarn Over! If you’re visiting the show, which takes place in Chipping Sodbury April 6th-7th, be sure to have a look and say hello from me!
You may also remember that last week I asked for name suggestions for the adult version of Honeybun and my wonderful wife has come up with a fantastic suggestion – Sugar Loaf Cardigan! Not only is a loaf larger than a bun, and honey is linked to sugar, but there is also a Sugar Loaf mountain in Abergavenny, Monmouthshire! (As well as the other ones with a single word name in Brazil and Maine). So, Sugar Loaf Cardigan it will be.
I’ve been knitting a lot of brioche this week. One item is for publication in July, and today I’ve been typing up the pattern and making the chart. I even created a stitch symbol in Stitchmastery that wasn’t there before – although it is a known brioche stitch. Brpyobrp (brioche purl 1, yo, brioche purl 1 all into the same stitch) is the purl version of brkyobrk. It’s very satisfying when you remember how to edit your stitch library in this programme. This is what the new stitch looks like, compared with the knit version above it:
On Sunday I knitted another Twisted Cowl. Twisted is my moebius brioche cowl that has two sizes and two yarn weight options. I’ve knitted quite a few of these now, so why did I make another? Well, one reason was that I wanted to have samples of both colour combinations that I’m going to have as kits with me at WonderWool Wales and the other reason was that I wanted to triple check the yarn usage in the small version. The new one is one the left in Soft Pink and Rust – it’s not even been blocked yet or had it’s ends sewn in. I have already made one in these colours, but it’s visiting Anne at Yarn O’clock currently.
There will be large and small versions of the kit in both of the colour combinations. The yarn is Town End Yarns Poldale DK which is a 100% Falklands wool and it’s so soft and squishy whilst still having enough body to hold the shape of the stitches really well.
The small version shown uses 24g of each colour and the kits include 26g of each. How did I manage to get 26g when the yarn comes in 50g balls? Well, there’s always a little bit of variation in the weight of balls of wool, so I weighed each of the balls I had, took the ones that were 52g or even 53g and split those to make the small kits! You can see soft pink and rust balls on the top of their piles are already part balls, as I’d used those ones to make the sample.
My kitchen scales have been getting a good work out today.
It may seem as though I’m being very organised and ahead of myself for a show that is a month away, but I need to be. I’m likely to be travelling down to Mum’s more frequently in the coming months as she is intending to make a big move this year (although nothing is finalised), and that will inevitably mean lots of time sorting stuff out. So, while I can, I’m getting my own things ready!
Caramel Slice is now available to buy online as an individual pattern! I uploaded this yesterday to my website, Payhip, Lovecrafts and Ravelry. The pattern was launched in printed form at East Anglia Yarn Festival, and I’d intended to put it online straight away after that, but then I came down with that cold and forgot all about it until reviewing my plans for March at the weekend! It’s a really cute child’s cardigan for ages 1 to 8. It’s knitted flat, with the body worked in one piece and the sleeves knitted separately. The colour-work on the body and sleeves is a slip stitch pattern, so you only use one colour at a time. And no matter which size you make you only need 1x 50g ball of each of the two contrast colours. One lady spotted the sample of Caramel Slice on display at EAYF and recognised it, having knitted it from The Knitter when it came out last August. This prompted her to buy two more of my patterns, Honeybun and Nos Da, on the basis that she knew she could trust my pattern writing as Caramel Slice ‘worked’. That was such a great thing to hear and has stayed with me (in fact, I may have told you about it before!) – a crafter’s appreciation for the pattern writing and being able to successfully use the pattern.
That’s all from me for today. Next week I’m hoping to show you some more progress on my small version of Petulia and on my crocheted Persian Tiles blanket, which is designed by the brilliant Jane Crowfoot. If you like crochet, have a look at her patterns – they are beautiful and they work.
Have a lovely Easter if you celebrate it and take care, K x
We had a wonderful time at Wool-in Garden City as you will know if you’ve seen any of my social media posts. The part I was nervous about (giving a talk as part of the Meet the Designers session) was great fun and my workshop students were amazing. An unexpected bonus was meeting a completely different set of vendors from the ones I have previously come to know at the shows I did last year. I think this must be because the location was that bit further away. It’s nice to expand my network of yarnie folk – and, just like the people I’ve met previously, they were such a warm, welcoming collection of people. As the event lasted a whole week, it gave proper time to talk to everyone and I got some excellent advice and top tips from other vendors and designers, most of whom are far more experienced than me in the business of yarn shows!
Do you remember how much I’ve been enjoying making my Mystical Lanterns blanket? I decided it was about time I extended my crochet skills further and I now have a copy of Persian Tiles blanket, also designed by Janie Crow. For Mystical Lanterns I took the opportunity to use some yarn that had been in my stash for a while and I’m loving the random colour approach of ‘pick a ball out of the bag without looking at it – whatever it is, that’s the next colour you use’ (it’s not finished yet, but it is growing well). However, for Persian Tiles I’ve decided to go down the traditional route of matching the colours of the original design. Not exactly, as I’m using West Yorkshire Spinners ColourLab DK rather than the Stylecraft used in the pattern, but I’m very pleased with the shades I’ve got. I already had the red and cream and picked up the rest this afternoon at Yarn O’clock. I like ColourLab as it’s pure wool and not desperately expensive and I use it in workshops quite a lot. The yardage isn’t as long as the Stylecraft at 225m/100g rather than 295m/100g, but I’m hoping it will be enough – if not, I’ll just have to top individual colours if I run out.
I realised this morning that there’s been a definite colour theme going on recently in what I’ve been knitting – perhaps I’m channelling orange to combat the darkness of the winter evenings (and some of the days)? I know that I’d love to go to Shetland for the Up Helly Aa fire festival one year.
Some exciting things will be happening soon with the lightest orange in that picture – watch this space!
The orange/fiery theme continues with my small Petulia which has grown quite a bit since last Tuesday! This pattern is currently exclusively available from RiverKnits as either a kit or just the pattern.
Speaking of exciting things happening soon, here’s another picture of beautiful yarn that is going to become something lovely in the near future.
This is Donegal Rich Tweed 4-ply from McIntosh in the colours Rossnowlagh, Raphoe and Ardara. Aren’t they gorgeous!?
At the beginning of the month I launched my year-long discount for members of my Facebook group (the imaginatively named ‘Kath Andrews Designs’ group) and subscribers to my monthly newsletters. Folk receive a discount code they can use each month (as often as they like) on specific patterns which change each month, so by the end of the year, my full portfolio will have been included. Facebook group members can get 10% off the full price of patterns and newsletter subscribers can get 20% off. January has been all patterns beginning with A or B – 11 designs in total. February will be – you guessed it – all patterns beginning with C or D.
This year-long discount has been introduced partly as a thank you to folk for signing up to the newsletter or joining the group and partly as a balance against the price changes I have been bringing in.
Garments are now £7 (for those with 4-7 sizes) or £8 (for those with 8+ sizes).
All other patterns are now £6 with the exception of my very simple patterns (Beginners Bunting Triangles, Furrowed Fields Scarf) and baby blankets (Croeso Baby Blanket and Nos Da), which are £5.
Those of you buying online in the UK won’t actually see a difference in price on the £6 patterns on platforms such as Payhip. Patterns will have already been costing you £6 because VAT was added on top of the main pattern price (the extra 20% is then kept by the website and passed on to the government).
However, I didn’t really like the fact that the price you paid depended on where you lived. So, I’ve now included any VAT due on digital patterns within the price – and raised the basic pattern price to cover this. This means that if you live in the US, patterns will cost you a little more and I will receive a little more. If you live in the UK (where VAT is 20% on digital patterns), patterns will cost you the same as they previously did and I will receive the same as I previously did.
It may sound a bit complicated, but it isn’t really. You’ll just see a single price that is the same for a given pattern regardless of where in the world you are.
Enough of the maths! During the rest of this week I will be putting Caramel Slice into my own format and continuing to knit the sleeves of the adult version of Honeybun (as well as playing with some fiery coloured yarns!). I’m nearly at the full width of the sleeves and then once I get to the sleeve cap things will progress quite rapidly as the stitch count drops.
We are hoping to visit the Process exhibition at Qube in Oswestry soon as well. The exhibition continues until 12th February and is open Monday-Friday 9-5 and Sat 9.30-12.30.
I’m hoping to have some completed sleeves to show you next week (and maybe a few other things too!). Until then, take care and stay warm. K x
I’m sorry about the corniness of today’s post title, but I just couldn’t resist it. After rehearsing ‘Consider Yourself’ with Shelby’s Singers (our local community choir) last Wednesday, and now being at Welwyn Garden City for the week long wool festival that is Wool-in Garden City, that twist on the lyrics just won’t leave my head!
How are you after Storm Isha? It sounded pretty scary outside to me, but there didn’t seem to be any major damage where we are.
I’m having such a lovely time at Wool-in Garden City. I’ve met a whole new bunch of fab yarnie people, given a talk about my work as a designer (!) and taught 8 people how to knit two-colour brioche. The folk standing around the edge might have picked up a tip or two as well!
The mayor of Welwyn Garden City opened the event on Saturday morning, cutting the obligatory ribbon, and he and his wife spent time talking to every exhibitor as well.
A week long show as a pop up shop is a big undertaking, especially for the organisers, and I can’t thank Helen and Naomi and their extra volunteers enough. They’ve been helpful, kind, friendly and encouraging throughout. We have the opportunity to take time out from the event, at which point folk can pay for items from our stands at the central cash desk. As some of the exhibitors also have full time a Monday to Friday jobs this means they can continue with their regular lives and have their work on display and on sale at the same time – a brilliant idea.
I got very excited about having some of my designs in the window of the shop too…
As a result of a conversation I had at the weekend, I took my courage in my hands and wrote an email I’m now nervously awaiting a reply for. It could be very exciting.
As well as all this, there has been some knitting!
The sleeves for the adult version of Honeybun are gradually growing and I’m getting closer to the armhole shaping. this is one of the two sleeves – I’m doing them both at the same time on the same needle, but photographing them both together is proving to be tricky!
My small Petulia grew by 40 rows at the weekend.
And I finally swatched for and started (twice) my chunky version of Fiery Dragon Skin Cowl.
This will be added to the original pattern once I’ve got all the details down and photos of the finished sample. This is using my handspun yarn that I made last year from Velvet Sixpence in Polwarth wool. I have to say I was impressed that it coped so well with being frogged twice and re-knitted. I usually keep my swatches, but as I only have this one ball of yarn and I didn’t know how much I would need for the cowl, I decided not to risk it.
By the end of Monday it was nearly finished!
And I did finish the socks before going to Wool-in Garden City!
I’m really looking forward to the rest of the event this week and I will take lots more photos of everyone else’s stands to share on social media and to show you next week.
We were woken up by an owl this morning – another addition to the list of wildlife we’ve seen or heard in the area.
Until next week, take care and try not to get blown away by Storm Jocelyn! K x
It’s unusual not have lots of pics in my blog posts, but the website is misbehaving and I can’t add image blocks at the moment. I will come back and add them in as soon as it lets me! Edit – pics have now been added!
I’ve been busy planning my Two-Colour Brioche Knitting workshop for Wool-in Garden City this week. It’s fully booked with 8 knitters which is very exciting! I’ve combined two of my previous classes so that the maximum number of brioche stitches can be knitted, allowing knitters to get really comfortable with the technique, as well as learning an increase and a decrease.
The yarn I’m using is the same yarn I used for Twisted, Poldale DK from Town End Yarns, and it’s really lovely. A good high twist DK yarn with lots of body and bounce – perfect for brioche knitting.
Yesterday I delivered everything for my contribution to the Process exhibition at Qube in Oswestry. I can’t wait to see how the whole exhibition looks once Gemma has put it all together – it opens on Friday. I decided to include a photograph of the Size 18 body blocking on its boards, rather than the actual pinned out knitting. This was for a couple of reasons; 1. it would take up a lot of space and be potentially awkward to display with lots of pins in the blocking boards, and 2. if the body of the cardigan was in Oswestry until mid February, progress on it for the next month would be limited to finishing the sleeves!
Apart from knitting a new swatch for the brioche workshop, my knitting this week has been all on Barragán Shawl Part 4 – the knitted-on edging. A few days ago Sue asked me how long I thought it would take to complete and I (rather over-dramatically) said, “Forever!” It is however, looking much more likely that I will finish it before Friday. I must remember to video some of the single and multiple joins before I do get to the end though.
As you may know, I’ve been wearing clothes from The Slow Wardrobe for a number of years now. Two of the early skirts I bought were a black linen skirt and a gorgeous green check wool one, rather like suiting fabric, with linen panels top and bottom. But they were in the small size and I haven’t been able to wear these two skirts for years (since well before 2017!). In November I finally did what Linda had suggested when I saw her at Wonderwool Wales in April and sent the skirts back to her for enlargement. I could possibly have tackled this myself, but it involved taking the pockets off, before adding a panel at one of the seams and then reattaching the pockets which I didn’t feel confident doing. So, for a very reasonable fee, Linda has enlarged both skirts, adding new elastic at the same time and I can finally wear them again. This makes me very happy!
Lichfield, my cropped cardigan design inspired by Lichfield Cathedral, is now printed out and ready to head to Wool-in Garden City with me.
Somehow a lot of errors got into it during the editing process, which I only discovered when knitting my own Size 7 version from the magazine, but my printed copies, complete with new photos, are fully correct and will be added to my online platfoms very soon. The Knitter has also published errata for the magazine version (which themselves will be updated soon with two more corrections) and folk from the mag have been very helpful in trying to get to the bottom of how the gremlins got into the pattern in the first place. It’s a long list of errata and I would hate folk to think that was how I sent the pattern in!
I had a lovely moment in our local Aldi the other day. I heard a young voice behind me say “Hello Kath”, and turned to see one of the children who came to sing with Shelby’s Singers at the Buckley Christmas Market with her Dad. She wanted to know if we were going to be singing Christmas songs again on Wednesdays. I said that we were going to be singing a whole range of new songs, a lot of them from musicals (including ‘Tomorrow’ from Annie and ‘Consider Yourself’ from Oliver!) and there was a very enthusiastic response. It is great to see the enjoyment that can be gained from singing with others so clear in the next generation – and I’m already looking forward to tomorrow’s rehearsal.
That’s all from me for today. By the next time I write I’ll have taught a one-to-one session on sewing up a sweater, an Introduction to Lace Knitting workshop, sung at an Epiphany Carol service, had a covid booster jab and been on a cinema and meal ‘date night’ with my lovely wife. I’m looking forward to all of these in very different ways! Take care of yourselves and stay warm. K x
So, it’s 2024! The rain hasn’t yet stopped enough for us to go out for a walk since our midnight walk on New Year’s Eve where we saw and heard lots of fireworks in the neighbourhood. I’m hoping we’ll be able to get out soon, but at least for now we are warm and dry and once again thankful to live high up. The garage might get water in it from the steep driveway if the rain pours too heavily, but the house is pretty safe from flooding.
Floella, my lovely estate car, did her longest yet journey since I’ve had her, all the way down to Kent to visit my in-laws and back via Worcestershire to visit my mum. We were away for nearly a week and, while it is lovely to catch up with everyone, there’s nothing quite like your own bed!
Since we’ve been back I’ve been very busy, preparing to take part in an exhibition at Qube in Oswestry. I’ve never had my work displayed in an exhibition before, so this is quite exciting. It’s all about ‘Process’ and that is such a major part of being a designer. Folk usually only see the finished product, and I think it will be interesting to see all the different things that go into developing a design. I’ve focussed on Joseph’s Jacket, which was one of my assessment pieces for my City & Guilds in 2012 and which much later – in 2018! – became Honeybun Cardigan. And the process is still continuing, as this is the design I am currently developing into adult sizes. I’ve blocked the body now and that will be included in the exhibition too. The design process covers 11 years with this pattern!
As I said, I’m taking part in the exhibition – there will be lots of other artists and designers working in different media taking part as well, so it should be a really interesting exhibition. It’s open from January 12th until February 12th and admission is free. The full details of the ‘Process’ exhibition aren’t yet up on the website, but I’m sure they will be soon.
In addition to sorting out all my drafts, samples, swatches and notes for the exhibition, I’ve been getting ready for Wool-in Garden City which takes place in less than 3 weeks! Patterns are printed (all bar one), kits are now in snazzy tins which also make them a lot easier to transport and to display, and I’ve been adding price labels and codes to everything. I’m teaching a brioche workshop while I’m there and taking part in a designer talk too, so it should be a really fun week. And it is a WHOLE week! I’ve never done an event this long before and I’m really interested to see how the central cash desk for all exhibitors works. Tickets are still available for the Preview Evening on January 19th, 5.30-8.30pm – entry to the event during the rest of the week is free and unticketed.
I’m going to be increasing some of my pattern prices this year (not all), starting with garments. Adult garments with 8 or more sizes (currently Of Night and Light and Reaching Out) will be £8 and children’s garments with 5 sizes will be £7 (currently Honeybun). This change has already taken place on all my platforms. Later in the year I will be increasing the price of those that have multiple sizes such as my hat patterns and the more complex designs such as Drifting Leaves (that one is 20 pages!). These increases will be to £6 or £7 from £5. I know price rises are the last thing anyone wants, and believe me, I have thought long and hard about it.
To make up for the price rises, I will be running a year-long (!) discount in my facebook group and for my monthly newsletter subscribers. I know many people subscribe to my weekly blog and receive this as an email, but what I am referring to here is the monthly newsletter, which is different – you can sign up to my newsletter here.
Each month all patterns beginning with specified letters will be reduced for those folks (10% off for FB group members and 20% for monthly newsletter subscribers). This month covers letters A and B and that includes 11 patterns! They are:
Besides all this admin and travelling I have actually done some knitting as well! I have finished the black lace Diamonds in the Breeze shawl I have been knitting for my friend Lucy’s 50th birthday and that just needs to be blocked now. I’m pleased with how the yarn (Drops Baby Merino) worked up and it will be very soft around Lucy’s shoulders.
If you’d like to learn to knit lace there’s still time to sign up for my Introduction to Lace Knitting workshop in Buckley on Wednesday 10th January (6.30-8.30pm).
I have started Part 4 (the edging) of my Barragan KAL which came out in The Knitter on Wednesday 29th December. I’ve got photos of both the front and the back of the shawl here so you can see how the knitted-on edging works. The line of stitches along the back is the back of the joining stitch. From the front the join is almost invisible. I’m going to do a short video of the joining stitch soon too.
Sue’s sock now has more than half a partner – I cast the second one on on the journey up to Edinburgh if you remember and it’s been a good evening knit when I don’t want to have to keep my eye on a chart or pattern!
And I have begun my small version of Petulia! It was very exciting to see kits for Petulia from RiverKnits featured among “The Knitter Loves…” in this month’s issue of the magazine. Becci is seen modelling the large asymmetrical version of the shawl as shown on the front of the pattern.
The smaller version is symmetrical and I’m using RiverKnits Chimera and Nene 4ply again (bought from Yarn O’clock), but in a very different colourway to the orginal large shawl.
I love the vibrancy and autumnal feel of the leaf shapes. I’m knitting this project with a fixed circular Lantern Moon needle from McIntosh and it’s super smooth to use – really lovely.
The rain is still falling and it’s looking highly unlikely that a walk today will be possible (especially as my lovely wife is in a poetry event on Zoom for the next couple of hours). So, instead I shall settle down with a cup of tea and my new journal and work out some plans for the year/month/week/tomorrow and maybe even do some embroidery.
I finally cast them on yesterday, having decided that the calculations are now good, certainly up to the armholes. I’ve decided to knit them both at the same time, which creates a bit of a yarn tangle at times when the contrast colours are being used, but it should be much more manageable once I get the last one of those done, and I’m back to just one ball of yarn per sleeve. If you knit garments, how do you approach sleeves? Do you knit them one at a time or tackle them both together?
The second half of our Twisted workshop last Thursday went really well – and at least one of the knitters has a completed moebius brioche cowl!
Many thanks as always to Anne at Yarn O’clock for hosting us and keeping everyone well supplied with hot drinks and biscuits.The pattern for Twisted will be available next Monday – yay! – and that means there will be discount heading its way to newsletter subscribers. If you’re not yet a newsletter subscriber but you’d like a 25% discount code for this pattern, you can sign up here:
The pattern will include a link to a really excellent video of a moebius cast-on by the amazing Cat Bordhi, which will be a great help to those unfamiliar with this technique.
The latest issue of The Knitter (196) came out last Wednesday and Part 3 of Barragán, my KAL shawl design, is in it. I’ve been keeping up with my daily progress on this and posting pics on my Instagram and Facebook stories, but for those of you not on those platforms, it’s currently looking like this (with a few extra rows worked since this photo was taken):
Once I finish the “Diamond Fantasia” pattern on this side of the shawl I cast off, rotate the shawl and work the same section again at the other end. This is how I managed to keep the shawl symmetrical, even though it was a rectangle with 4 parts to the pattern, each of which needed to be different!
I’ve finished the first sock of this pair of Bodelwyddan socks and I’m enjoying how the colours change in the yarn.
I thought it would just be a long repeating stripe, but it seems to slowly bounce back and forth between the two main shades of purple and teal. It’s a Zauberball yarn with the colour way name of “Smoking Area”. I’m not 100% convinced the length is correct, so I won’t weave the toe yarn end in yet until it’s been tried on for size by its recipient.
The Fasten Off Yarn-along is going well – there are posts and activities on most social media platforms and bingo cards you can complete, with a choice depending on whether you want to try out lots of different patterns or focus on one:
This is the third year I’ve taken part and there’s such a lovely atmosphere of folk supporting and raising up other designers and sharing gems they find. There are 96 designers taking part this year, all of whom have patterns available somewhere other than Ravelry and while the event as a whole goes on until New Year’s Even, the pattern sale continues until the end of Friday 8th December (American Eastern Time – which is pretty much Saturday morning here in the UK). You can get 25% off a vast swathe of the designers’ patterns by using the event code “FO2023”. For me that code works on Payhip and on Ravelry and it applies to all my self-published single patterns. Head to the Fasten Off YAL website to check out all the details – the patterns are even searchable this year.
There’s been some more embroidery happening too. Can you see a difference in the bottom left part?
The next few days have quite a few events taking place – I’m teaching a workshop on cable knitting tomorrow at Shaz’s Shabby Chic in Buckley, then my lovely wife and I have a stall at a school Christmas Fair on Thursday.
On Saturday it’s the Buckley Christmas Market in the shopping precinct where I shall be wearing two (metaphorical) hats! I shall have a stall, where my lovely wife will also have her cards, calendars and poetry collection, AND I shall be leading our little community choir in singing Christmas songs. Do come along if you can – the event runs from 9am until 4pm. Buckley Town Band will be playing too – and they are great!
So, as you can see there is a lot happening. And on Sunday just gone (Advent Sunday) I sang at the Advent carol service at St Mary Without-the-Walls Handbridge. It’s been so good to get back to singing again, and to feel that I can trust my voice once more. It really can be a case of ‘use it or lose it’ and I’m going to be singing there as much as my other commitments allow. There were some other additional people drafted in for this service and it was good to see some friendly faces from my previous life as a music teacher – some of whom I haven’t seen since I left the classroom in 2018!
And as it’s now Advent, the tree is up!
That’s all for now. I’ll be updating my “Where I’ll Be” page later on so you can see some of the exciting things lined up for 2024! Take care one and all, K x
I’ve been to Evesham again over the past few days to do the reverse of last week; collecting Mum from her respite week and settling her back at home. I got back only a couple of hours ago, so today’s post will mostly be photos!
The quinces became jelly (though they needed a bit of help from me to do so)! I was secretly quite relieved that several of them were past their best (translation: starting to rot…) as, even when those ones were discarded I had 7 pounds of fruit that had to be cooked in 2 batches. That gave 4.25 pints of juice which turned into 7+ jars of jelly.
I finished the body of the adult Honeybun! It really is starting to look like a garment now. The sleeves have been calculated to the armholes twice now – having refreshed my memory of raglan-style sleeves via Shirley Paden’s Knitwear Design Workshop book that the full sleeve width should be 2.5cm more than a regular sleeve. It’s amazing how differently the colours came out in these two photos – you almost wouldn’t believe it was the same garment. Neither is quite right…
I also finished the first of this pair of socks for Sue. It looks a bit odd on the table, but I think that might be the angle I took the photo at. Yarn is from deep, deep stash, bought many moons ago.
I’m getting really excited about Wool-in Garden City in January. This will be a week-long event in a disused shop in Welwyn Garden City shopping centre. There’s a ticketed preview evening on Friday 19th and there are workshops, talks and demonstrations throughout the week.
I’m taking part in a ‘Meet the Designers’ talk on Saturday 20th 12 – 2 pm alongside Jane Crowfoot and Gurinder Kaur Hatchard where we will be talking about our crochet and knitting patterns and our creative journey into designing. (For reference, Jane Crowfoot is the designer of the crochet Mystical Lanterns blanket I’m making, so I will have to try very hard not to be too much of a fan-girl!).
Then on Sunday 11am-1pm I’m giving an ‘Introduction to Brioche Knitting’ workshop.
Tickets for all events can be purchased from the show website.
Currently running is the ‘off-Ravelry’ Fasten Off Yarn-along and I’m one of 95 participating designers! There’s a sale period for everyone’s eligible designs (for me, that’s all my single self-published patterns) that runs until 8th December and the whole event runs until December 31st. The discount during the sale period is 25% and the code is the same across the entire event for all designers – FO2023. Please note the difference between the capital “O” and the numeral “0” in the code! There are games and lots of social media activities on almost every platform you can imagine – the hashtag to search for is #FastenOffYAL.
If you’re near Flintshire and want to expand your knitting skills, I’m teaching two workshops at Shaz’s Shabby Chic in Buckley in December. Knitting Cables (both with and without a cable needle!) on Dec 6th and Introduction to Lace Knitting on Dec 13th. Both workshops are 6.30-8.30pm and are £25 per person including yarn.
That’s all from me today – apart from to let you know that my car door got fixed. The electrics in the lock had failed. Stay warm, stay safe and I tell you all about the second part of the Twisted workshop (which happens this Thursday) next time. K x
