This workshop is perfect for both absolute beginners to knitting and those returning after a long break.
You will learn the sturdy cable cast-on technique, how to knit, purl, ‘read’ your knitting, count your rows, cast off, work a simple seam and stuff your work to make a cute little stuffed owl.
£30 Price, includes all materials and the loan of 4mm knitting needles which you can purchase at the end of the workshop. (You can bring your own 4mm knitting needles if you have them). Also includes drinks and cake.
To book click ‘Going’ on the Facebook event and PM Ditzy Rose or email Nikki@ditzyrose.co.uk Full payment required before the day.
Learn this amazing technique to create a wonderfully squishy fabric. We’ll cover the basic two colour brioche stitch, the terminology, as well as a brioche increase (and maybe even a decrease!).
Bring 5mm circular knitting needles (60-80cm long) with you. Needles must be circular for brioche knitting, though we will be knitting flat, not in the round.
Skills required – cast-on, cast-off, knit & purl.
Refreshments can be bought from the shop during the workshop.
We have a couple of dear friends who we see about once a year. We meet up in a different place each year, stay overnight somewhere, eat out, explore the local area and generally have a great time. A couple of years ago we went to Lichfield – which led to the cardigan of the same name! Even though we don’t see each other very often, it never feels as though a year has passed since the last time.
(Speaking of Lichfield the cardigan, I was right about the sleeve cap length after all: the added rows didn’t work once I seamed the pieces together. There were other errors that had crept in to the pattern during the editing process too, so if you are knitting Lichfield, please check out the errata page!)
Last weekend we met up with our friends in Leek. None of us had been there before and we didn’t know it was the same weekend as the Leek Blues and Americana Festival, so the town was pretty full. It was nice to hear live music coming from lots of venues while we were there. We stayed at The Fountain Inn, which had a really cosy and friendly atmosphere, and the room was very well appointed. Before we went out to dinner at The Napoli (awesome vegan options!), we had drinks in the snug and I was able to just nip upstairs to grab my knitting! I find I’m able to follow conversations and relax more when I have my knitting in hand.
The photo I took was of an almost completed first sleeve of my Umbriel.
That sleeve is now done and the second sleeve is well on the way, with the short row sleeve cap nearly completed.
Whilst in Leek we had a good mooch around the shops. Naturally I found the yarn shop, Love My Socks, which is also called Moorlands Wool and Crafts. I had a lovely chat with Amanda, the lady who owns the shop, while I was buying a gorgeous skein of &KnitCo sock yarn, and it turned out that we’d met and nattered at the Buxton Wool Gathering in May!
I popped back on Sunday and got a few more little treats as well: a Chiaogoo 2mm 80cm circular needle (I’m embracing Magic Loop for socks), an Emma Ball tin for my larger stitch markers and a little tin of stitch holder cables from Ducky Darlings.
These are the same type of cords I got from All Wool That Ends Wool and I’m very pleased to say they all fit in the same tin!
Sue (my lovely wife) has quite a collection of googly eyes and every now and then they come out to play – she got some cracking shots on Saturday evening.
My version was a little more sedate, but the pizza box looks quite happy!
This was another brilliant feature of The Napoli – although our sharing starter was so huge (and delicious) that we couldn’t finish our pizzas, they were very happy to box up the rest for us to take away.
All in all we had a fabulous trip to Leek, despite the weather – it rained most of the time. We also very much enjoyed the craft/flea market in the town on Sunday morning.
This morning I got my new lenses fitted into my glasses frame. I can see brilliantly at distance (trees have leaves even when they’re far off – who knew?!?) and close up reading again, but you should see me at the moment; I keep shifting position trying to get the right distance between me and the laptop screen for optimum focus whilst experimenting with which part of the lenses to look through! The joy of varifocal lenses – I will work it out fairly soon, I’m sure.
As promised, my Bodelwyddan sock pattern was released on October 1st (after we got back from Leek!) and 50% of all sales throughout October will be going to Treasure Chest YGC. If you are a sock knitter or know someone who is, please consider buying this pattern and helping to support a great cause. Truly Hooked also has a wonderful colour way that she’s dyed especially for Treasure Chest and 50% of proceeds from that will also be donated. So you could knit Bodelwyddan using the Treasure Chest sock colour way and even store them in the limited edition project bag made by The Woolly Tangle! £10 from the sale of each of these bags will be going to Treasure Chest YGC during October. And they’re sweater sized project bags too.
I am very excited about Barragán Shawl Knitalong beginning in The Knitter. The shawl is going on some adventures this evening that I should be able to tell you all about next week!
Issue 194 is out tomorrow containing Part One of the pattern! I have wound my yarn and am ready to cast on with everyone. The 150g skeins are huge when wound – and they actually weigh about 160g. You even get a woven fabric label if you get a McIntosh yarn kit.
Remember you can still sign up to subscribe to The Knitter and get the yarn kit as a free gift (although there are limited quantities of the yarn for the subscription offer, so check carefully! Your first issue would be Issue 195, so you’d still need to buy Issue 194).If you don’t want to subscribe to the mag (or already do), but really like this yarn – and who wouldn’t as it’s hand-dyed 100% British Bluefaced Leicester – you can buy a yarn kit direct from James McIntosh.
I’m going to leave you with this little teaser.
It’s called Twisted and it’s a brioche moebius cowl. There is a two-part workshop next month (2nd and 16th November) at Yarn O’clock where you can learn how to knit it! I’ll tell you more next week.
Until then, take care and do stuff that makes you happy. K x
The past week has been so busy, and my intention of picking raspberries every couple of days has gone slightly sideways. The high winds today have done some other harvesting for us and there are quite a few windfalls on the grass waiting to be picked up tomorrow. The last two tomatoes are ripening on the kitchen window sill – they are tigerella tomatoes and their stripes are emerging nicely as they change colour.
Various projects I have been working on have also come to fruition and are ready to harvest this week! Partly as a result of these I have been updating my homepage of the website and I have to say I’m pleased with how it’s looking.
You may have seen on my newsletter or social media posts that I have something very exciting happening with The Knitter. Barragán Shawl is The Knitter’s Autumn 2023 knit-along, designed by me in McIntosh’s BFL (Bluefaced Leicester) yarn. It’s a gorgeous British wool and the colours I chose, MY Serenity and MY Joy, are stunning.
The shawl is called Barragán, named after the Mexican architect, Louis Barragán (1902 – 1988) who is quoted as saying, “A garden must combine the poetic and the mysterious with a feeling of serenity and joy”. With serenity and joy being the names of the colourways I chose it seemed absolute serendipity when I came across this quote and I had to name the shawl after him.
You can pre-order a yarn kit direct from McIntosh. (By using this link, if you decide to buy a kit, I get a little commission!). Part One of the KAL is out in Issue 194 of The Knitter on October 4th, so in order to receive your yarn kit in time, pre-order by September 29th.
Another piece of exciting design release news relates to my Petulia shawl which I designed for RiverKnits. It is going to be launched at Yarndale, this coming weekend (September 23rd and 24th)!
There are still some tickets available for timed entry to Yarndale on the Sunday if you haven’t got one yet. The pattern is a big one; there are two shawl shapes within the one pattern. Both versions use the same two-colour brioche leaf motif as a structural building block. The smaller version of Petulia is symmetrical and uses 2 x 50g skeins of Chimera and 1 x 100g skein of Nene 4ply, the other is larger, asymmetrical and flamboyant and uses 3 x 50g skeins of Chimera and 2 x 100g skeins of Nene 4ply. If you’re going to Yarndale look out for my large Petulia shawl on the RiverKnits stand – they’re on stand F1!
Just as with Tiffany and Agnes, Petulia will be available exclusively from RiverKnits for the first six months, after which I will be selling the pattern as well.
I finished sewing the zipped project bags on Thursday and was really pleased with how they turned out. I even discovered that my sewing machine has a thread cutter on the side, which I had no idea about, despite having had my sewing machine for over 6 years – doh!
Sewing the tabs on the side was the trickiest part – 12 layers of fabric, 2 layers of fusible fleece and a zip to keep lined up! I’ll be adding them to the website later this week.
Yarn Gathering on Sunday was fantastic. We had a dozen wonderful vendors and over 160 visitors. I really loved seeing all the people in The Daniel Owen Centre having a good time, chatting about yarn, weaving, crochet, knitting and dyeing.
Some of the best moments of the day for me were when knitters came to show me their finished projects, either on a photo or in real life – I wish I’d thought to take some pics of them, but it only occurred to me afterwards…
There have been some great posts on social media, with folk showing off their purchases. The day ran smoothly, after the slightly scary moment when we opened the fire doors to the car park and the alarm went off! Fortunately one of the lovely people from the venue arrived a few minutes later, turned it off and all was quiet again!
My workshops at Shaz’s Shabby Chic are going well and I’ve booked some more dates in for October – more details to follow very soon. Working with Colour – Slip Stitch Knitting is tomorrow (you can still book a place!) and I’ve had fun digging out samples of my designs that use slip stitches to create colour patterns.
If you want to expand (or begin) your knitting skills why not sign up for a workshop? The October workshops will be available to book by the end of week.
Yet again, the day is running away from me and I need to get this posted. I will tell you all about how tomorrow’s workshop goes next week and hopefully I’ll have some news about how Petulia was received at Yarndale.
The song ‘Follow Your Arrow‘ by Kacey Musgraves has been a proper ear-worm for me this week. I’ve even been singing it in the shower! If you’ve never heard it, I highly recommend a listen.
There are changes are afoot in our household, with my lovely wife moving on from primary school headship to a new pathway of her own devising, and I may be doing some musical stuff in our local community in the near future as well as continuing to knit up a storm. I’ve even been brave and set foot on a big wheel – the one pictured in the main image of Llandudno pier! Once we got moving (after sitting at the top for far too long) it was quite spectacular.
In the meantime, I am preparing for four knitting workshops this month and for Yarn Gathering on Sunday 17th! As part of this, there has been a lot of printing happening today. As you might expect, some of the printing has been patterns, but there have also been posters, risk assessments, pattern spreadsheets and public liability insurance certificates!
A slightly less fun part of today has been trying to find out why my car insurance renewal quote for this year is 50% higher than last year’s premium. That’s without any changes to the policy (and no claims) at all! Fortunately I got to speak to a really helpful woman on the phone, explained the changes I do need to make, and she is going to ring me back on Friday when she’s heard back from the underwriters and then we’ll look at possible discounts. Argh. At least I know I’ll be speaking to the same person, so I won’t have to go through everything again from the beginning.
Admin is one of those things that has to be done and it’s something I generally don’t mind. Having had a week of visitors and then visiting Kent, the only work I’ve been doing is social media and knitting, so I’ve had to catch up with myself a bit today, which means I’m noticing the admin more than usual!
But the knitting? Well! I thought I might have moved on to the sleeves of Lichfield by today, didn’t I? Haha! I’ve done both the sleeves (apart from the very tops of them – I need to decide whether or not to knit the extra four rows added by the tech editor just before the final cast off rows) AND I only have two rows and the cast-off left to do on the neckband.
That means the shoulder seams are already done as well. Although, now I’ve seen the photos of it lying flat I think I might redo the neckband to shift the stitch pick up a little on the left hand front (right side of image). This will get rid of the little ‘pull-up’ I can see at the bottom of the neck band.
Do you see how the stitch pattern in the back panel lines up perfectly with that of the neckband? It does that for every size. That type of detail is important to me as it makes a design (and a garment knitted from it) look really finished and precise.
Once I’ve re-done the neckband and done the last little bits at the tops of the sleeve caps (I’ll probably add the extra rows in one sleeve, leave the balls of yarn attached, pin them to the body of the cardigan and decide which fit I like best, then redo the top of the other sleeve cap to match), that’s ALL the knitting done. Then it’s blocking time, seaming and weaving in the ends. With any luck (and if the weather isn’t too hot) I’ll be wearing it at Yarn Gathering, although I can’t sell the pattern myself until next January.
It’s been an eye-opener knitting a waist-length garment in my size. It’s so much quicker than something long that supposedly ‘hides’ your hips/bum, but in reality does nothing of the sort. That sounds pretty obvious when you think about it, but the full circumference of knitting happens at the bottom of a garment, so to take off 6-9 inches of fabric is a lot of knitting removed from the equation. This might make it sound as though I don’t enjoy knitting. I do – I love it. But I also know (and have been told by other knitters) that it can get very frustrating when it can literally take months to complete a garment when making a larger size. I also seem to be using slightly less yarn than I’d calculated which is interesting. I started each section with a new ball, but I only used 3 on the back, 2 on each sleeve and 1 on each front. It’s 1 so far on the neckband, but that might become 2. Add in a 10% buffer and we’re looking at 12 x 50g balls rather than 13 for size 7. Another saving! I can see potentially more waist-length garments (or ones with a waist-length option) in future designs…!
Anyway, I hope Yarn O’clock doesn’t mind my ‘borrowing’ this photo, but I thought this was an excellent placement of a diversion sign – and a great example of ‘follow your arrow’ too! Why not divert into a yarn shop (though ideally not while still in a car)? On the day of Yarn Gathering (September 17th, 10-4), Yarn O’clock will also be open from 1-2pm.
I wish I could share a pic of my desk with you right now. It’s rather overflowing with work! However, I can’t show you, because one of the things on it is the finished child’s cardigan that no-one will see until August, and there’s also piles of pattern printouts and schematics with various measurements relating to that. On the right side of the desk is a stack of stitch dictionaries with a small heap of knitted and blocked swatches on top, ready for the next design! I’ve even started using the top of my printer as a desk extension, which probably isn’t very good for it…
Now that it’s May we finally have some warmth here. I walked to the post office earlier with sandals on! I have good news on the seedlings too – they are sprouting well. As long as they survive we should have some homegrown broad beans, dwarf French beans, mange tout, coriander, and courgettes so far. I’m having to do regular sweeps of our click-together plastic-covered greenhouse to check for slugs and snails; I just lob them into the patch of ground elder and tell them to munch on the new shoots of that instead. Pics soon!
The cardigan is done and even has its buttons sewn on (pics in July when it’s published). I have recovered from the shock I had at the weekend end when I opened the pattern file only to discover several pages were missing! Fortunately I had printed the pattern out as I was working on it. I also discovered an older version saved in the back ups on ‘Time Machine’ from two weeks ago that mysteriously had more of the pattern than the current version and I was able to recover that, which saved quite a bit of re-typing.
I can’t imagine how five pages of a Word doc vanished, unless something went very wonky when I was using my new iPad and I accidentally deleted them without even realising? Something similar happened with my Excel spreadsheet file for the same design a few weeks ago too – maybe there’s something I’m leaning on on the screen? Losing work is NOT something I want to experience on a regular basis!
This afternoon I’ve been chomping through the numbers, double checking they all work and make sense – and result in a garment of the proportions intended for all sizes! I’m really pleased with the sample. It’s made using West Yorkshire Spinners Elements DK and includes two of the new seasons’ colours.
If you’ve been following my social media over the past week or so, you’ll know that I’ve been knitting my own version of Tiffany, one of the shawls I designed for RiverKnits. It uses their Nene 4ply Shadow Rainbow minis set and the colours are so rich and saturated that you could just sit and look at the yarn for hours. However, I had a shawl to knit – with the aim of having it ready to display at Buxton Wool Gathering, which is now only 5 days away!
This morning I finished the shawl and photographed it before I went on to block it.
I videoed the blocking process. It’s quite an ‘aggressive’ block and it tends to make my blocking mats lift up at the edges. You also need to put the pins into the mats at a steep angle to stop them pinging out. You’ll see in the vid that I end up weighing the edges of the blocking mats down. The end of the video is cut off as my phone ran out of space – the video was 37 minutes long at that point! Don’t worry though – I’ve edited it and sped it up A LOT so it now takes less than 90 seconds!
Blocking Tiffany
Yes, I really do measure each point of the shawl from the cast-on tab at the centre top of the shawl. This makes sure it’s a semicircle. The finished blocking is a heck of a lot larger than when the shawl comes off the needles, and you need to leave it pinned until it is completely dry. It will pull back in by about 3.5cm on the radius once the pins are removed and I think it will look stunning at the show.
Speaking of Buxton Wool Gathering, here’s a reminder of the details. It’s being held at Buxton Pavilion Gardens, St. John’s Road, Buxton, Derbyshire, SK17 6BE. There’s a pay and display car park and food and drink available both at the venue and in the town which is only a short stroll.
Please note that the show is on Sunday and Monday (as Saturday is the Coronation). Tickets bought in advance allow entry from 10am, tickets bought on the door allow entry from 11am.
Buxton is closely followed by Wool @J13 on May 13th and 14th!
My Moebius Knitting Workshop at Yarn O’clock on May 18th (£35, 6.30-9pm) still has a couple of places on it. If you want to understand and learn to create the unique structure of a true moebius ring and how this technique can be used for wonderful neckwear and more, this is the class for you! Learn two Moebius cast-ons and create a simple headband. Ring Anne at Yarn O’clock (01352 218082) to book a place!
I’ve also recently been invited to have a stall at the Cheshire Guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers Friendship Day the following weekend, which was a lovely surprise! If you’re a member of the guild or one of the other local guilds they invite to join them, you’ll see me there!
I think this is my busiest month yet in terms of events – everything is on my ‘where I’ll be‘ page on the website.
I’ll tell you all about how things went at Buxton next week! Til then, take care, enjoy the sunshine if you can, and do some stuff that makes you happy, K x
It’s been a full week, with much of it being dedicated to my next design commission. The pattern is written for the back and both fronts and for the sleeves up to the underarms. So, really it’s just the sleeve caps and the collar to do in terms of writing/grading. This design is in 10 sizes. The sample size required will be too small for me to wear once I get it back, but it does mean that it will take less time to knit! The yarn arrived a few days ago and it’s a really gorgeous, vibrant colour:
It’s a really soft pure wool yarn that I’ll tell you more about in the coming weeks. Later on today I’m going to cast-on the back for the sample! Hurrah!
This evening I’m teaching a stranded colour-work workshop at Yarn O’clock. Stranded colour-work is one of my favourite knitting techniques, as you’ll know if you’ve looked at my pattern pages. It used to almost always be referred to as Fair Isle knitting, but the term stranded colour-work is becoming more common now. The idea is having two contrasting yarns being used in each row, one as the background colour and one as the pattern colour, and handling the yarns so they create neat ‘floats’ or strands of yarn across the back and a consistent colour-work design on the front. I’ll be taking some of stranded designs with me this evening for the knitters to examine and help them understand what they are aiming for.
This is what they are going to be making:
I’ve left the yarn ends loose on this swatch deliberately so I can demonstrate how to weave the ends in tonight.
As well as working on my new design, I’ve been making good progress with my Umbriel sweater in Cirro from The Fibre Co. I found a few issues with numbers and mirrored instructions in the back shoulders and front of the pattern and have made a note of them. I ended up counting stitches in one row at least six times, along with checking the fabric for dropped stitches, before going back to the pattern and doing some maths. One too many stitches instructed to be knit after an initial cast-off caused me quite a headache for a good few minutes! I have now finished the whole body and I’m pleased with it:
The next stage is to seam the shoulders. Stitches are then picked up around the armholes to work the sleeves top down. I might do both at once, or I might just make notes of any changes I have to make as I go. Knitting two sleeves at once avoids the ‘sleeve island’ that many knitters often feel marooned on, and it does mean that the sleeves are highly likely to match – so long as you remember to swap between the two sleeves every one or two rounds. However, I often prefer to make sure a sleeve works for me, writing down any changes to the pattern, going quite slowly with the first and then knit the second one more quickly from my notes. Also, there is always the possibility of getting the two balls of yarn tangled or more seriously mixed up by knitting on a sleeve with the yarn from the other, or forgetting to switch between the two or it just feeling like a sleeve is taking twice as long as it should (because you’re making two at once)!
In preparation for Buxton Wool Gathering, I’ve printed even more patterns over the past couple of days, including the final version of Am Byth, which is also available as an update for those who’ve already bought it, and Bargello Aurora Wrap which was first published in The Knitter in September (Issue 180). Before the printing could take place, the photos had to be taken and much laughter and fun was had on Saturday afternoon in the garden as Sue took over 200 pics! At least with so many to choose from I can be ruthless about the ones I don’t like – these are usually the ones that catch me looking gormless or pulling an odd face!
Am BythBargello Aurora Wrap
Am Byth is already available in my online stores, and Bargello Aurora Wrap is available as part of The Knitter issue 180 either as a back issue or as an ebook on Ravelry. I’m going to add Bargello Aurora Wrap as a single pattern to my online stores after the show at Buxton this weekend.
I’m really looking forward to Buxton. I’ll be heading there on Friday to set up in the afternoon and my lovely wife will join me later in the weekend as my ‘booth babe’ – the amazing person who talks enthusiastically to knitters, helps find things, get cups of tea and holds the fort when I need the loo!
It’s only £5 entry for the day or £8 for a weekend ticket, which is very good value I think. Held in the Buxton Pavilion Gardens, the show is open 10am-4pm on both days, with entry from 11am for those who buy tickets on the door.
The only potential spanner in the works at the moment is the weather forecast. We woke up to a centimetre of snow here in North Wales this morning. It’s all gone now – even though it took some of it until about an hour ago to melt where the sun wasn’t shining. I usually like snow, but not when I need to travel in it. Still, the tyres are all good and I’m going to allow myself plenty of time. But please keep your fingers crossed for good weather for me anyway?
I’ll tell you all about how it went next week! ‘Til then, take care, stay warm and do something that makes you happy. K x
It’s been a productive week and one that got busier as it went along! It seems as though my work is building momentum currently and that’s really quite exciting. This wouldn’t have been possible while I was a full-time school teacher as I just wasn’t able to put the time in to yarn-based stuff to get things happening.
The socks are finished as I intended and, as you can see, they fit me really well. I can’t wear them ‘properly’ yet as I want to use them as a teaching aid at my sock workshops at Yarn O’clock on Thursday and there wouldn’t be time to wash and dry them between now and Thursday evening. The yarn is from RiverKnits – it’s the cormo wool 4-ply version of their 2022 Open Day Special yarn, dyed with Lola from Third Vault Yarns, and the colourway is called ‘Ankh Morpork’. The pattern is the basic sock pattern I always use for me; 2.25mm needles, 80 stitches to cast on, rib for a while, stocking stitch for a while, heel flap, heel turn, gusset decreases to 68 or 72 sts (68 in this case), work foot straight for a bit, toe decreases, graft. What some people call a ‘vanilla’ sock.
Yesterday’s beginner knitting class went well. It was still just the one lady attending and she got on really well. I forgot to take a photo of her bunting triangle, so instead, here’s a pic of the one I made. She did some extra eyelet rows in hers too! I rather like the extra eyelets – it keeps it interesting and add extra practice of yarn overs too! Our next class will be in two weeks, with the focus on using knit and purl stitches to create texture. I’ll be adding it as an event to Facebook to see if that helps encourage folk to book a place.
I chose my next fibre and started spinning it. I’ve got 200g of this lovely Bluefaced Leicester wool. It’s dyed by FibreHut and the colourway is called ‘Faded Blooms’ which I think suits it well. As I’ve got more fibre to play with, I decided to spin this one a little thicker. The singles are (mostly) coming out around a DK weight and I’m hoping the plied yarn will be somewhere between an aran and a chunky weight. I do need to concentrate to avoid drifting back to spinning finely though. It’s certainly eating up the fibre more quickly spinning this way!
The final section of our mystery knit-along, Am Byth, was published on Friday and I’ve done two videos to help folk with certain technical aspects. One was for the 5 stitches to 1 stitch decrease and I’ve been absolutely astounded at how many views it has had on Twitter – at the time of writing, over 1700! I will add this one to the website as well. The other video I recorded was for one of the cast-off options. it’s a sewn cast-off that gives a fabulous finish to a ribbed fabric, but it’s not one that everyone knows.
Also, now the larger cables are complete, can you see why I called it ‘Am Byth’? Am byth is Welsh for ‘forever’, and these closed cables look like the eternity symbol (when you hold the knitting on its side!).
I’ve also started getting ready for Buxton Wool Gathering – which is now less than four weeks away!! These are the filing cases I transport and store my printed patterns in and I’ve been going through my patterns spreadsheet, deciding which patterns I need more copies of, and I started printing more out today. The next thing to do is to go through the kits and see what I’ve got and what I could do with replenishing. Although, at a pretty big yarn show (there will be 54 vendors) it’s not as if folk won’t be able to get some gorgeous yarns from the other stalls to knit my designs with.
Part Two of Branwen is in the new issue of The Knitter that is in the shops from Thursday. It’s a knit-along shawl (but not a mystery) using West Yorkshire Spinners Fleece. It’s a lovely DK yarn made with Bluefaced Leicester wool. There are three more parts to the pattern after this one, and I will of course be publishing the whole pattern once I receive the rights back. This also means that if you want to read the interview with me in Issue 185 you have one day left to visit WHSmith and buy a copy!
Yesterday I had two more design submissions accepted which is lovely and very exciting, and one of the reasons for added busying! I set up the Excel spreadsheet for the first one that’s due and started working on that this afternoon. I bet you didn’t know designing knitting patterns was so glamorous, eh?! Seriously though, it’s amazing how much easier the process is with a few formulae up my sleeve – it helps turns one set of numbers into ten far more quickly than I could ever do on my own. Afterwards, I go through it all and make sure it’s still elegant and all the sizes represent the design concept ‘authentically’. Wow, that sounds a bit pretentious, but it basically means if you have a sweater with a design where, for example, a cable hits the shoulder just by the neckline in one size, it needs to be positioned so that it hits the shoulder in the same place in all the sizes. The geek in me loves playing with the numbers to make it all work.
There have been one or two less fabulous things that have happened this week too – but that’s the way of the world, isn’t it? One of the things was that I broke ANOTHER tooth this morning whilst eating my breakfast. At least I already have a dentist appointment in two weeks… I think I need to go back to porridge oats stirred through plant-based yoghurt, it’s far less hazardous than a bowl of cereal!
Anyway, take care one and all and don’t go clicking any links in your notifications until you’re absolutely certain you know who it’s from! And do something that makes you happy this week. K x
Sometimes photographing knitting has surprising results! I was trying to get a shot of something that is 220cm long and I couldn’t fit it all in, so decided to try the panoramic feature – I wasn’t expecting it to give me five right feet!
It seems appropriate as a photo for today (though I’ve cropped it to remove the knitting as that is yet to be published), as I want to write about sock knitting.
There are many ways to knit a sock: top down, bottom up or even flat and seamed!
Heels can have a variety of structures including the afterthought heel where you knit the whole sock as a straight tube and then add the heel in afterwards.
Needles also give a range of choice – double pointed needles (dpns), a tiny circular needle, two circular needles or one long one using the magic loop technique. There are also flexible needles that are a cross between dpns and circular needles that you use in a set of three.
Depending on the needles you use, you can knit one sock and then the other, or both at the same time – or even knit one inside the other!
With all these options there are bound to be some techniques that a knitter favours or dislikes.
Personally, although I generally love using circular needles for most things, when knitting socks I tend to return time and again to double pointed needles – those or the flexible version.
I also prefer to knit them one at a time, top down, with a reinforced slip stitch heel flap and a gusset structure. My lovely wife and I both find this type of sock fits us best. Short row heels are great for self-striping yarn, but I haven’t yet managed to get the fit right for myself.
I’ve finally reached the foot of the second sock of the pair I started in October (!) using RiverKnits‘ Open Day 2022 Special in the colourway ‘Ankh Morpork’, having finished the gusset decreases this afternoon.
The joy of hand knitted socks is that you can make sure they fit you: if you have particularly pointy toes you can adjust the toe shaping to suit; if you have one foot a different length or shape than the other you can make them slightly different; if, like me, your ankles/lower legs are larger than your feet your socks can have more stitches in the leg than the foot. Shop bought socks do not offer this type of customisation.
For me, once I reach the heel flap on a sock my progress tends to speed up. I think because there are small clear sections it’s easier to plan and see the end result: I’ll knit the heel flap and heel turn one day, the gusset decreases another and then I’m on to the foot and it’s not long until the toe decreases start. That might also explain why I’m not a big fan of afterthought heels – knitting a long tube with no shaping until the toe feels a bit endless!
Heel Flap, Heel Turn, Sock Gusset
I’m teaching a workshop on sock knitting at Yarn O’clock on February 16th, 6.30pm – 9pm. There are one or two spaces left. Contact Anne at Yarn O’clock if you want to book.
We won’t be working on a full size sock, but one very similar to the advent mini socks; that means you’ll be able to work through all the sections of a top down heel flap sock in one workshop.
My intention is for my RiverKnits socks to be finished by the workshop so folk can see how the structure scales up to full size.
In case you thought I’d forgotten about it, my Am Byth MKAL is all up to date! Part Three will be released on Friday 10th and I will be uploading a video for one of the cast-off options. I’ll share my completed Parts 1 and 2 here next week (and on social media this Thursday).
The garden is showing signs of spring! We have snowdrops, primroses, hellebores, cyclamen and crocuses in flower and there are some very early daffodils about to open. I can’t remember if I told you we planted about 70 in the late autumn, mostly in the lawn, with flowering times from late Jan/early Feb until late May. It’s good to see them start to emerge. The rhubarb is also starting to peak above ground level again as well. Here is one of the front garden borders with lots of lovely flowers in bloom:
As you can see, I don’t believe in removing all dead leaves from the borders – the worms will do that eventually and I think it helps protect the ground from the worst frosts.
That’s all from me today. Take care, stay warm and do something that makes you happy this week. K x
It’s one of those week’s where everything is happening at once and some of them are coming to fruition after quite a while!
I’m on the final flag of my Safe Space cross stitch! Once that is complete I shall do the final bit of cross stitch (the word “Welcome” in the middle), then crack on with the outlining and blackwork.
I do want to get this finished in 2022 and it’s starting to look more feasible, which is very encouraging.
On Thursday I will be teaching my Introduction to Two Colour Brioche Knitting workshop. I’ve re-jigged the course and re-written the notes, and therefore also re-knitted the samples! We’re going to start with straight brioche knitting with a garter stitch border so folk can get comfortable with the brioche stitches before having to deal with the fancy cast-on. We’re also using DK yarn this time, so the stitches will be bigger and it will be easier to see how it all works.
Brioche frontBrioche back
Once the straight sample is done we’ll move on to the Italian two-colour brioche cast-on and add an increase and a decrease into the mix!
Brioche leaf frontBrioche leaf back
On Friday I’m launching Nevern Lap Blanket on my website, Payhip, Ravelry and Lovecrafts. Newsletter subscribers have had their discount codes already! The pattern is already live on KnitPicks and it’s selling well so far. If you’re not a subscriber and you can’t wait until Friday you can buy it there!
Nevern Lap Blanket on sofaNevern Lap Blanket on floor
And on Saturday I have a stall at the Christmas Fayre at The Rise in Buckley! It’s open 10am – 4pm, so if you’re in Buckley and you still have any Christmas shopping to do, this will be the place to come. (This pic is from a post on their facebook page in October, so there probably aren’t stalls still available now!)
I will have my knitting patterns, kits and pyrography (wood-burning) decorated coasters, hearts, wooden spoons and spatulas with me. I’m really looking forward to it, and have been adding a couple of items to my products in preparation – sheep- themed wooden spoons!
Among other kits, I will have the Mini SocksAdvent Calendar kits with me. You may think this a bit strange as Advent has already begun, but bear with me… If you start now for next year and knit one sock every week or so you will be ready without having to knit lots and lots all at once!
Speaking of Advent and Christmas things, how cool is this post box topper? It’s on the post box outside the Spar in Buckley and was made by a group of knitters who meet regularly in the town. A huge amount of work has gone into it and it looks very impressive. It makes me smile every time I go to the post office (which is in the Spar) – a frequent activity at present!
I do have a very exciting piece of news to share with you. Next March I will be a vendor at the Buxton Wool Gathering! This is held in the Buxton Pavilion Gardens and tickets are only £5 for the day, or £8 for the whole weekend, which is brilliant value. There will be over 50 exhibitors there alongside me, so lots to enjoy as well as the beautiful town of Buxton to explore.
I’ve paid for my table, booked the accommodation, but somehow when the leaflets came through the post that was what made it feel totally real.
As well as all this I’ve been selecting a few more patterns from the #FastenOffYAL pattern sale (which finishes at midnight on 8th December Eastern Standard Time – that’s 5am on the 9th GMT), and this morning I wound the yarn for the next design I’m going to cast on. It’s Confluence Cowl by Mary W Martin and it’s a new technique to me as well as being a pattern from a new-to-me designer. Two yarns are held together and knitted together for the main fabric and then some magic is worked so that there are different cables on each side of the fabric! I’m using two colours of Amble from The Fibre Co. It’s a sport weight rather than fingering weight yarn, but it’s so soft and I think it will work really well.
All in all, the rest of the week is quite a busy one, but in a very good way. The Christmas presents are mostly posted (or wrapped if they’re not going in the post) and the cards are written, so I can tick the most pressing aspects of home Christmas prep off the list, which is a great feeling at this stage. I even remembered to feed the Christmas cake with brandy at the weekend – you should have seen my lovely wife’s face when she walked into the kitchen at 11am to see me putting the brandy bottle back on the shelf…!
That’s all from me today – quite enough, I hear you say – so I will leave you with this: Mae smygu’n ofnadwy, dw i’n hoffi cerddoriaeth a dw i eisiau paned a bisgedi! (Translation: Smoking is terrible, I like music and I want a cup of tea and some biscuits!)
Take care one and all, K x
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