January, sick and tired, you've been hanging on me

Oh it was just a big old washout.  It just seemed like a constant barrage of rain and storms.  At least I am fortunate enough to live at the top of a hill so no flooding around these parts unlike the poor folk down in Somerset and the South West.

On the plus side, I did make a few bits and pieces;

Ripple crochet scarf - present for a work colleague

Slouchy socks for my mum

Groovy Girlfriend Earwarmer  also for my mum

Birthday socks for Big Girl's Friend "E"

Myboshi hats for the girls with MASSIVE pompoms!

It was that rainy and miserable.  We didn't get out anywhere in January.

Did go along to the Lakeland 50 recce/night run though.

Total miles running: 71.4
Total Hiking: 14.89

Crochet Cushions

I bought a "Lucy" pack of Stylecraft DK a while back and was intending to make a ripple blanket with it. However, it just didn't progress much and has lingered forlornly in a basket for quite a long time so it was time to do something about it. I ripped it all back, cursing my weaving in.  Can anyone tell me why on earth weaving in will persist in poking out when you don't want it to but is almost impossible to unravel when you don't like the piece anymore. It is one of life's great mysteries isn't it.

Anyway, I wasn't feeling in a blanket mood so decided on cushions instead.  That way I can have it all. Granny squares, patchwork squares and ripples. In fact, anything I feel the urge to crochet.  So here you have the first two cushions. Fraternal rather than identical just as I like it!

Jolly cushons

Patchwork granny squares

Giant granny square

Finished and almost finished items

Finished my chunky cowl. The one that I spotted a mistake on and pulled back.

Properly executed cabling on this cowl now

It was worth it though because I think it looks great! It's supposed to be a gift for someone but I'm having second thoughts. I rather like it and it is soooooo warm and cosy on. Hmm, I may just have to keep it all to myself.

Big chunky cowl with fabulous buttons, looking quite purple in this shot

It's an odd sort of colourway called "Wild Pansy" and depending on the light can look anything from purple to grey and a myriad of shades in between. That's probably why I like it so much. Oh and the buttons, I really, really, really, really like them. They cost more than the yarn and are polished wood. So nice to touch. I don't think that the intended recipient will appreciate them. But, of course, I would definitely appreciate them. Absolutely, completely and utterly.

Close up of gorgeous button!

Looking a more grey colour in the bright sunlight

I can't swap them for cheaper alternatives because I can't find anything that looks as good. Difficult decision ahead.

I am halfway through another pair of socks for himself. One sock complete and the other about halfway down the cuff. It's a bog standard 68 stitch sock in plain stocking stitch. The fancy self striping yarn does so much of the work for you that there is simply no need for any fancy knitted patterning as well. It's a bright Regia Jacquard colourway called Florence and he likes it even though it has some girly pink stripes in it!

Bright and cheerful Regia Jacquard sock yarn

I am also crocheting like a mad woman whenever I get a few spare minutes. Little crochet mini Christmas stockings. I'm aiming to turn them into a reusable advent calendar. Got five done so far, so another nineteen left to go. Got until Friday to finish them off.  Wish me luck!

Cute little Christmas Mini Stockings

On the needles

Here's what's occurring on the needles at the moment;

Sweetheart Dress

Sweetheart Dress by Tora Froseth

It's a super cute little dress that is knitted from the top down in one piece.  I'm using a Bergere de France yarn called 'Caline' in the Charlotte colourway.  Loving the cute heart motif around the top.  I think I will try and incorporate the same motif on the bottom edge even though it isn't in the original pattern

Heart motif repeated around the yoke.

There are also a couple of ongoing blankets.  There's a crochet ripple (shown) and I really must get my act together and work a bit more on my sock yarn blankie.  It's been languishing "in progress" for many, many months now.  Naughty me!

Crochet ripple blanket

Colourful, scrappy granny

This is not yet a finished object.  It's a work in progress really but it has been huge fun so far.  I am a bit of a hoarder you see, and there is a massive collection of half used up balls of yarn that I keep, you know, just in case!  I desperately need more room (for more yarn, of course) so it needed using up.  Can't bear to, gulp, gasp, throw it out, goodness me no!

So may I present to you my colourful, scrappy granny blanket.  Be prepared for many gratuitous pictures ahead!

Ok, here's what I did.  I decided to do 6 round granny squares.  2 rounds per colour.  I decided to join as I went along and pick random colours all the way through.  Huge fun getting out all of my leftovers and picking out the scheme for the next square.

Currently running at 9x9 squares, 81 in total.  At this point I haven't decided whether to stop or carry on for a bit.

It's not a bad size as it is.  But it is very square.  I might add a couple of rows in one direction to make it a bit more rectangular.  I just can't make up my mind.

It's quite snuggly, as you can see and I don't think I have repeated any of the squares exactly at all yet.  Some of them have the same colours but not in the same order.  I am loving the randomness of it all and the brightness.

Get your sunglasses on! It's very bright

More colourful granny squares

The leftover yarn is mostly stylecraft special DK but there are also odd leftover balls of James C Brett's TopValue, King Cole's Pricewise and other acrylic double knitting yarns (ball bands gone astray so could be anything!).

New Babies and Blankets

Another new baby in the family.  Little baby S arrived on June 4th.  A beautiful little girl and a sister for baby O.  All doing well.

Little Girl S

This meant another excuse for yarn and crochet! Yay!  Here's the granny stripe I made for baby S

Rainbow bright colours because we didn't know what flavour little baby was going to be.  I don't really do neutral - just bright, bright, bright.

Also a work colleague just told me that she was expecting.  She knows she is having a girl so here is the little blankie I made for her. Still bright, bright, bright but using girlier colours. and granny squares instead of striped.

Chillin' in da crochet

School holidays.  Gotta love them.  The girls get themselves up, head downstairs, make their own breakfasts and chill out until we surface a bit later on. In complete contrast to the shouty, last minute mornings of a typical school day.

This is the site that greeted me most mornings this week

Chillin' in da crochet

I love seeing my girls wrapped up in blankets that I have made... makes me feel totally justified in buying more yarn and making more blankets.

If you look carefully, you may just spot a child amongst all the crochet!

Mystery Crochet Hooks

Got home today to find a parcel containing 2 gorgeous knitpro symfonie crochet hooks.  Size 4mm and 5mm.

Wonderful. 

Only I have absolutely no idea how they came to arrive here.  There's no note or address or anything with them.

They could be a gift, or a prize or anything.

Thank you whoever sent them! 

Yarnival

Yarnival Woolly Advert in the Post Office Window

Heard about this event via Ravelry and simply had to go as it was in Trawden which is not too far from me.  About 10 miles in fact, so in a moment of absolute bravado (madness is more like it though) I announced my intention to cycle there and back!

I chose a route and set off.  Powered along the bypass to Barrowford - bit of a slog on the uphill but wonderful on the downhill stretch. This will be a piece of cake, I thought.  Turned off and was pleased to find a handy underpass system to guide me under the M65 and I headed into Nelson.  I had decided to take a rural route but had only checked it out on Google Maps..... silly woman.  It looked so innocuous and of course there are no contours on Google Maps so I was completely unprepared for the one and a half miles of hill that is Barkerhouse Road!  And then just when I thought  I was at the top there was even more hill to go up.  It took me ages.  But I did it.  Hooray for me.  Sweaty and with a face the colour of beetroot I must say the twisty downhill bit was good fun.

Heading into the village of Trawden I suddenly realised that I hadn't made a note of the building that I was headed for and was a bit worried that after all the hill related hassle of getting there it would be all in vain. I needn't have worried as the wonderful organisers had been busy...

There was no mistaking the venue as there was yarn graffiti everywhere and very jolly it was too.  The best use I've ever seen fuzzy yarn put to on the Trawden sign!

I especially loved the bicycle.  It is really quite spectacular don't you think.  Inside there was a small but choice selection of stalls and happenings and some delicious cakes on sale in the cafe.  You got a free brew with your entry ticket which was really nice.  The turnout was pretty good. Hundreds of people making the overall event a real success.

I met some really interesting, quirky and cool people too.

Pete from Spindlers 2

Pete from Spindlers 2 was demonstrating hand spinning and has some simply gorgeous spindles for sale too.

Beautiful wooden spindles from Spindlers 2

Freyalyn was also spinning but this time with a wheel rather than by hand.

Freyalyn in action

She also had lots and lots of truly gorgeous hand-dyed fibres and yarns.  Had to treat myself to some which I have neglected to take a piccie of...silly me.

Some of Freyalyn's sumptuous hand-dyed sock yarn. Yummy

And there was also the lovely textile and button items from Handcrafted Textiles , braiding kits from Berlin Braids and a delicious selection of yarns from the Hawthorn Tree to name but a few.

Kate, event organiser and purveyor of gorgeous yarns at the Hawthorn Tree

There was also an ongoing knit and natter in the cafe area where lots of lovely work was displayed.  There were scouts and cubs getting stuck into knitting and lots of other informational stalls too.  There was a super cute Ronaldsay sheep with two 3 week old lambs outside but didn't get a decent shot of them - the lambs kept jumping about and being scampish!

Displays of knitting and crochet pieces - I especially liked the green monster made by pupils at Trawden Forest Primary School.

Decided to take a different route home.  Just couldn't face having to go back up that massive hill again. Took the opposite way out of Trawden and after a bit of guesswork and following the advice gleaned from one of the Yarnival chaps, found my way back via some back streets, an unexpected nature reserve and the canal before rejoining the bypass at Barrowford.  Much easier and a lot flatter route than the way there.  Even the sudden downpour of rain didn't bother me all that much.  Was a bit saddle sore when I got home though.

Took my new iPhone with me and all the photos were taken using it.  They are ok - not used to the phone so lots have my finger over the viewfinder!! Also used the GPS to find out where I was when unsure.  Nick was able to track my progress too so that was pretty cool - he would have been able to pinpoint where exactly I was if I'd needed to be picked up at all!

All in all a really great event.  I hear there is talk of next year's event so maybe it'll be back again next year. I do hope so.  Although I will choose a different route to cycle next time!!

Rainbow Blanket

There are a couple of babies on the horizon in the family in the coming months so that is one excellent reason to be cracking on with some little blankies.

This is the first and it's a rainbow. I'm really enjoying it so far.

It's based on the Neat Ripple of Attic 24 fame.  I've used a mixture of Stylecraft Special DK (cream, Jaffa, Bright Green) and Patons Fab.  Chained 140 to start and am doing a single row of the cream with 2 rows of each colour in between. Really bright and fun.

Crochet Watch

In the course of searching for the signs of spring, also caught glimpses of other stuff too.

Check out the granny square blanket on the window sill

I had to take the photo a bit to the side or the owners would have thought I was some kind of peeping tom I'm sure!  Really enjoyed spotting that, so imagine how surprised I was to spot this as well!

A really huge granny square blankie hanging out to dry.  A huge, cheery colourful one at that!

What a jolly surprise!

Pretty little circles

Just look at this bag of crochet loveliness.

Almost good enough to eat

Looks like a bag of sweeties

You may remember this post. I was intending to make a ripple blanket for Little Girls room but have had a change of heart. Will keep you posted.

Here's another shot of the pretty little circles

Mmm... yummy

A rainbow in my project bag

Top Row: Fondant, Lipstick, Shrimp, Saffron
Bottom Row: Spring Green, Cloud Blue, Bluebell, Wisteria

I am skint as anything at the moment, totally brassic, but decided to splash out on some rainbow loveliness.  It is bargainous Stylecraft Special DK so it's a fairly low key splurge.  I'll be embarking on a ripply blanket for younger  daughter.  It will be a mix of Attic 24/Sucrette in looks.

I've noticed some pain in my hands and especially in my elbow lately.  I think I may have Knitters Elbow (otherwise known as Tennis Elbow).  Eek... I will just have to shovel in the ibuprofen and take it easy.  Can't possibly not knit.  Apparantly, you can get some kind of support bandage.... may have to check that out.  Curse the onslaught of age!!  Bits of me keep giving up the ghost.  My teeth and gums are knackered, my eyes are going and now I have achy joints.  It'll be stay press slacks and incontinence pants next..............

Crochet Crazy and a bit of a ta da!

Ooh control yourselves!  Yes some actual crafty content.  I have been having a few mad dos on things lately.  Crochet is at the forefront and I am slowing covering almost the entire house in bright crocheted stuff!

Square in a square cushion.  Pattern by Sarah London. Love it.  Love the regularity of the squares.  Love the neatness of it.  It's great!

Fab! I think there will be many more of these to come!!

Then I got a couple of round cushion pads and here's what I did.

As I've used relatively inexpensive acrylics for this, I haven't bothered to make an opening.  Just crocheted the 2 sides together.

Like it... it's cheerful.

Then I decided to do a granny circle for the other one. Using a combination of Andie Hanley's granny circle and Crochet with Raymond's mandela.

Hmm... it's ok but it's not as cool as the square in a square one.  So after lots of faffing about I give you .... ta da!... my circle in a circle! It's not quite finished yet but I have taken copious notes and will post full instructions shortly!

Can you see how it goes with the square in a square.  All the clusters line up in the same way and it looks very pleasing to the eye.  I'm very excited about it.

There are also blankets.  Lovely, lovely colourful blankets.

Finally - the finished Granny Stripe

Dog and daughter hijacking bright ripple