Moving Things On

Despite the build up to the music festival, I have spent the last couple of weeks reviewing all my work in progress. This is primarily due to the fact that I became absolutely disenchanted with the February socks, and just couldn’t face picking them up again. The new method I found for the jogless jog didn’t seem to work at all, and I don’t want them to end up looking like they looked before I frogged them!

So, in a rather bleak mood, I went through my other projects looking for some inspiration. The biggest white elephant in my project bag has to have been my Liydia sweater dress. I had just fallen out of love with knitting it so, consequently it was sitting there festering. This was not a kind way to treat something which, despite my current lack of love, had seen many hours of work poured into it. So I decided to follow the suggestion of a couple of friends, and give Liydia a new lease of life …. as a BAG!

I confess that the whole project was a bit Heath Robinson, but I am actually really pleased with the result… And what’s more, she’s been put to good use already!

I crocheted the pale pink border around the top edge of the bag, and added a button and crochet loop as a finishing touch.

I’ve now turned my attention to the beautiful Old Rose Wrap by Juju Vale at Loop which, again, has had several false starts since I bought the yarn. But I’m going great guns now, and am really enjoying the crochet.

It’s made up of individual crocheted squares which are then joined together on the 3rd and 4th sides as you go. There are 13 rows of 5 to do, but I’m loving the look of it already!

My final project rejuvenation has been the totally gorgeous Jared Flood Celes scarf. I have just today completed the first half of the pattern!

I’m much more comfortable knitting lace now than I was at the start of this project, so am looking forward to completing the second half of the scarf within the reasonable future! Not sure how I’ll cope with the edging work but hey, I’ll cross that “edge” when I come to it!

So far as the fated February socks are concerned, they might just be lucky enough to be rescued from the project bag by my good pal and fellow CCG member Jen, who has super kindly offered to knit them up for me!

Thanks ever so, Jen :0)

More New Projects

I think I’m on a bit of a roll at the moment, determined to do absolutely ALL the crafting and creating that I want to do and which are physically and financially possible for me to actually do.

I forgot to mention yesterday that I have also picked up the ripple scarf project which I bought last time I was in Loop, and which has been sitting patiently waiting for some attention.  It’s a fairly straight-forward 4-row repeat pattern, and I can see that the only thing to slow me down on this will be having to wind another skein into a ball!

The pattern is featured on the Loop website (here) and I also purchased the yarn there too.  I am using two different greens (changing colours every other row) as I felt like being a bit different to my normal pinks and purples!

Last night Jen came over for a crafting evening, where we decided that we are going to become a “guild”.  More on that another time!  Anyway, I had stocked up on vodka, brandy, lemons and peaches from our local supermarket, so we set about making limoncello and peach brandy.  At the end of it we had 5 lemons left over (and several oranges bought “just in case”) so we decided to make some preserved citrus fruit, opting to preserve in sugar and (more) brandy, rather than salt, which by the magic of Google we saw was the favoured method.

In point of fact the “by-product” of preserved citrus fruits looks far prettier than the other two, but in a month or so’s time we’ll bottle it all up and do the taste test!

My wine-making gear arrived too, this week, so I took myself off to our local nearly-organic farm today to pick some gooseberries (I’m determined to keep within the seasons).  Unfortunately, it seemed I was a little late for gooseberries, so ended up reverting to the plan to make peapod wine instead.   I gallantly sat down amidst rows of pea plants and picked and picked and picked – I needed 5 lb of peapods (ie once peas removed).

I managed to gather around 6 lb altogether, but it’s looking like I’m going to have to go back for more – I’ve shelled about 2/3 of them and only have 2 lb worth of peapods.

Anyone want any peas?!!!!

Just as a footnote, those who know me may be rather perplexed by this sudden alcohol yen, since I don’t actually drink!  Fortunately this is not due to any great principle or religious convictions, I just don’t drink.

So my theory follows that of the great Kevin Costner in “Field of Dreams”:

If you build it, they will come.

My paraphrase:

If I make it, I will drink it….

Works for me!

On the Town

Confession time – I slipped in a quick trip to London on Thursday – it’s the holidays, right?  Anyway, I went up primarily for a bit of “away” time, to go drool over the yarns at John Lewis, and also to go to the Afghanistan exhibition at the British Museum.  As a last minute decision, I also decided to go to Loop, having found the most beautiful scarf/wrap on their website which, although still in my infancy of crocheting, I decided to have a bash at.

First thing’s first – having gone to Highbury tube station last time, purposely avoiding the 5,000 ft high escalator at the Angel, I realised that it was maybe worth suffering the escalator so as to avoid the rather long walk down Upper Street in Islington (as lovely as it is).  Anyway, I c**ked up again, and wrongly remembered that Highbury was the nearer tube with the long escalator, so ended up, once again, doing the long trek  down Upper Street, a little confused!  (for those who don’t know, the Angel tube station is 2 minutes from Loop!).  But I made it, and purchased my beautiful galabrigo 4 ply yarn with which to make this:

To see more (and it’s truly worth it), go to the Loop webpage here  and they show you a whole stack of different ways to wear this beautiful wrap.

Then, of course, comes the joy (?) of turning these:

into these:

but then, if you’re lucky, it starts to look like this:

(My trouble will start when I do the next square and it looks nothing like the first one… but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it!)

Back in London I then, according to plan, mosied over to John Lewis in Oxford Street to try and buy some yarn that was a colour other than pastel – it’s actually incredibly hard to find primary colours in decent yarns (please don’t ask me what I define as “decent” – that’s for another time).  Rowan Belle Organic was the only contender, really, so I purchased a couple of balls for Jen and I to share in our endeavour to create a crocheted Chelsea Flower Show!

Next came the trip to British Museum, which was when it all started to go a little pear-shaped.  Got to the museum fine, only to discover that the exhibition had finished on Sunday – yes, this Sunday just gone – durrrrrrrh!!!  I was able to chuckle at my general inefficiency … that was until I went to go outside and saw that the heavens had opened with 2 month’s worth of rain.  The nearest walkable refuge (and next on my list) was Foyles, and I arrived there absolutely dripping wet (I make it a point NEVER to use an umbrella in London – waaay too dangerous!).  Obviously the best thing to do was to gravitate to the coffee shop and enjoy a lovely latte whilst I dried off – well, it would’ve been rude to drip all through the store, wouldn’t it?!  Whilst drinking said latte, I phoned home to check on the rest of the family – well, mostly the animals actually – to be rather reluctantly told by Hannah that Honey had decided my crochet flowers not only looked good enough to eat, but that they were good enough to eat.  OK, so plans for Chelsea a little set back now… just as well I bought some more yarn really?

The day’s adventure complete, I decided (unusually for me) to get the tube back to the mainline station – I prefer the bus as I think it’s far more civilised – only to get stopped mid-tunnel because of a problem further up the line.  In RUSH HOUR!  I don’t even want to begin to describe the heat and sweaty bodies with whom I shared that tiny space for what seemed like an eternity.  I was only relieved that I wasn’t on a home-ed field trip with a stack of exuberant youngsters crammed in with me!

Home safe and well – cuddled the rabbit, glared at Honey, oh yes, and cuddled the children and husband.  I don’t think they’d actually missed me very much.  That’s what comes of raising independent children.

 

 

 

London and Loop

Just got back from my day in London and decided I would update the blog whilst it was still fresh in my mind (and before I collapse in a heap into bed, having seemingly walked at least 500 miles!).

My first mission was to find Loop – that treasure trove of a yarn store which I cyber-visit but have never actually seen.  It involved a bit of a trawl out to Islington, but it was actually a beautifully sunny day – which is just as well because I elected to alight at Highbury and Islington which is quite a walk from Camden Passage.  The store was not difficult to find and, although it was smaller than I had anticipated, I think any bigger and it would’ve lost it’s charm.

It was just full-to-bursting with exquisite yarns, needles, buttons, ribbons and so forth, with sample shawls and socks hanging all over the place.

The trouble was, this place was for Knitters (as opposed to knitters) – you know, people who know their stuff.  All the yarn was in skeins (which I think looks fab) and labelled according to weight – “lace weight”, “finger weight” etc.  Now I’m not in that league just at the moment, so I was a little lost.  However, this didn’t detract from my enjoyment, and I did manage to come away with some yarn and a free scarf pattern, a pair of funky needles and (and don’t tell anyone) a crochet hook (blame Mollie Makes!).  I’m very keen to do some more lace work, and thought this scarf would be a good start – see the pattern here.  In fact, the effect seems quite similar to the Noro jumper I made a couple of years ago, which was fairly straightforward.   As I write Hannah is now coming down to the kitchen ready to lend me her hands, as I need to wind the skeins into balls!

The rest of the day was spent between John Lewis and Foyles, and then a trek over to Peter Jones at Sloane Square to check out their yarn/haberdashery department (which was, I’m afraid to say, sadly lacking).

Home now, and ready to start winding.  More tomorrow….

(PS No Louisa Harding yarn to be found – that’ll teach me to buy an old pattern book, from which the yarn has obviously been discontinued….)