Did someone say Knitalong?!?!

ARGH! a whole month without an update?

It really has been a very busy and hectic January. Not just on the Knitting front mind, but with moving and finishing work and more "fun" things. I am no longer based in London, but now in Leeds, "oh Leeds how I have missed thee?". My new digs are a little small and whilst equipped with a fair few cubbyholes is unlikely to successfully hold all my stash. So i'm going to have to be parted with much of it again, and be very smart about what projects I am going to be knitting in the next few months to stash bust to make way for more!

Little teaser of the Test Knit I mentioned last month

So of course my genius plan to sort this out, was to do a Knit along with some of my friend's from I Knit in London. Combating the issue of plans for stashbusting and also keeping us "bonded" in a small way. Now me saying a Knit along is a little misleading, because we are in fact doing 11! Over the course of this year.  The simple idea of a Knit along grew and grew and became a devil monster of a crazy suspiciously organised thing, but really, with myself at the helm and several others going along for the ride it could be no less.

So when I say that those 11 KALs are our shortlist, you should not be surprised. I wouldn't be able to tell you the number of project suggestions we started off with as everyone had a good deal that they wanted to knit, but with vetoing powers and bribery in some cases (You know who you are!) we managed to get a list of 22 patterns, which we then priority voted down to 11. Another Priority vote after than and we had our knitting order.

The clear winner was Carpino by Carol Feller
An absolutely lovely pattern and with the yarn choices, ranging from Rowan Kid silk haze glamour, Uppingham Shetland 4ply yarn, botany lace to my gorgeous blue purple marl from Kingcraig they all promise to be the same beautiful project but stunningly different!

Next up as a light relief and an "I'm frustrated with this lace pattern and 4ply" project we have Millwater by Beth Kling
Scrumptious cowl that it is I have ummed and aahed about what yarn to knit it in and think i might end up dyeing some yarn to use for it, but then again I'm not sure.

The rest of the list consists of

• Infinite Loop
• Paris Sweater
• Raindrops
• Clarity
• Il Grande Favorito
• Blanket cardigan (Bethany Wrap, Caramel, or Eternity cardigan)
• Stonecrop
• Funky Grandpa
• and finally Owls

Of course this wasn't enough for me and i had to add one last KAL with a friend in Leeds to make a little bit rounder in number, i am finally going to be knitting a version of Aidez. Aidez with several modifications i should say, as i'm adding pockets, buttons, a hood and a different cable pattern for the back.

Last month in all of the hecticness i did manage to carve out a little time to do some yarn dyeing so feast your eyes on the lovelies as they hung to dry.

Left to right, Malabrigo lace, and several Kingcraig Shetland DK (sugarflair dyes used)

I've wound up those pretties and looking forward to using them, now what project to knit in a gradient yarn.......

On another note if you are interested in Knitting one of the items listed above, join our KAL all you have to do is pick a stash yarn to do it in and comment, my favourite suggestions will receive the pattern free as a gift on Ravelry. 

#knitting  #giveaway

New Year, New projects and what's this about a newspaper article?

So now that most of my Christmas knits are finished (I was a little too ambitious at short notice), I've moved on to other projects and have enjoyed selecting some fun projects for this year.

The Finished Christmas Knits, The middle scarf ended up being nearly 2 metre long!

I've finally acknowledged the full on fail that my first ever jumper was and I've 'frogged' most of it and re-purposed the yarn for a much more beautiful and hopefully much better cardigan. A test knit courtesy of playsweetmusic on Ravelry. The lovely Grey Matter Cardigan, which I am knitting in a Ben Nevis Aran (ugh, that's the thing about re-purposing, you reuse yarn that you fell out of love with an age ago).

As I've been reunited with most of my stash I thought a quick stash busting exercise was in order a week or two back and I used up some of my Wendy pampas chunky, and one of my Stylecraft Swift Knit to make the lovely Acer shawl by Kourtney Robinson of Dollybird Workshop (She has some amazing patterns, of which I snapped up 8,  so you could be seeing more of her designs here)

My version in serious need of blocking

The Acer shawl makes for a really quick and really warm knit. I just need my brother to disappear back to Uni so that I can use his bed for blocking again :).

As part of the stash busting/de-stashing exercise I'm getting rid of some of the yarns I have desperately tried to find a purpose for but can't. Yes 8 Colinette point 5 balls that is you, your going to a better home! If your interested take a look at the ebay listing.

As I said I've been planning out projects for this year, which is obviously subject to flights of fancy and queue change up. A few of this year's definite knits are

• Grey Matter Cardigan
• Game of Thrones inspired knit (own pattern)
• Aidez (yes thank you Lidl, that Crelando Meli yarn has a home)
• Tie back tank in  Araucania ruca 
• Raven shawl in Kingcraig Lambswool Cashmere Aran

I have a lot more patterns in my library and queue but I'm still not sure of them yet, and this frees me up for lots lots more. 

This year I reckon I might also play around with Arm Knitting a little bit more, to see what else is creatable, whilst still being fit for purpose. This is mostly due to when I was at I knit last I was asked to demonstrate some arm knitting for a reporter and photographer, purely because at the time I was the only person in the store that had dabbled in it (purely out of lack of needles, an out of battery tablet, a borrowed phone and boredom) you can see it isn't really my first choice of medium.  Anyway that all resulted in a larger than expected article in The Times Newspaper which can be found here (if you are a subscriber) or a really bad scanned copy of the article in the physical newspaper below. 

I'm not very good at looking after little bits of paper

The project that I made for the article turned into a very holey shawl, which is currently still residing in the I Knit shop. 

Now that 2013 is over, I would like to say a quick thanks to all the new friends I made and the ones who made things worthwhile though my life kind of stood on it's head. Hopefully 2014 will be much much more fantastic!

#knitting :)

Christmas knitting List

Now that it's getting to the end of November i'm frantically scrambling about to get my Christmas knits on the needles, and flying off to make way for the next one. This year I have a lot of presents to make. I decided to go a lot bigger than I did last year for my boyfriend's family's presents, so instead of mini stockings we have scarves, cowls and boots. I'm also going to be doing most of my presents this year as knitted ones as a stash busting exercise and generally because a knitted gift is given with love. With Ravelry as a great source of inspiration I got to work finding patterns for presents. The Patterns that made the present list so far are

• Little Red Riding Hood Slippers by DROPS design

 These Slippers are knitted in a super bulky weight yarn and look like they would be incredibly comfortable to wear whilst being pretty effortlessly stylish (or at least as stylish as one needs to be in their own home/for sleepovers).

• Slip-it Cowl by Jenny Faifel

The picture I believe is the one Jenny knitted, and it looks scrumptious, especially in the Malabrigo Rasta. However that yarn is slightly outside my budget (though I Knit do sell it , so I wouldn't have to pay postage) so I'm going to be using my stash Araucania Tolten which is slightly thinner but will work. It will knit up to make a nice squishy but close cowl that is nice to wear against the neck.

• Striped Scarf by Erika Knight (from the book Men's Knits a new direction)

This pattern is also available on Ravelry but I had picked up the book at my local library and saw it when I was flicking through. I will be modding it though, by using a linen stitch to join the colours, and aran weight yarn. I had originally wanted to knit Incognito, but I was informed that it likely wouldn't be worn. How can anyone not love Incognito! I'll be knitting myself one soon methinks...

• A modified version of the Crochet Lace Masquerade mask by Andrea H of Craft Disasters and the Katya choker by Dawn L.E. Riden

Props to Andrea for this gorgeous piece it's really lovely and I was completely inspired. As I'm hoping the present will be used as a costume piece I might make it a bit more ornate and possibly add some beads. I am also considering making it only one eyed and crocheting some fancy lace over the top to the other side of the face. Along with this I was thinking of adding a necklace, the choker is very nice but again I'd be making some changes to it to make them work together.

• Nest by Hanne Katajamaki

Now there are a lot of cats in the household, so I think this one will be well received I might try to reinforce it a bit so that it isn't as easily collapsible, though not having cats myself I don't know if it's a plus or a minus.

So that's the shortened version of my Christmas knitting list, i'll be adding more as I go along as I've gotten involved in a few secret santa's. One for my old school friends and another for the I Knit Christmas party. So bring on the knitting!

If you have any suggestions of what to add let me know. Also I would like to state none of the pictures used above are mine this time and all belong to the lovely designers of the items/patterns. So massive thanks to them for the patterns that I will be using. 

I'm sorry this was so late but i just came back from holiday to Iceland, so that's what my next post/ posts will be about with a little contribution from the boyfriend.

Stylish Knits and blocking

I talked about it in my last post, and I'm talking about it again. This will be the last one of the Salt City Cardi, because it's done!

Blocked and ready to wear!

I spent most of Saturday knitting my heart out to get it finished. I decided to add another repeat for the shawl collar, which is probably what took the most time but I think it was probably worth it as it crosses over a lot better now. I debated a bit about what cast off to use for the collar, as I wanted to make sure it wouldn't impede the blocking. In the end with the help of a few YouTube videos (don't you just love YouTube!), and Stitch Diva studios. I chose the Lacey bind off. Now I know it isn't the stretchiest of the four shown, but from the swatches I thought it looked to be the most uniform with the stretchy cast on and I really didn't want the bind off to be too stretchy.

For reasons entirely unknown, I kept having issues with the sleeves and knitting them up. Though from other peoples comments I think that was entirely just me. I bound of the ribbing on the sleeves with a stretchy twisted cast off as seen here, serious thanks to Lorraine L for that as I've been looking for a bind off that gives stretch but doesn't flare. It is a mite fiddly though.

Enough of the finishing/knitting discussion though, I know you want to see it! I took some pictures unblocked as I just wanted to get it on and see how it fitted. please excuse the cropping but I was making some seriously strange faces, due to general silliness on mine and my mother's part.

I'm thinking that I will probably need to pick up a shawl pin to hold it together. As you can probably see the shawl collar is a bit stiff and doesn't fall as smoothly as it should. That is mostly because the yarn I used for the collar specifically was still oiled and needs a good wash to soften it up. 

After that there was one more step to do, BLOCKING!

Obligatory blocking pic

Who needs blocking wires, not me! I just took some of my acrylic yarn, threaded it through and secured it tautly to achieve straight lines. I'm blocking it on top of a mattress, plastic to protect the mattress (by mother's request) and towels. It looks a lot more gorgeous up close but i'm not going to spam you with pictures.

Now that the cardi is done, I can move on to doing my Christmas knits. Pressies here I come!

I've got quite a few people to knit for so I'm looking for quick knits and yarn that won't break the bank so let me know if you have any suggestions!

I Knit, Test Knits and Yarn

Fairly recently I started going to a knitting group in Waterloo at the I Knit London store. It is very different to the Stitch 'n' Bitch that I used to be part of back in Leeds, though it is a good group. The age ranges and people are much more diverse, which is always a good thing for a well rounded group. The past few times I've been I took along my test knitting project.

The item I am test knitting is a gorgeous cardigan by Sheila Toy Stromberg on Ravelry called the Salt City Cardi, it uses three different types of lace stitch and they flow really well together. Though I'm finding time wise, it has taken me a fair bit.  I started it on the 17th and I'm still working on it, I have had less time this week however. The yarn pictured below is the Merino Silk blend I talked about before from Kingcraig fabrics on eBay, it's been pretty good to work with and has got me load of compliments at I Knit.

From balls like this

One of the great things about having a more diverse group with a crowd generally older than me is nice varied levels of experience. This came in pretty handy when it came to figuring out what to do about washing my  yarn before knitting it. I wouldn't have thought about the possible ramifications of skeining and washing the oiled balls of yarn individually. Each skein would likely have been washed at slightly differing temperatures and also with varying degrees of roughness which affects how much of the oil is washed out. Knitting them all together like this would then impact blocking as different parts of the garment used different skeins, with different amounts of all and could therefore when completely wash skew the shape because of the tension changes etc.

What this meant I did in the end was use the skein I had already washed, but only for the back piece, and then I used the unwashed yarn for the shawl collar and I plan to use the remainder of the washed yarn for the sleeves. As each of these sections are blocked separately the different levels of oil will not affect the final look and structure of the garment.

   

To this

Taken at I Knit, London

As I am knitting to a deadline I take my project with me everywhere, I've been knitting on all my journeys and whenever I have a spare moment. I even took my knitting to Blues Fest at the Royal Albert hall last night to see Greg Porter and Natalie Cole, which was amazing. Greg Porter really blew my mind with his smooth voice, I will definitely be listening to more of his songs. It took me a little while to warm up to Natalie Cole, though in the end she was great too.

How would you recommend treating oiled yarn? I know some people are adamant either way, washing it thoroughly before knitting or washing as a garment. Let me know, also if you have any tips for treating it, I would love to know for future projects.

Goodbye Chemicals, Hello Natural hair

I remember when I was at school, the girls around me had sleek and fantastic hair. My hair was curly, thick and unmanageable. I was seduced by the lure of being able to have hair that was straight and easy to work with, I didn't want to have cornrows any more. Of course I went to an all girls school where the majority of the girls were not black, in fact there was a handful of black girls and they generally had weaves or relaxed hair.

My last braided hairstyle, pre-relaxer

So as soon as we were finally allowed to wear our own clothes to school I convinced my mum to let me relax my hair. Looking back now I think that is quite possibly the worst mistake I ever made. From then on I tended to get my hair relaxed every two weeks, my mum used to do it for me until she no longer could take the time. So then I would go and pay to have it done. I sat in chairs in salons and let the relaxer work whilst it burnt my scalp and caused scabbing and pain, but none of that mattered because my hair was straight. Unfortunately those weren't the only problems, My hair demanded time and patience and heat every single day, every hour of the day. Washing it, far from being easy, was a nightmare because it matted, tangled and generally felt stringy and lifeless.

The Trademark Bob, thank the straighteners

I put up with it for just over 4 years, but it got so bad I couldn't stand my hair being long. One summer I got it to a place where it was past my shoulders relaxed because it had been in a weave before hand. I got it chopped off to pixie crop short as soon as I could because it was even worse than before. That then had it's own pitfalls because when your hair is that short, you need to relax it even more often to make it look good. 

Short as it got

For my Mother's birthday party I had it put into a weave and left that in for a while. When that came out a while later I took a look at my hair and decided I was never going to relax it again. I was going to stop putting chemicals in it and keep it natural. That day I washed my hair, called my housemate into my room and handed her a pair of scissors. I told her anywhere she saw any straight hair she should chop it off. I also had my own pair of scissors, and believe me I was brutal. I was getting rid of the relaxed hair for good.

Attempting to make short natural hair workable

It's been just under 3 years from that point and i've never looked back. I've been learning my hair, what it likes and how to do it for myself (still working on that part). Every time I take it out of a protective style I get far more excited than I should at the length gains that it's has made. The most recent length check is in fact 9 inches long! which for my hair means that when stretched it no longer stands straight up in a crazy ass fro.

Said Crazy Ass Fro! (early summer)

I'll be posting some pictures of my current hair soon, as I decide what to do with it and how to wear it now it's out. What is your hair like? Has it changed drastically over the past few years? Let me know, comment below.

Two week update on the spotty situation

So for the past two weeks I've been raving about the FOREO LUNA Mini. I still think it's pretty good, easy to use and fast.

As I promised here's an updated picture of my face two weeks on from when I started using it. Since last week I've cut down a lot on my use of it. I no longer use it twice a day everyday because after a week and a half of constant use it was drying out my skin and giving me spots. I had a massive break out last weekend, now not so much they've all faded away as my skin has had a chance to rebalance and restore it's oils. I still use the Luna but in the morning about every 3 days or so. Which is much closer to my normal skincare regime before I started using it. My skin is much clearer and a lot brighter looking.

Whilst it dried my skin out it also gave it a crazy good deep clean so my skin doesn't feel heavy, and clogged but feels incredibly soft and smooth.

I will keep using it as I am currently and I'd still recommend it to people but not at the same rate of use that FOREO suggests.