Where has time gone?

Hello, I can't believe it's mid November already.  I’ve been so busy recently that I haven’t even looked at my photos on my camera. I sat down and sorted through my photos the other day and there were so many lovely memories, of the summer, of our holiday to Italy, and of Yarndale.

We went on holiday to Italy and visited Venice and Verona as well as Monza to watch the Formula One race.

 

Mum and I went to Yarndale and bought a mountain of yarn each.

We also met the people I met up with last year for another Yarndale picnic.

Rob managed to run his first half marathon – the Oxford Half Marathon and I was there to cheer him on.

Also, I got some hamsters. Two adorable girl hamsters called Juno and Hera.

Hooky Holiday

When I went to Yarndale last September I met up with some of my Instagram friends for a picnic (I blogged about it in this post). 

Because the picnic had been such a success and we'd all got on so well, we had mentioned about a weekend away together.  We'd talked about it for so long and were all very excited about it.

So, last weekend, 18 of us went to Knockerdown Cottages near Ashbourne, in Derbyshire for a crafty long weekend together. 

On the Saturday, we had a visit to Griffiths Mill where they talked to us about how their business had started and showed us all of the wool processing machinery.

They had a small shop where I bought 2 skeins of Blue Texel wool.

Then they let us cuddle some lambs which was lovely.

We also got a lovely group photo - with the lambs of course!

After that we went to Ashbourne and browsed the vintage craft fair at the town hall and went to lots of charity shops and antique shops - and looked lovingly at all of the beautiful antique wooden furniture.  We visited the Sticky Fingers shop which is full of pretty gifty things.

Apart from that one busy day, the weekend was mostly spent crocheting, knitting, chatting, and drinking gin and tonics (and making jewellery by melting cheap plastic knitting needles).

Because this much wool is perfectly acceptable for 4 days away... (more about the crate soon)

I'm making blanket squares using Grandma's Knickknacks pattern available for free here

But this was the biggest shopping haul of the weekend - including 4 dresses from charity shops which I then was forced to show to the others as a fashion show.

I can't wait to meet up with everyone again at Yarndale this year but until then we've got a bit of a group project - one of the ladies left a bag of crocheted hexagons and 7 of us were crazy enough to volunteer to join them into a blanket to give back to her.

Happy New Year and Project Update

Hello again!  Happy New Year.  Hope your 2015 is going well so far.

I'm having a very quiet day today and just sitting in my flat knitting and watching knitting podcasts.

I've managed to get lots of projects finished since my last post including this lovely jumper which I finished only this morning.  Ravelry project page here.

The pattern is Snug by Kim Hargreaves and the yarn is Sirdar Escape Chunky in colour 0197

I crocheted a tiny little monkey as a present a while ago using 2 different crochet patterns.  Ravelry project page here.

I also made a Honey Cowl using the yarn from Wild Wood Wool I bought at Yarndale.  Ravelry project page here.

The last WIP I mentioned (a long time ago) was my Age of Brass and Steam shawl which I was speeding through so finished soon after.  Ravelry project page here.

I received a request to make a knitted clanger from the old childrens TV show using the original pattern from 1972.  Ravelry project page here.

I got around to making the colourful armwarmers I had been planning to make for ages.  Ravelry project page here.

I knitted myself a toy robot using the Louie the Lovebot pattern by Rebecca Danger.  Ravelry project page here.

I am currently working on a few knitted WIPs.  The first is something I started a while ago but stopped halfway through.  My first pair of socks!  Ravelry project page here.

Yup I have second sock syndrome but I cast on the second sock on Friday

I started another Trillian shawl project which will be my handbag project as it was last time.  This time I'm using the Laalbear yarn I bought at Yarndale in the colourway Gandalf. Ravelry project page here.

My final WIP was cast on on Thursday night as part of a live knit-a-long on Instagram.  Dan from the Bakery Bears podcast decided to start a knit-a-long for the Bankhead hat pattern because he loves it and I couldn't resist joining in. Ravelry project page here.

Here's to a productive 2015 - already off to a good start!

The Yarndale Picnic and WIP Wednesday

In my last post I mentioned that my Instagram friends had agreed to meet up at Yarndale for a picnic. People were taking photos of the whole group during the picnic and someone was kind enough to send me this photo for my blog.

Unfortunately some people had left the picnic just before this photo was taken but there is still a pretty large group of people!

I also wanted to share the progress I've made on my Age of Brass and Steam shawl - because of the lovely yarn and the super-simple pattern - I've been so engrossed in knitting the shawl that I haven't worked on another project for the last 2 weeks.

I did have to rip back more than half of my shawl (twenty rows) because I had the wrong number of stitches but I've managed to catch back up and it's making good progress.