Lots of Pictures of Yarn…

Just a quickie with loads of pix…

We’ve got a new Silk Blend colourway just arrived, the Wildflower colour which has been very popular in the States. When I first asked around on Ravelry which Silk Blend colours folks would most like to see in the shop this one came out on top, so as soon as it launched over here I grabbed it! And so far, I’m keeping my price for Manos Silk Blend at £11.99 – the RSP is up to £12.99 – I’ll keep it at the original price as long as I can!

We’ve got some new colours in the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino range; I can’t get over how many fabulous colours there are to choose from… We’ve also added in some colourway suggestions to the Twig Cabin Baby Blanket so I hope some of you will choose these new colours!

I’ve called the above combination “Oh Pink!”, the one below is “Calm”

Also today I’ve updated the pictures for the Artesano Aran range. The yarn is incredibly beautiful, unfortunately the pictures which came from the supplier orginally weren’t really doing it justice and I’m embarassed to admit I’d forgotten all about updating them until now…

Also, I’m thinking about putting together a kit for this yarn with the Liesl Pattern by Ysolda, as well as stocking some of her other fabulous patterns and books; I’d love to know what you think!

OK, so I’ll sign off before I picture-overload this blog…

Next?

Soak Wash, which is On The Way… c’mon postie!

Bring it on Knit Nation… I’m ready for you!

Well, almost 😉

I’ve been frantically finishing WIPs to display on my stall so that now currently enjoying the magical blocking process are:

1. Travelling Woman shawl in the U-boat Crazy Zauberball

2. Ysolda’s Scroll Lace Scarf in the Europa colourway of Manos Silk Blend

I’m very happy with both of these… or at least I was, until I saw this…

I don’t drop stitches. I just don’t. Ever. The, um, downside of this is that I have No Idea how to fix it. You can probably see that I already made a bit of a hash of pretending I hadn’t dropped anything, ending in the blue pin. The red pin is holding a loose bit of cast off edge. All I can hope that someone comes round and rescues me, otherwise I’ll be taking the shawl, still pinned to a sofa cushion, to the show with me, with a big sign pinned on saying HELP!

But setting that aside for now I have been getting some things packed, see?

Empty space where the yarn was this morning! Now, you’ll remember me saying before that I have the best dad ever* (B, of the Big Needles fame)… so last time I saw him I said “Dad?? can you make me something to hold all the colours of Superwash DK?”. After some debating over the design and a trip to the local hardware store he made this…

Which from the side looks like this…

How. Cool. Is. That?!!! It holds 100 balls of wool and spins round and everything! And you can load it before the show and simply plonk it on the table! The only thing is that I already need a second one ideally….

I’ll save that bombshell for just before Wonderwool 2011 😉

So, back to it… there’s more to pack, things to print off, bits and bobs to hunt for and lists to tick off 🙂

*Mum is fabulous too, and I’ve learnt over the years that I’ve not to show any favouritism… I love you both!

Scroll Lace Scarf in Silk Blend

Last year I treated myself to Ysolda Teague’s Whimsical Little Knits 2 – I’m a HUGE fan and starting to feel pretty excited that I might meet the lady herself at Knit Nation…!

The pretty Damson shawl was the reason I bought the book but since it arrived I’ve been wanting to knit the Scroll Lace Scarf too. Well just now, as you can imagine, my mind is full of Knit Nation – what to take, what to display, show offers etc – very exciting busy days 🙂

The Manos del Uruguay Silk Blend is always popular and one of my favourites to be sure… I’ve just realised I don’t have many skeins in any one colourway but with a limited amount of space at the show that’s not a bad thing! I’ll have my shade cards with me and I’ll be taking orders at show prices (£10 per skein) for anyone who would like more than I have on the day.

Now, I’ve been hankering after a one-skein pattern for this DK weight yarn for some time, in a background sort of way, rather than an active scouring Ravelry sort of way, but the looming show and a desire to display a one-skein Silk Blend project at said show bumped the search up a bit in my brain. I started to picture this scarf I’d seen, narrow shawl type, some short row shaping, wrapped around a cute blonde… Ysolda! The book was out, the yarn was on the swift and I was away.

The pattern calls for 28 repeats along the edge and I got 12 done yesterday in a couple of hours so it’s going quickly and I hope to have the scarf finished in a couple of days and it’s gonna be real pretty!

Do hens sun-bathe?

Why yes, yes they do, see just here…

This young lady, Rose, has been out of a battery cage for approximately 24 hours. She’s never seen the sun before and yet within minutes of the sun appearing she’s laid out soaking it up quicker than Lilly could say ‘oi, that’s my bit of soil!’ (she’s not penned in by the way, my spoilt hens have the run of the garden…)

Here’s Lilly:

Yup, same kind of caged battery hen as Rose, she just lost more feathers in the process. She’s been out about 2 weeks and is NOT  happy about Rose arriving. There has been fighting. Our other girl is Madam Mabel, she’s snoozing in the shade and not happy about either Rose or Lilly arriving, she had the place to herself for about 3 weeks so is thoroughly disgruntled about having to re-assert herself as top dog, er, hen. Another 2 weeks should see peace restored to the garden. In the meantime they’re all laying beautiful eggs and I just. love. watching them.

Here’s the charity I volunteer for if anyone’s interested… Battery Hen Welfare Trust.

Anyway, yarn!

I made this little treasure from about 25 grams (yes a quarter of a skein) of Manos Silk Blend:

It’s quite tiny, about 4″ across and the same top to bottom including the handle but it’s SO cute. I’m not sure if the pattern intended it to be so small… the pattern called for Manos Wool Clasica on 8mm needles, but it also showed the baskets in Silk Blend, well I had some in my stash, so tried it on 6mm needles. I might try doubling the yarn to make another one and see how big that comes out… The handle is created using the moebius cast on, fascinating and easy, do try it if  you haven’t already – watch the Cat Bordhi youtube video first though!

Lastly, for today, there will be a Sock Club on the shop very soon….!