W-i-P Weekend!

I've spent the weekend catching up on some Ws-i-P. As you can see from the previous post I finished the slippers; well, I also finished... Sonnet :-0 I know, finally. I'm going to get Mr Bee to take pictures later. Still don't know how I feel about it, other than bitter about the fact that it broke me. I put it on over my pyjamas and asked Mr Bee what he thought about it... he's not impressed. Doh! Ah well, I've learnt my lesson now.

I've also finished my handspun project, and again will post pics later. I had a bit of an issue with the new yarn I'd spun. It was a lot thinner and way overspun. I actually finished last night, but really didn't like the way the new yarn looked so I ended up frogging the new stuff. I then untwisted the yarn, and chose the thickest stuff to knit with. I'm much happier now!

I think later I may work on the Leaf scarf, as it's a chunky project. I'm sick of teeny needles! The Alien Illusion scarf is going slowly - I figured it takes me 6 hours per alien face, and I still have 2.5 to go. Tempting is also slow going, plus it hurts my wrist: I don't know whether it's the 2x2 rib or the circular nature :-/

Pics to follow soon...

Blue'n'Pink Slippers

I finished knitting the blue'n'pink Mary Jane slippers the other day, but only got round to putting buttons on them today. Annoyingly I have a huge button box inherited from my grandmother, but I think it's still at my parents' house. Luckily I found two little plain buttons, which will do. I know that this pair is actually going to form a Christmas present, and therefore I have 9 months to find buttons, but I just wanted to finish them ;)

As you can see, I guess they should technically be pink'n'blue slippers, as they are mainly pink!



I may decide to make a blue flower to sew on, but at the moment I think they're OK as they are. Making all these slippers were a great stashbust - I used up all the grey, blue and pink yarn!

Ravenclaw Slippers

These are the blue and grey slippers which I made for Sunday for her birthday. I used the pattern for Ridiculously Easy Mary-Jane Slippers, but made them in Stockinette rather than Garter knitting. I also didn't make a strap, as I had hardly any grey yarn left over. However, they are a very snug fit, so should be OK, and I threaded the left-over yarn around the top of the slipper to act as a drawstring just in case:



I realised once I'd made them that they are in the colours of Ravenclaw House from Harry Potter, and that as Sunday likes Ravenclaw it made complete sense to call them that! I think she likes them too - well, I got 'yeahsalright' from a teenager ;)

Oops I bought a stash...

At the weekend Mr Bee and I went back to Manchester to visit our families, as we each had sisters with birthdays.

I was planning to go to the fabric shop I always used to frequent (to buy fabric) to check out whether they had any yarn on sale. They mainly sell balls of novelty yarn, but they had one huge unit full of packs of regular yarn, and it was cheap - plus I got a student discount!

So, from top to bottom:

• 10 balls of Sirdar Nova (50% wool, 50% acrylic) in Navy - £1 per ball
• 10 balls of Sirdar Nova (50% wool, 50% acrylic) in Hot Pink - £1 per ball
• 10 balls of 'mixed fibres' (looks a bit like mohair, but probably mainly acrylic) in a magenta shade - 58p per ball

Yes, admittedly I did have to buy a lot to make the savings, but I think it is worth it, given that they worked out to less than a ball of acrylic would be. They did have a pack of beautiful bottle green 'mixed fibres', but it was a lot thicker and way scratchier than the magenta. The Nova stuff is chunky as well, which I like as it means a quick knit!

I don't have any plans for them yet, except I'm thinking of the Spider-Web Capelet from Stitch'n'Bitch Nation for the magenta.

I also went to the charity shops in the suburb between my parents' house and Mr Bee's parents' house. Found some cool jumpers to frog as well...

From the top:

• Pale blue jumper, high lambswool content, size 12-14 and not-me enough for me to definitely frog it: £2.49
• Smokey electric blue shrug (a bit like Blackberry, but sooooooo wrong), mainly acrylic with sparkles, size 12-14 so so so bad in it's current state it's definitely being taken apart: £4
• White jumper, 100% acrylic (yet still handwash only!), size 10-ish. I haven't tried it on yet, but I do like it. I might be tempted to keep it as a jumper unless I can find something nicer for it: £2.99

I think the shrug is going to become Hug from Magknits - that's by the same designer as Blackberry as well (I should email her and tell her she's fab!). I haven't made a decision about the others, but thought I should get them as they were cheap. Both blue items were originally from Primark, so they probably didn't cost much more to begin with. I'm surprised that they have a wool content and proper sleeves to be honest, but then I imagine Primark uses sweat-shop labour :( Ah well, this way I'm supporting charity shops, not horrid companies. I think if reknitting charity shop jumpers works I will try and get all my yarn from there.

I also found a cool knitting book for £2.99. The patterns in it are mostly awful (it's late seventies early eighties), but the best part is the first half is basically a stitch directory! Can't wait to try them out.

One thing I didn't buy was what would have been the best stash-bag. It was a large red hemp 'toy bag', with snail or a caterpillar on one side and a bee on the other! It also had two inside pockets, but sadly no covering flap. Unfortunately it was £12.99 - it was in a charity shop, but as a new product. I decided not to get it, but to think it over and potentially go back. I thought about it, decided I did want it, but when we went back the shop had closed. Sigh. Other branches will possibly have it, but there isn't one in this town. There is one in the next town where we sometimes go to the cinema, so maybe I'll try there. However, after having looked at my bank balance today, maybe I don't need it after all (even if it did have a bee)!

And today my order from Wingham Wool Work arrived - now I can finish my Ultramarine project! I've also bought 150g of Petrol (a beautiful deep jewel green) merino, and 300g of their cheapest sheepy stuff to continue practising with. I'll probably spin up the rest of the Ultramarine tonight - it'll be nice to actually have a completed project!

I did work on Tempting over the weekend - I've attached the sleeves and am about an inch into the yoke. The 2x2 rib is hard going though, and I did have wrist pain issues. It's being done slowly but surely though! I also finished one blue'n'pink slipper and am quite a way into the next. I need to finish those before I can get started on anything else (and I want to swatch for the Corset Pullover! I unravelled a sleeve to make yarn for it on Sunday). The good thing about my Denise kit is that I can't have too many Ws-i-P: I don't have enough connecting cords! Admittedly Tempting is using up 3, but still I need to keep my Ws-i-P down, and this is as good a reason as any.

Maybe I need to detangle...

That was the situation earlier tonight with the slippers! It shows one fully knit grey slipper, one fully knit blue slipper and one partially knit blue'n'pink slipper all still on the needles (the same set: I've got so many Ws-i-P that I've run out of cables for my needles!), and what used to be a couple of balls of yarn.

I have since turned the blue and the grey ones into fully sewn up slippers - they are cute! I'll put pictures up later, I'm too tired now. I didn't have enough blue to knit two slippers, and had just enough grey for one, so decided that they would go nicely together. The left over blue is forming the first 10 rows of each of the blue'n'pink slippers.

I've also decided that the blue and grey slippers will go to Sunday this weekend for her birthday, but I'll keep the blue'n'pink ones until Yule for Mr Bee's sister. We don't normally exchange birthday gifts, and I don't want her to feel obliged to get me something! I still intend to finish them soon though - I'm taking them with me this weekend.

I'm also taking Tempting - have to finish off the second sleeve and then it's the scary attaching-to-body malarkey. I may not be able to do it on my own (may not have access to the knit-a-longs, etc), but I'll give it a go.

I'm tired!

WANT IT NOW!

The other day I came across this gorgeous creature: Interweave Knit's Corset Pullover. It is bee-youtiful. Admittedly not very corset-y, but lovely in a mediaeval way. I spent a lot of yesterday searching blogs about it, to see if I could pick up any hints and tips, especially about which yarn to use. Well, I dicovered that the actual pattern yarn is for sale on a US website - it's really cheap too (for 'proper' yarn)! Until you factor in postage... Also, as the yarn is discontinued, the remaining colours are pretty bleh.

So the question was: do I want to buy the proper yarn from America, but have it in a colour I don't really like, or do I try and find a substitute? Well, duh! So, I went back to all the blogs to see who made it in what. I noticed that Rowan's Calmer was mentioned: Rowan is British, I am in Britain. Aha! I searched online, the average price is £6 a ball, and I'd need about 6 balls. £36... it's still a lot. It's a lot when you have no income and usually buy your clothes in charity shops! If I normally shopped in TopShop then £36 would be great, but I don't.

However, it is a beautiful pattern. Hmmm.

I had a chiro appointment this morning, so I headed into town. I decided to support my LYS and see if they had the Rowan (you know, just to see. *Twitch*), and to pick up some cheapy acrylic to finish off the Alien Illusion. Now there are 3 places that sell yarn in this town. Two are general craft shops, and one is a regular yarn-only place. None of them sell any Rowan at all! It's all Sirdar and Wendy.

I did get more yarn for the scarf though - I can't match the green so I'm switching to a vibrant purple, and continuing with white. I got two small 25g balls for 49p each. I was worried I'd have to get huge 100g balls that would last for ever! I think the 25g ones will be fine.

So anyway, no Rowan. I don't seem overly upset do I? That's because I had a trawl round the charity shops, ostensibly looking for balls of yarn (ever hopeful I'll find a 10 pack of some amazing wool for 50p or something ;) Never going to happen...), when I realised I could look for jumpers.

Ta daa!!!



It's huge, a size 16, so there should certainly be enough. It's 100% cotton, like the original yarn, and the gauge it currently has (I got my tape measure out in the shop) is 21 stitches and 28 rows - not far off! It's a nice olive green as well, which will suit the pattern. It's from Marks and Spencers, so it should be good quality (there's a small amount of pilling going on, but should be fine), and it's wrong enough that I won't be tempted to wear it rather than frog it ;) Oh, and it was £3.50 :D

Of course, it may be completely impractical. I'd like to undo part of one sleeve first to swatch with, as I could always knit it back and give it back to the charity shop if necessary. First I need to wash it though...

Well, FIRST, I need to finish Tempting. That is the goal. And I can't continue with Tempting until I have finished the slipper-presents, so we're talking next week at the earliest.

I hope it works out! :)

Starting yet another new project!

I've added yet another WIP to my status bar. I'm rather proud of this piccie - and you should see the gloves one (better I never use that ;) )!

Anyway. I'm making these Mary Jane slippers, as gifts for my sister Sunday and Mr Bee's sister. They both have birthdays next week - let's see if I get them finished in time! I'm using random balls of yarn in my stash, but I'll probably have to frog the little I've done soon, as I don't think I have enough. If that happens I'll restart with stripes. Or maybe I should restart with stripes while I still only have 5% done? ;)

I'm really struggling with writing stuff for my thesis. I really tried this evening but it just wasn't happening. At 11pm I gave up and went back to knitting. When I was looking for the MJ pattern on Craftster - it's the one Figg used for my beautiful slippers you can see early on in my blog - I came across a link to an article with Debbie Stoller, author of Stitch'n'Bitch. It's from The Guardian Weekend - which is my favourite part of The Guardian! The article is from last January, so I guess I must've missed it...

But fantastically - other than being a really interesting article - it has a pdf of the Alien Illusion chart! Hoorah! Now I don't need to carry the book around with me to finish it off!

OK - I think I'm done for today. Off to bed...