dolly dimple knits

Rip-it Rip-it

Okay, so I had a major tantrum over the holiday weekend and frogged, totally frogged, the Irish Creel bag. There I've confessed. I feel better now.

A stronger, better knitter with more patience would have persevered - but no. Once I started rippling along that first row I just kind of kept going. I STILL love the design but it was taking forever and when I realised I'd made a mistake about 5 rows back, it was curtains for it.

It was nearly curtains for the edgy exchange scarf too. I finished the knitting, whipped up the first edging and thought "ho hum, not sure, frog ??"

But then I decided it was a case of "more is more" in this instance - so I added another border, a fringe and some lazy daisies ....... what do you mean over the top ?? !

I LIKE it. So it's going in the post today and I shall let Sue my Exchange Mom know I'm done :0)

Bored

Do you ever get a project that just never seems to grow no matter how much you knit ? That's kind of how I feel about the Irish Creel bag at the moment. I knit and knit for ages and then I check the measurements and it's only half an inch bigger. I am getting seriously bored - not to mention anxious. This is supposed to be for a birthday in June but at this rate she'll be lucky if she gets it for Christmas.

To give myself some sense of progress I've been feverishly knitting away at my edgy exchange project. I'm desperate to finish the main knitting part so that I can get on to the fun edgy bit. That's not going all that fast either :0(( I have unearthed the contrast colours from deep within the stash though. What do you think ?

Do you know, it's a complete mystery to me how I end up with so many single balls of things in my stash ? I thought I might have to buy some contrast shades but no. I actually had a CHOICE when I dug out all my single balls of wool cotton. And the really weird thing is I have no memory of buying most of them. Is there some kind of spooky nocturnal yarn gathering going on when I'm sleeping ?? Who knows.

(Note to self : Actually however you look at it this is just a sign of old age - proving that either I've been stashing for decades, hence the choice or I'm going senile, hence the lack of memory of buying the blooming stuff !)

No matter how bored I am with my current projects though my mail has been great this week. See what Bobby sent me for my final SP4 package.

I love the colours of the sock yarn and frankly, I have NEVER seen such gorgeous, tiny little sock needles in my life. I may go blind trying to use them but as I'm already senile, what will that matter ? :0)

SP4 was fab. As well as getting loads of lovely things, I had great fun picking out stuff for Melissa. I've decided not to do SP5 though - not for any bad reason, just things are pretty manic at the moment, we're going away in the summer (hopefully !) and I don't need an extra thing to remember. SP6 ?? Maybe !

TTTT-Touch me

This week has been all about texture - both knitting-wise and life-wise (does that make sense ?) Life recently has been strange. I've gone from the mundane parenting and work stuff, to making new, far away friends at the same time as coming to terms with the idea of my brother moving away to far away lands.

My brother and his family have just announced that they are emigrating to Adelaide, South Australia in August. Now I only see my brother about once a year, if that, but somehow I feel a bit weird about this and I don't know why. On the up side we can look forward to some fab holidays in the future but on the down side, it is an awful long way away. I suppose I feel like the option to see him more regularly will be gone and I've kind of thrown that chance away over the years. My loss.

My new friend, is my not-so-secret Secret Pal, Bobby who has come clean about who he is. Go and check out his blog here. He's an entertaining guy with incredible taste in yarn (remember my Blue Heron ??) Enjoy !

Knitting texture comes courtesy of the Irish Creel bag which I started but which is taking ages to work. See how little I've done ...

When this pattern tells you that the basketwork stitch is worked to a very stiff gauge, they AIN'T JOKING. My poor fingers ache with this but I'm going to keep on as I think it's really pretty and so appropriate for a creel.

The pattern also seems a bit complicated to follow as I've read it right through about 5 times but still can't figure out the exact construction of this bag but I'm not going to worry - I'm just going to blindly follow and if necessary fudge it !

As a bit of light relief from that texture, I've started some more texture for my Rowanettes Edgy Exchange gift (the theme this year is all about edgings for anyone who doesn't know).

This is based on the Sasha Kagan Rosebud Scarf from Scarf Style (I may have mentioned once or a hundred times how much I LOVE this book ?) I'm using some stashed Rowan Wool Cotton in Clear for the main colour and odds and ends for the rest.

I say based on the Rosebud Scarf because it's a lot narrower, it's going to be a bit shorter and I'm changing the flowers on it. I'm also swiss embroidering afterwards rather than intarsia working my design because I think the raised texture of that will better echo the texture in the rest of the scarf - and the edging ? Well, I've not got that far yet .....

I really do need to go and get on with one or other of these little projects to leave me free to get on with something a bit bigger ! So I'll leave you with this ..... nature's way of telling you you've done enough ironing .....

Obsession

Proof postitive today that I'm over the edge on the knitting obsession front. It was a lovely sunny May Sunday so we decided take the girls to the Botanic Gardens for a stroll. The gardens were a favourite haunt of ours pre-marriage (yes, that long ago !) as I used to live just round the corner.

So the sun shone. The plants blossomed. The children played. And me ? I spent the afternoon "sweater spotting".

It all started with the girl in the lilac, close fitting, deep rib then stocking stitch v-neck with a kind of cross-over thing going on. Not a handknit but I thought, as I arranged to walk past her for the third time just to check out her jumper, easy enough to copy.

Then there was the woman at the Children's Play Area with the gorgeous denim blue jacket, very like this one. I loved this when I saw it on the blog but didn't think about it in relation to me as I'm a different shape from the blogger who knitted it. BUT I am a similar shape to the woman in the park who looked fab, see where I'm going here ? ...

Heading down towards Byres Road, I stalked a woman in a 2 colour ribby sleeve, stocking stitch zip front jacket ........ which would look beautiful in Burnt Orange Cotton Silk Aran contrasted with a deep winey colour ...... should anyone (naming no names :0) Oh, okay, ME !) happen to have some in their stash ....

We finished off with dinner in the Cul de Sac which would have been great except Alan sitting opposite me kept interfering with my view of the little lacey, short-sleeved wrap cardigan at the next table. I wasn't going to get sucked in to the Rebecca knitalong running on Kristine's blog but seeing it in the flesh like that, I don't know, it's hard to resist .......

I think my knitting wish list just got 4 jumpers longer. I am never going out again. Let's face it, I won't have time with all the knitting I'll be doing :0)

On which topic, here's the knitting I have been doing

I'm fairly happy with my first go at knitting socks on 2 circulars - it's much easier than I thought it would be. Trouble is, now I've got the hang of it and I've got past the turning the heel interesting part of sock knitting, they've kind of stalled. Maybe I'll make them my stitch 'n bitch knitting project as they don't take much thought, which I find is essential for any kind of group knitting :0)

I do have a good excuse for stalling as well. I realised that it is just over a month until a very good friend's birthday and I want to knit her the Irish Creel bag from the Folk Bags book.

I really like a lot of the bags in this book. I noticed that one of the reviewers on Amazon reckons it's imaginative but not realistic because "The wools are all non UK, and there is no guidance on equivalent weights and yardage, making it time consuming before even starting a project. I don't think many would work without the original yarns." Rubbish !

I think it's pretty easy to work out alternative yarns and hey, it's a BAG, it's not like it has to fit or something ... so I'm off to cast on with my Jamieson's of Shetland Spindrift in Raspberry and Foxglove . Yum !