Catching up...

Doesn't this look amazing?

I actually have no reason for posting this, but it made me happy this weekend. The first locally grown strawberries are always a highlight of early summer for me, and these were absolutely delicious. 

Despite this rather misleading start this post is actually not about strawberries but about catching up on all those neglected FOs that I never posted about. It's time I update my Ravelry list, so without further ado I present:

The Boneyard Shawl

The Boneyard Shawl was started almost well over a year ago (heck, make that nearly 2 years ago) when I purchased some gorgeously soft Seidenstrasse yarn at a little wool shop on Borkum in the north of Germany. I cast on for this shawl there and then, and despite slow progress I finished it in September 2016. It's an easy and effective pattern but I still found working it a little boring. Apparently I'm not much of a shawl knitter... 

I do like the finished product, though, and actually wear it fairly regularly, so I'm glad I persevered. 

~*~

The second FO is the Bias Knit Sari Silk Scarf

This was a stash-busting project. Do you remember when Sari Silk yarn was all the rage? All those years ago? Yeah, that's when I bought this skein from a little online yarn shop called Hip Knits. I think it closed down years ago but they used to have lovely hand-dyed silk yarns and I used them quite a bit at the time. 

Anyway, since I had this skein of Sari Silk languishing at the bottom of one of my yarn boxes I thought this pattern would make a good stash buster because you basically knit until you run out of yarn and presto, you have a scarf!

This was super quick - I started on 17th Dec and finished on 21st Dec 2015 in the midst of my flurry of xmas knitting at the time, but then I never actually posted about it. 

So there you go, two neglected FOs, finally documented! :) 

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FOs and WIPs and such... A Year of Projects...

... Well, in my case more like half a year of projects. Not that I have that much to show for.

I have, however, steadily been working on and I do in fact have one FO. It's been a FO for some time now, but I never got round to posting about it. It's the Scheepjes CAL Dancing in the Rain blanket. I joined the CAL on Facebook and, apart from a few lapses, kept up with the pattern pieces pretty well. Some were tricky, others were not favourites in the making, but mostly they were fun to make, and always challenged my crocheting skills. It's been good to make this blanket, yes, and it's very rewarding to see it used by the boys every day. They really do love their blankets. The first thing they said when we got to our flat when we went on holiday a few weeks ago was 'but there are no blankets on the sofa!!'. I think my enduring love of blankets may be to blame. Clearly it's rubbed off on them...

Anyway, here we go - 'Dancing in the Rain', all complete and such:

The yarn is acrylic, which, considering the near-constant use this blanket is receiving, is probably an excellent thing, and after some initial teething problems I actually got on with it very well. There was a significantly more expensive Merino option for the kit, but I'm glad I stuck with the acrylic - it's soft, and light, and the blanket feels very snuggly.

I'm also slowly making progress on two projects that I've had on the needles for ages - Black Acer, and the Boneyard Shawl. 

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WIP Wednesday Project Update

I've joined another CAL.

Yes, I know, I have enough to do as it is, and I'm not even mentioning the 2 (!) partially finished crochet blankets that I am currently working on, but this CAL was just too tempting to pass up.

It's called the Spice of Life CAL and yes, it is another blanket.

What I like about it is that it will work in lines, but with a variety of colours and stitches, so it should be a good stash buster for the selection of acrylic yarns that I bought for the Weekender blanket. The Weekender isn't finished, but because of the amount of colours I doubt that I will use up any of the big 100g and 200g balls that I bought for it and well, I'm unlikely to use acrylic for anything other than hard-wearing family blankets that need to withstand frequent washes. 

Why do I need another blanket, you might ask...

Well, I happen to think that you can never have too many crochet blankets in your life! Seriously, though, our blankets are in constant use. The boys, like us, are blanket fans, and whenever they curl up on the sofa to watch TV or to just sit with us, they will curl up under a cozy blanket. These blankets see a lot of use - they are dragged around the house, they are snuggled up in wherever the boys happen to be, and they even become walls, ceilings and bedding for an infinite number of elaborate dens.

So yes, I do think we can do with yet another blanket! ;)

In other news, I've been steadly working on all projects. A few more rows have been added to Black Acer, but not enough to warrant a photograph. 

Similarly, I've been knitting away on the Boneyard Shawl, but you can't really tell, so again, I'm not  going to bore you with a WIP shot.

I've also re-started work on the Weekender blanket. I've had this on the go for some time, but to be honest, that was always the idea. It's an easy and satisfying project, and one that allows me to take a ball of yarn along with me when I go to the doctor, or take the boys swimming. A little hexie is quickly finished, and once I've collected a few I pull out the blanket and sew them on. It's a long way from finished, but it's reached that critical point when a scrap becomes a blanket, and I've noticed that the boys have started using it as such. ;)

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Stitch Along Wednesday

Craft Away Thursday

Since I missed my usual Wednesday WIP update this week I thought I'd post an update on Thursday instead. 

Not that there is an awful lot happening, but it's good to stay in some kind of routine, right? ;)

This past week I've found my way back to a project that I've neglected for quite some time - Black Acer. I find it very difficult to find time to knit on this with the kids around, because you really need to make sure to concentrate on the pattern and I found myself constantly double-checking and re-counting my rows to make sure I didn't miss those with cables. 

It took some time to re-familiarise myself with the pattern because in my infinite wisdom I obviously DIDN'T make a note of which row I was on. In the process I also found a number of real whoppers - proper mistakes that I hadn't noticed at the time. They are mainly at the beginning, those first few rows, when I wasn't really in the swing of things and the pattern was unfamiliar. I also, at the time, tried to work on this quite a bit with the kids around, so there was a lot of picking up and putting down of knitting. As a result I have one cable row where things are just... wrong. 

Guess what, though?

I'm not frogging. I'm leaving it as it is, because even though I can see the mistake I'm pretty confident that the casual passer-by who happens to see me wear Acer is never ever going to spot the mistake. 

Similarly there are a couple of mistakes further on, where I somehow managed to not do a yarn-over and therefore was a stitch short. I noticed a couple of rows further in and just corrected it then. Although if you stretch the fabric apart you can see that there is something not quite right in that section, due to a purl stitch right after the yarn-over there is a natural crease in the knitted fabric that conveniently masks the missing hole from the yarn-over. As far as I'm concerned a mistake that nobody will notice is not an actual problem. ;)

I'm about to start my third ball of yarn for this, so I'm going through the yarn quite quickly. Hope my calculations were right so I won't run out with half a sleeve to go!

I've also been working on the Boneyard Shawl. 

In contrast to Black Acer, this is really a pick up / put down kind of project for me. Right now I still can't tell much of a difference, and of course as the rows get longer, progress gets slower, but I'm persevering. Sooner or later it's going to get done.

And last but not least, look at this:

It's done! I've frogged Cowl! Isn't it funny how many small balls of yarn came out of that sweater? What on earth was I doing?!

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WIP Wednesday

Nothing major to report this week... 

I've been knitting a bit on my Boneyard Shawl, mainly in the car, while out on daytrips with the kids, but progress is really too minor to bother you (and myself) with a picture.

I've also been adding a few rows here and there to Ripple. It doesn't look much, but since the last picture I took the blanket has actually doubled in size! There is a long way to go of course, but if I only knit one or two rows every few days I should have it done in a year, which is good enough for me!!

Other than that I've been busy with my testknit. I was nearly done with the colourwork, but then spotted a mistake that meant that I had to rip a few rows out. I'm nearly done with the section, though, and after that it should be a breeze. I quite like the way it looks, although you really don't want to see the back of it - suffice to say that it has been a loooong time since I've done any colourwork, and it shows. It took me a while (and quite a few wrong decisions) to remember and figure it out. It's definitely improving now and for the past few rows I've been almost happy with the back, but I just don't have the heart to rip and start again, lol. 

What have I been reading? Mainly books on pottery. I've started doing pottery again after nearly 10 years and I might just have become a teensy bit obsessed... I'll tell you more about it another time. 

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WIP Wednesday

It's been a long time since I've last done a WIP Wednesday / Year of Projects update, with the holiday and the work madness there just hasn't been time!

I have been knitting, but since we've come back from holiday progress has been slow. Every so often I pull my knitting out and knit a few rows, but with all three boys at home quite a lot things have been more focussed on keeping them entertained than on sneaking in knitting time. I do miss it, though, much as I am also enjoying spending some fun time with the kids. 

My most recent project, and the one that is currently the only one to get a look in, is the Boneyard Shawl. When we were on holiday I discovered a tiny little but very well stocked yarn shop. I tell you, I could have spent our entire holiday budget there! Thankfully D was with me, or we wouldn't even have had money left to buy ice creams at the beach... 

As it was I didn't buy much, although I did spend a good long time admiring and petting yarn. Fortunately the shop owner was very understanding and kept on bringing more yarn to stroke and cuddle. :) 

I finally walked away with two balls of Regia sock yarn in bright red - I'd been wanting to buy some solid colour sock yarn for ages, and the red looked so very tempting!

I also bought two skeins of fawn-coloured Seidenstrasse, which is a dk weight 65% Merino, 35% silk yarn and so soft that I just couldn't resist. I immediately knew that this yarn wanted to be a shawl and on the journey back from Borkum I cast on for the Boneyard shawl. 

Progress might be slow, but it's a fun project with an easy-to-memorise pattern that is kept intersting by the continuous shaping. I do have a long way to go though!

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