Progress update... and another quick FO

Progress this week is less spectacular as last week (after all, I'm not finishing a whole blanket every week!), but it's been steady. With the granny square blanket finished and the sock still stuck in my office at work (I've been working from home a lot this week) I've reconnected with the Garter Yoke Cardi.

I have to say that now that the garter section is finished I'm enjoying it a lot more. I don't really like knitting garter stitch for too long. It's odd really - shouldn't it be easier and quicker than stockinette? I think I just enjoy seeing that smooth stockinette stitch fabric grow as I knit. 

Here is the cardi as it looks now:

Gratuitous close up of the increase:

I've finished the increase section and I'm about to separate the sleeves from the body. They are supposed to go on waste yarn, which is why I stopped knitting - I was at D's mum's house and I didn't have any waste yarn with me. 

This is obviously not even nearly finished, so it's going to stay with me for a while, but a lot of the more concentration-heavy stuff is done (as long as I can keep track of all those button holes. So many button holes!!) so it should be quite good mindless knitting while the house is full of family for boy #3's Christening. 

I do have one little FO to share, though - here is the little granny square pillow I was knitting with the spare granny squares last week:

It's just the one side - once it was done I carefully sewed it to the existing cushion cover. I'm really happy with it. The construction was easy - 9 granny squares, then 2 rows of double crochet around each square. I then crocheted all the squares together and started double crochet rows around and around the set of squares until it was nearly the right size. Right towards the end I added one row of the same pattern that I used for the squares (triple crochet, 3 into one stitch, then a gap of 2 stitches, etc) followed by 1 row of chain stitch. At the moment the pillow is on the sofa but I think eventually it may live in Matilda the caravan. 

More of Matilda and my plans for her to come later in the week! :) 

I played along with:

A Year of Projects

Yarn Along

Keep Calm Craft On

Hooking on Hump Day

WIP Wednesday update!

Well, it's been a productive week. 

I finished the granny square blanket... I'm still a bit in shock, I think. I've had this on the go for so long I don't think I really believe that it would ever be finished. 

The blanket was done a few days ago, actually, and we've had it on the sofa ever since. It's quite heavy, but in a good way, and very cuddly and warm. The boys love it, although I've had to scold them a few times for digging their little toes into the granny squares. I guess it's quite tempting... 

I'm so so happy with it!

In fact, I'm so happy with it, I decided that with the remaining 9 squares (they were the first ones and the gauge was just totally different because I was still learning) I was going to make a little cushion cover for the new stylish Matilda the Caravan. I edged these with blue so they'd match her new shiny outside paint. This is not finished, but I'm planning to crochet around the edge until it's the right size to cover that side of the pillow. I'll then hand-sew the crochet onto the cream pillow itself and tadaa! new cushion cover made out of an old (and rather worn) one!

In between all this I've obviously completed my handspun mobius cowl. I've actually been wearing this on and off - it's great to wear. How did I know know how comfortable cowls are? 

I've also continued to make progress with the Lombard Street sock #2. I've had a couple of hospital appointments this week and as I'm sure we all know, that always entails a lot of waiting around. All good for sock knitting, though, so to be honest I quite enjoyed the quiet time to sit down and work on this .I can't show you a picture though, because, guess what - I've forgotten it at work.

I've also been digging around for some yarn that might be suitable for Steph's Hitofude KAL and I managed to find this:

This is a HUGE cone of some sort of burgundy wool. I think it's lace-weight, so a little thin for Hitofude. May do a swatch, though.

Then I found this:

Honestly, I'm a little bit horrified. There are two cones of 4-ply, one of them superwash. There are also two hanks of Knitpicks yarn, one of them lace-weight, the other 4-ply. Seriously, I had no idea I had all this stuff!! The problem is that I'd have to dye it. Perhaps some Koolaid dying might do the trick? 

I'm also looking forward to starting Liesl. Here is all the yarn - should be enough, no? 

There is still no progress on the Garter Yoke Cardi, but it's next on my list. What with the crochet obsession I've just not found a moment to think myself back into this project (what row was I on anyway??). I'm looking forward to reconnecting with it in the coming week, though.

Oh, and last but not least, D's auntie gifted the boys with this:

Boy #3 calls him 'Ratty Bear'. Isn't he adorable? 

Shared with:

Yarn Along

Keep Calm Craft On

A Year of Projects

Hooking on Hump Day

The last days of summer...

We've had a surprisingly nice last few days - surprising not because of the time of year, but because of the performance record of the August weather so far. The boys went back to school this morning, with boy#3 having his first pre-school morning ever, and I'm taking a bit of time off here and there this week to catch up on things and re-charge my batteries before my own work load picks up again at the start of the university year.

We spent these last few days before the start of school enjoying all the little things we like - boy #1 went to his best friend's birthday party and came back full of Mac Donalds junk food (my stomach turns just a little bit but he LOVED it), and all three boys enjoyed time with their little cousin. We dug and weeded at the allotment and brought home more spuds and carrots and late-summer salads as well as more beans (these beans, they just keep on coming!). 

Boy #1 and #2 spent quite a bit of time with D in the shed. They love shed time and both of them worked hard on their little projects.

As for knitting and hooking progress - I'm planning on finishing the granny square blanket in the next few days - hopefully there will be a FO post this Friday. If I can get all the critters and boys off the half-finished blanket that is - it seems to be some kind of kids and animal magnet (that's not even our dog - it belongs to BIL). 

A little bit of everything...

... Well, not really, but I have done much more than the previous week. Only the Garter Yoke Cardi didn't get a look in this week. Mainly because I'd forgotten where I'd put it. I've now located it in its little bag in my office so hopefully there will be some time later this week to make some progress with it. Here it is, as it looks now:

These past couple of days I've been slightly obsessed with my Granny Square Blanket.

This is such a long-term project and it's using up scrap yarn that's accumulated over many years. Now, though, it's nearing completion. I've finally figured out how to attach the squares. For a long time I was balking at the idea that I may have to sew all these little squares together, in particular when I was imagining the untidy hand sewing that I was bound to produce. The other day, though, I suddenly hit upon the solution - I'm going to crochet them together. I immediately set out to try it and lo and behold, it works, it looks tidy and it's a lot less fussy than sewing all these pieces together.

I still have a number of squares to complete, and ideally I'd like the blanket nice and big, but I've made a lot of progress on this these past few days and I'm so in love with its mad and mismatched look!

Apart from that I've also been busy with my Lombard Street socks.  can't show you a picture because I've forgotten them at work, but I've turned the heel! There was some slight pattern confusion because the patterns is written for dpns and I'm using a circular needle, but fortunately by that point I'd basically memorised the lace pattern anyway and I just ignored the lace instructions post-heel and carried on with the pattern as before. It's working well and I should complete sock #1 soon.

Playing along with:

Yarn Along

Keep Calm Craft On

A Year of Projects

WIP Wednesday

A Year of Projects

I've signed up for A Year of Projects. Since my aim for this year was to a) get back into a regular knitting and blogging routine and b) to knit from stash, I thought I might as well make it official and join up.

I've since done some thinking about what I can rationally achieve this year. The idea is to not buy any yarn, so that limits it somewhat, but with a stash as huge as mine it doesn't really limit it very much!

This is my ideal list:

The Garter Yoke Cardi
Yarn - natural wool/cashmere yarn from stash

Ink Flare
Yarn: that unruly purple yarn that never gets the correct gauge

Ink Flare
Yarn: the huge hank of green Fleece Artist hand-dyed mohair that I've had for I don't know how long.

Socks for boys
knit one pair of socks for each of the boys. They've chosen their yarn already, so:
Yarn: Regia Crazy Color self-striping 4-ply.

Bulky Moebius Cowl
Yarn: Berry Handspun (by me)

Shalom cardi
Yarn: Olive wool/cashmere blend

Ubernatural
Yarn: orange and yellow handspun

Dietrich
Yarn: sock-weight feltable yarn from stash

Socks for me
Patterns: Conwy or Whitby
Yarn: any number of possible yarns from my huge sock yarn stash

Sideways Grande Cloche
Yarn: Single skein purple Cascade

Easy Raglan V-Neck
Yarn: GGH Savanna

Granny Square Blanket
Yarn: all the left-overs and the single balls and skeins that I have lying around in dk and aran.

I'll update, create links and images and add to the list in the days to come, but it's a start!