The last few days have been epically crafty and yet I've knitted not one stitch! I finally admitted defeat on the Advent scarf. At this time of year, there just weren't enough hours in the day to work, run the house and knit on the scarf! I'm disappointed, but not overly surprised. I'm going to finish the project, but I think it will be later rather than sooner now. I can see it becoming a gift for next Christmas.
I decided this weekend to make a drop spindle for my pen-pal. I'm hoping that she doesn't see this before her package arrives! I had originally hoped that my talented other half would turn a whorl for me, but sadly his lathe had other ideas on the matter and broke! So I had a re-think and went to my local craft shop and bought some FIMO. I've never used this before, but I had fun making the whorls, but I managed to burn them, and the colours went a bit squiffy!
While I was burning the whorls, I set about making stitch markers. I'm pleased with them, and I hope the recipient is too.
On the crochet blanket front, I've been beavering away at it all week. I discovered early on that the original idea of six rows and increasing six stitches on each turned edge wasn't going to work as I kept winding up back where I started and I wasn't going to work around each side of the blanket. So I changed it to five rows and five stitches and I was away! It's now big enough for me to snuggle under while I work on it.
I've also brought Whenu out. Whenu is my spinning wheel. She is an Ashford Kiwi 2 and her name is Maori for spin. I've had her for about 6 months now and on the whole, we get on well. I aim to spin a laceweight yarn and knit a shawl I've designed myself. Last night I spun for about an hour. I'm working on some Forrest Fibre Marino silk blend in the damson colour way. I love how it's spinning. The Marino gives a lovely soft yarn and the silk makes it spin like butter.
Today has been mainly cooking for christmas - flapjack, chocolate cake, ginger biscuits, sausage rolls, roast ham. The sausage rolls were an epic fail - soggy bottoms and the sausages weren't very nice either! Boo!
But now, I'm relaxing with a sock. I'm hoping to design the pattern. I hope it goes ok. I can see what I want to achieve. I just hope it works out in the sock!
Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and I hope that everyone out there has a joyous festive season and I'll write again on New Year's Eve.
Well hello from across the pond! I found your new blog through a ravelry link ( I was looking at the pattern for the knit monster - so cute!), and thought I'd say hi :) Happy Holidays!
ReplyDeleteHi! Hope you had a great Christmas! The hug monsters and spiky monsters went down well with their recipients. They're a great way to use up odds and ends to yarn.
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