What I made, by Sharon

I knit this cute baby jumper out of left over sock yarn and FINALLY used up all my navy blue left overs . I'm pretty happy with it, I think it's really cute, and used 3 colours as well as the navy blue. It was quite a fun knit, although there were a lot of ends to sew in at the end. That's always the cost / benefit analysis when using LOSY. Now I've got two baby jumpers in the gift box, one grey and one blue. I think the next one will be a pink, purple and green one for girls.

Sonia , the hostess and founder of the Richmond Knitters decided to run a little competition during sOcktober. She donated a bunch of beautiful prizes, and made up a whole lot of catogories, including "most socks knit". Much to nobodies surprise, I won that category, with six pairs . I chose this yarn as my prize, because it's really pretty. What I didn't realise until I saw it in real life (and you can't see in this photo) is that it has sparkles, and you all know how much I love sparkle yarn. The cat bag was also part of the prize, and it seems so appropriate for me and my cat based lifestyle. I think this yarn would be amazing as part of a two colour shawl - maybe paired with a dark green. Thanks to Sonia for organising, administrating and providing prizes, and all the Richmond Knitters for making it such a fun month. Now i presume this will be my last sOckober post until next year, but you really never know, do you?

What feels like a million years ago, Kate Jordan told me she was going to write a book, with patterns and a short istory of Wellington Train Station. She finished it and has published it as Onward Knits.  You can read what Kate has to say about it here , and see a preview of some of the patterns. She  was kind enough to allow me to test knit, so before we went to Scotland, I knit Leon a pair of Sojourn gloves. I accidentally reversed the colours, without changing which side I held them on. Yet another lesson in colour dominance. This is the only picture of them I can find, and I think they are currently in the camping box All the patterns in the book are lovely, and I'm going to use another of them for Leon's winter set 2019. She's having a launch party in Wellington, New Zealnad right now, and I wish I could be there. Instead I'm going to admire her designs, photography and stories, and plan what I should knit next. You can see all the patterns, and buy the...

As I promised, here is Leon's He-Oak jumper , finished and blocked: I know last time I said I would block my next project before blogging it, because it's the right thing to do, but with this one I had to. Right until it dried, I was convinced that the neckline was a fail. This happened for two reasons. 1) A rather "interesting" neckline construction 2) The pattern calls for positive ease, and Leon likes his jumpers with less ease, so I made it with less ease. Not a great plan, although it still looks pretty good: There were NO projects on Ravelry for this. I knit it because I thought it would be great to support an Aussie designer. The thing is, most designers get people to test knit for them, and then the test knitters put their projects up. Apparently this didn't happen here. There are details I really like, like the shoulders: I don't love the way the short row sleeve caps start three rows in, I think it makes the t...

I know that Yarnalong is now only  the first Wednesday of the month, but I took this photo on the weekend and had to post on this, the 3rd Wednesday: It's the deck at my parents holiday house, and I spent quite a lot of time out there reading and knitting over the weekend. That is the first paper book I have read in four years - I always read on my beloved Kindle , but I realised in the car up there thst I had failed to bring it. Tragedy! Luckily they have a bookshelf there, with a lot of books I had no interest in and, Friday Nights by Joanna Trollope. It's a lovely light but not fluffy read about female friendships.  And that's my He-oak jumper for Leon, knitting up remarkably quickly. I'm joining in with Ginny and the monthly yarnalong . I recommend popping over to her blog to see what everyone else is knitting and reading this month. If you want to find all my book reviews, I'm SharonDb l k on Goodreads. On Ravelry I'm SharonDoubleknit , and I b...

This weekend, Leon and I did the full marathon in the Marysville marathon trail running festival. The run started the year after the entire town burnt down 10 years ago, and I've done it 7 times - mainly the 10 kilometer, once the half marathon, and this is the first time I've done the full 42.2 distance. And it was hard. The first half was great - no wind, beautiful weather, nice people, stunning trails. I stacked at 26 kms, but escaped with bruises and grazes. From 30kms it got really hard. There is a climb to a lookout that just went on forever, and coming down there was quite a stony path, and I kept kicking rocks. We had been looking forward to the final 4km - mainly down hill, and a very familiar trail, but the heat took a toll on Leon, and he was suffering from severe cramps. Still, this marathon has been my goal for a long time, and now I've done it. We might have to train differently and do it again stronger next year, or maybe not. I'll decide once the br...

My best times are when I'm reading a good book, knitting a good project and just cruising along. And that's where I'm at right now. I'm knitting He-Oak , a jumper for Leon. I was a bit concerned, because there are no projects on Ravelry (surely you'd get some test knitters or something) but it's coming a long nicely. Also quite quickly - I started it on Friday, and it's really knitting up well. The Chiaogoo needles are such a joy, although knitting at 4.5mm does feel enormous after all the socks. I'm reading Love and Treasure by Ayelet Waldman. I bought it ages ago, after listening to One Good Day and then I realised it was a Holocaust novel, and I wasn't really in the mood, I've read lots of holocaust novels and I think most of them are reading from the same source material - or many people had similar, heartbreaking experiences. Either way, not what i wanted to read right now. But this novel starts with a question I've often wonderin...

Since sOctober is over, I made a baby hat! In left over sock yarn, my favourite thing to use. Also, I seemt o ahve endless amounts of it, even though I've used kilos of it. I'm certainly not complaining, I have quite a few projects lined up for it, but it's odd. Also, I do seem to keep making more. I used some LOSY - I have no idea what it was, or how I have any left over blues after the bathmatt . I used more the the self stripping that Katherine gave me . For 29 grams of yarn, this has gone a long way! I used the Countless baby hat pattern, and then failed to follow most of the instructions, but it still worked out. Top down and magic loop! I was going to take a photo to proove I knit a whole hat on magic loop. I do love my new Chiaogoo interchangable set - but I still love doublepoints over magic loop, even with the best needles in the world. I really need to go back to blocking things before posting them - I've managed to pu up 8 projects in a row without d...

I nearly missed this months "Once apon a sock" - for some reason it didn't click in my head that the first Thursday of the month can be before the first Wednesday. So, I'm a dollar short and a day late, but at least I'm here. Here's a picture of the socks I knit in sOctober I somehow knit 6 pairs, including a pair of knee-highs , a KAL with the Richmond Knitters , sneaker liners , monster socks , thrummed slippers and a pair of baby socks . There is something about sOctober, that lets me knit more socks than is entirely possible - or as one of the Richmond Knitters said "do you have a time turner?" Last year I also knit 6 pairs, which was 4 pairs of crew socks and 2 pairs of sneaker liners. Mixing it up with 6 different styles this year was really fun. I'm joining in with Once-apon-a-sock, hosted by Paula from Spinayarn. Pop over to the linkup to see what everyone is knitting - and to join in in you feel like it. And now I'm off...