What I made, by Sharon

I finished the  Primervera socks I started for something small and convenient to carry around at Bendigo. Every Christmas, our good friend Dani of HalfBaked HandDyed fame dyes the Richmond Knitter's a special self stripping, riffing of the Christmas theme. this one has twelve different coloured stripes, for the twelve days of Christmas. I stole Sonia's photo, because it was better than mine: Stunning. I have come to the realisation that I don't like wearing plain, stocking stitch socks. They sag, and don't grip my legs well. The patterning on this sock is basically a 7 x 4 rib, with some extra fancy stuff thrown in every 6th row. They are so comfortable! The heel also called for a style I've recently adopted - adding one or two garter stitches to the edge of the heel flap. For some reason if I just slip the edges of my heel flaps it never ends up as neat as I would like, but this technique makes picking up those stiches easy and very neat. Even with this modifica...

I got sick again!  This winter it's just been one thing after another. A bad cold kept me at home Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. I always work from home Wednesdays, so I did log on today. Being sick left me lots of time for reading and knitting, so it's not all bad! Double Standard*  was an excellent short romance.  Ninefox Gambit* by Yoon Ha Lee is complicated  military space opera with lots of things blowing up and an interesting societal structure. It got me through a day when I barely got off the couch!  Now I'm reading  Never Date a Celebrity* by Claire Forsythe w hich is  Sapphic romance, set in rural Northern Ireland. very comforting.  Next up is the final two books in my current attempt to stay ahead of Netgalley deadlines -  I Love the Whole World!* by Victoria Hannan (Australian Women's fiction) and Preaching to the Choir * by Adrian Tchaikovsky   (horror novella).    The knitting has been very satisfying, since ju...

I often don't swatch. I cast on with a fair idea of my yarn and usual knitting style. If it doesn't work out, I stop and reassess. On Tuesday I cast on for   Alpine Bloom pattern by Caitlin Hunter  which I was intending to extend into a dress with a full skirt. It was apparent pretty early that, while I had gauge, my fabric was going to be too loose to make a dress that was decent. After googling slips and finding pout I could buy one at K-Mart, I stepped back and started swatching. I started with doubling the yarn on 3.5 mm needles, which made a nice fabric, but a bit thick. Then I went down to a 3mm needle, which makes a lovely, but slightly airy fabric. Back up to a 3.5 for comparison and that was immediately way too stretchy and flexible. I ripped what I had started and cast on again with smaller needles.  The second attempt has been much more satisfying. The colourwork is soothing, the contrast colour is slowly changing from pastel to pastel shade and the fabric...

Last week I said I was struggling with      The Intrigue* by Silvia Moreno-Garcia . Unusually for me I put it aside and read  The Music Between You And I by Quiana Glide * a book that was full of grammar and plot errors. After that I returned to The Intrigue, but I didn't suddenly start caring about the characters or plot. I had just read three 5 star books in a row, so I guess I was due a slump. Now I'm reading  Double Standard*: An 831 Stories Romance by Mallory Thomas . All 831 romances have the same boring cover, in different colours. The book itself is an easy read and I'm liking it. I have an unusual number of ARCs to read - after Double Standard  there are four due on the 11th of August, which should be quite achievable, none of them are particularly long. Although i really should stop requesting ARCs with short timeframes! these all sounded really good. They are  Ninefox Gambit*  by Yoon Ha Lee ( military space opera)  Never D...

It was good! we (this time meaning me, Nat, Katie and Kris) stayed in a very nice place across from a different lake! We had our traditional Thai dinner on Thursday night.  Friday morning dawned chilly but sunny. Kris and I walked to the show and then we shopped hard until it was time to meet for our traditional Richmond Knitters Bendigo Knitalong photo.  Then we went to the Women of Wool lunch, which was fun, interesting and dleicious.  After lunch we looked at some sheep, which is always a highlight for me. Every year Dani, our friend who runs HalfBaked Handyed runs a competition where punters can make their own selfstriping combinations. I think she makes the best one (or a random one, I'm not quite sure).  I made mine with my theme colours for this show - teal, lilac, pink and grey. It's in the middle here:  Friday night we had pizza, and I took my traditional terrible photo that doesn't have everyone in it. This year I manages two different, incomplete phot...

Every year, before I go to the Australian Sheep and Wool show I like to assess what I have, what I'm planning to make and what I want to buy. Then I come back at the end of the weekend and see whether my shopping matched those plans! (Planning Posts from 2012 , 2013 , 2014 , 2016 , 2018 , 2019 , 2021 , 2022 , 2023 2024  and 2025 )  I also now only press post on this on the Thursday morning before I leave for the show, because of what happened in 2021 ! This year I was doing a very good job of reducing my stash. I thought I might even get it below 10 kms for the firs time in ages. And then Anna  came to knit night a couple of weeks ago and presented me with a one kilogram bag of handspun BlueFaced Lester because she thought I would like it.  Like it? I LOVE it. So much lustre, and so even. Just stunning. Also some Lopi, which I'm excited to knit with and a single skein of Koigu. So I go into this with 13988 metres, over 21 entries.  The three on the bottom row ...

That's right, tomorrow I leave for my favourite weekend of the year - the Australian Sheep show.  As usual all NetGalley copies are marked with an *. I finished  In Wonderland * by Joyce Maynard . It's a mediative tale told from the point of view of a 14-year old having a very different summer, a poor girl being a 'mothers helper' for a rich, but dysfunctional family and reflections on how it affects the rest of her life. Now I'm reading    The Intrigue* by Silvia Moreno-Garcia . I'm a third of the way through. It's well written on a paragraph to paragraph basis, but i just don't care about any of the characters, or what happens to them. We have a failing scam artist, a bitter spinster and a frustrated young woman, and I'm completely not invested. They all deserve each other. I might not finish it, but I'll struggle on for a bit.  After that, I'll be reading   The Music Between You And I by Quiana Glide * an age gap, rockstar romance with a...

This weekend I finished my final project for Bendigo - the  Noosa Scarf . This means I've knit the Richmond Knitters jumper for our annual Knit-A-Long , and a hat , j umper , socks ,  and now this scarf for the Bendigo Project, which is an initiative launched last year by some Australian designers. Last year I didn't knit any of the patterns, this year I went wild with it!    Knitting this was pure joy. I bought the yarn (locally died merino possum) on our recent tr ip to Adelaide . I cast it on the same month as I bought it, which is always a fun time It's the sort of knitting that uses just enough of my brain to keep it interesting. A little too complicated to knit when out and about, but just right when sitting at home on the rare quiet weekend or unfortunate sick day that has happened recently.  I knit it to pattern - right down to using a merino possum wool! I went up a needle size because I think my yarn is just a tiny bit thicker than the...

I got a cold AGAIN. It's been a winter for them! Leon is sick as well. This meant we stayed home Sunday, knitting and reading. On Monday, instead of my usual after work routine of gym to knit-night I came home. Tuesday I took off work, and spent the entire day on the couch - reading and knitting. I'm feeling better now, but it's been pretty restful and I did get a lot of reading and knitting done.  Books given to me by NetGalley in exchange for an honet review will be identified with a *. I read 3 5 star books in a row  Cherrywood by Jock Serong ,  The Followers * by Maree Prat and  Starlight Mountain * by Taylor Gray. Then I blew the streak with  Hot Girl Murder Club * by Ashley Winstead , which was a book about sisterhood and revenge and I thought it was a hot mess (a lot of reviewers thought otherwise, so that is, obviously, just my opinion). This morning I started  In Wonderland * by Joyce Maynard . So far I can say I like the writing style, but I'm re...

 I knit a Ranunculus in 2021 as the Richmond Knitter's Bendigo jumper for that year's (later cancelled) Richmond Knitters Bendigo Sheep Show project. It was never quite right - it got shorter over time and the colours were a bit too swirly.  It is a very useful layer - in winter under a jacket, in summer it's light enough to stuff into a small handbag. Two Tuesday 's ago I cast on a Love Note , which is a similarly themed garment - fluff knit on 6mm needles. The day after I cast on I washed Ranunculus, since I had taken it on both my recent interstate trips. It came out like this: It's not felted, but it seems to have become shorter and wider and the sleeves are long and tighter. Weird, since I did it on a wool wash with all my other woolens, as usual, and the rest of them are fine. Luckily Love Note fills the gap: No too short Not too weirdly coloured. Not too anything. Just a really light, wearable, delightful jumper.  I knit it to pattern, except I didn't do...