What I made, by Sharon

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 knit Andrea Mowry's Bright Lights shawl out of my own handspun, and there are very few joys more joyful than knitting something where I've managed to spin the perfect yarn for the situation. The project was great for taking out and about - simple and intuitive. As usual (I ranted about it here ) Andrea Mowry writes out the pattern as if they are a bunch of individual rows, rather than a simple, cohesive pattern. She wrote it out as a 16 row repeat, when it is actually a two row pattern, with one tiny tweak every 16th row. And then there are 30 finishing rows that are the same as the pattern repeat, but written out separately. The whole pattern is 8 pages, but the actual information needed could fit on an index card. I guess that's modern pattern writing. Why do I keep buying and knitting Andrea Mowry's patterns when I don't enjoy her pattern writing style? Because they are simple and effective and (usually) very wearable. Once I had the hang of the pattern I did...

 And just in time too, the chill has arrived here.  For Leon's 2024 winter set I decided to knit the Winding Road Hat and Scarf pattern by Teniana Ortuta Designs. I don't really know where I came across the pattern, but it looked interesting, but not so complicated I couldn't knit it in public, because I knew I was knitting the whole set while travelling. Full trip report here if you would like to hear about things other than the knitting. I started the hat before we left, I wanted to check that the needles and yarn worked well together. I'm glad I did, because I decided I liked it better all knit on 4mm needles, so I didn't have to carry extra needles.  I made up a pair of mitts - cast on 36 stitches, 12 rounds plain rib, start a thumb gusset and hat chart at the same time. reverse the pattern for the second one: When we went to The Yarn Trader I bought a "matching" skein of sock yarn, from local dyer  Colagirl Collective .  I finished the mitts before w...

It's only February  and I've finished Leon's winter set (2021) This might be some sort of a record! I've certainly never knit a two metre long scarf in 5 days. This is the second set I've made with handspun, but it's the first time I've been truly happy knitting with my own handspun. There are, I think, 3 reasons for this: 1) I'm a better spinner. I'm also more experienced, so instead of being lazy and spun three lots of singles and 3 plied it. Much lighter, airier and rounder yarn. 2) The pattern - the pattern, which is essentially a broken rib was designed by handspun and very flattering. When I look at all the projects on Ravelry, I think the handspun one's outshine the commercial yarn.  3) Swatching - I did four swatches on four needle sizes, blocked them and then chose the needle size based only on how the swatch looked. A slightly onerous process, but well worth the time. As I often do with Leon's set's I found one element (in this ...

I don't want to sound like a snob, but I hate the suburbs. I live in what is now an "inner city" suburb (6 kms from the CBD) and I don't like going outside Melbourne's trams zone, unless it' all the way outside. (Trams or trees, Skip calls it). So when the wrap I've been knitting is called Suburban Wrap , and I've felt ambivalent about it the whole time, it's not so surprising. I guess I started knitting it in the lull before Bendigo, when I was in a bit of a directionless slump about what to knit next. The actual knitting of it was ok, it was sort of fun, but I was having increasing doubts about how it looks. I decided to lengthen it, and then second guessed myself, so ended up mainly changing around the final patterns, which I'm glad I did, since it avoids the (in my opinion) excessive final stripe pattern.  Last Saturday afternoon Leon was out and I marathon knit it, sewing in the last end as my lift arrived to take me to a beer even...

As mentioned the other day , I finished the Cathedral wrap . I blocked it, and it had ended up very long - which is not a bad thing, although I'm considering blocking again for width. I love the Oyster Yarns Maven yarn knitted up at this gauge. it's so soft and squishy and smooth and silky. Really stunning.  I'm still mad about the "join in the middle" pattern instruction, although I don't think you can see it when I'm wearing it, I know it's there. I'm still considering my options on reworking the join. Other than that though, it is quite glorious. It wraps softly around the neck, floats about and is really hard to photograph well! It's like a giant merino / silk / yak yarn necklace. This was quite a fun scarf to knit,although it was a little painful to be reminded that - for me at least - lace is harder than colourwork - and I was glad to support an Australian dyer for my first finish of the year.  It was another project...

Why do I follow instructions, even when I know they are going to make my life difficult? I did it with Strathendrick , and now I've done it with Cathedral Wrap. I know that you can't knit something, in pattern, from both ends and graft it perfectly. I did a class on this at EYF. The instructions that Joji link to make this clear. I knew it when I cast this wrap on - with the instructions to graft it in the middle, in pattern.  Knowing it's not possible to make this perfect, I decided to do a swatch to test out the technique: Y ep, looks like crap on one side (the "wrong" side of this twisted rib) And a little better, but still crap on the "right" side. I had a look on the Ravelry forums, and there is no discussion about it, but I did notice that only one person showed the join in their photos - and theirs looks like this too. I though about doing a three needle bind off, which would be neat, but also interrupt the stretch of the scarf in...

Yesterday I wore my hypernova scarf out for the first time. I love the way it came out after blocking, its drapey and bright and cheerful. I suspect it will be my go-to scarf this winter. I also caught up with some of the Richmond Knitters at a little fibre fair at Brunswick Town Hall. I bought this: Some camel / bunny / silk and some Wensleydale, which I am going to spin and then ply together for a shawl for my mothers birthday,which is in November, so no rush on it. I'm particularly excited because I have never spun longwool, or camel, or bunny so playing with these fibres should be a whole new experience.

I have been knitting and spinning like a madwoman. I thought I had lost my spinning mojo, but it turned out I just needed to rethink my plan. On the weekend I spun some green alpaca, which I am going to ply with this Miss Babs Merino / silk / bamboo and some merino / silk that I have not yet dyed, I haven't even received it in the mail yet. Still that's my plan. I have become very keen on the idea of doing more dying, which means I need to buy some more dye colours. Not that I don't love dying everything green, but maybe the addition of some other colours might be exciting. Like red and yellow and blue, so I can make all the colours. Or possibly dye more rainbows. I'm obsessed with rainbows. I finished knitting something green: the Hypernova Scar f, in Wollmiese. This was an absolute joy to knit. The pattern was simple but not boring and I love the way the yarn looks in this pattern. It makes me think of dragon scales, but that might be just ...