KNITTING UPDATE

Last year, DB and I went on holiday camping, in Brittany, France. Whilst we was there, I came across a yarn store, accidentally of course ;-) I thought I'd like to buy some yarn and make something to keep as souvenir of the holiday, It was a lovely tiny craft shop, which was full of Bergere De France Yarn. The shop itself, was very busy and being so tiny, it was difficult to browse properly, and as they were all speaking french, it was difficult to enquire about anything too, but the lady, who owned the shop did speak a little English, well let's say her English was much better than my French. So when it came to my turn, I decided it would be easier just to purchase one ball of sock yarn, so after a lot of pointing and waving my feet about, the lady nodded and pointed to a small basket of odd balls of sock yarn, to be honest there was not a lot of choice so I quickly selected a ball and purchased it, and as I was going out the door I thought I heard the lady say, that's lovely (something) Bergere De France yarn. Then the other day I was speaking to a Knitter friend, and when I showed her my completed socks, she said, I have some of that yarn in my stash, it is Opal Petticoat, I was a bit startled at first, here's me thinking I have got some unique French yarn, to find out I could have probably purchased it in the UK. now me being a 'complete gonk', a couple of months ago whilst clearing the bottom of my knitting bag, had thrown away a number of knitting bands and alas, I think this was one of them, so now I think I'm going to have to change their name to stripped socks, not very original I know,but I can't think of anything any better at the moment, so here we have Stripped Socks.

and the yarn used will remain a mystery, not that it matters, as I did enjoy making them.

The cropped cardigan, has got off to a very sticky start, The pattern is full of errors, not just one either, each piece is wrong and to top it all, the picture in the pattern is a mirror image, so everything in the pattern is reversed! Yikes, Luckily I had not got very far, before Roxy very kindly pointed them out to me, there has been nothing posted on the Yarn Forward website as yet, in fact it says no errors have been found so far with issue 1 and although I understand very basic principles of decreasing at armholes etc.. how many stitches and when is not something I find easy to digest, I always rely on the pattern to do that, even DB tried to help, but him being an engineer, managed to make it sound more technical. I was disappointed to say the least, as this was something I had set my heart on making. I have tried sending an e-mail a couple of times, to the editor but I am still waiting for a reply. Then Roxy, yet again, has come to my rescue, as she knew another Rowanette, who has made this cardigan and has made and written her own amendments so Roxy has very kindly e-mailed them to me, so all is not lost after all and I will be able to make the cardigan. Thanks ever so much Roxy for sharing this with me, and also thank you to the lady, who made the amendments and has shared them.

In the meantime, I was a bit undecided what to make next, so I decided on this

Its Chamomile from the Rowan Summer Tweed book, I have been wanting to make this for a while and I had purchased the yarn in the shade Denim, last autumn. I have visualised wearing this whilst taking Tess for walks at weekends, and so I don't think the leather thongs would be practical. so I'm doing the neckline the same but without the ties and if it starts to flap open too much, I can always add a hook and eye closure, just to hold in place. I have made good progress so far, and about half way with the front. It's the first time I have knitted with Summer Tweed, and although I like it, I do hope it softens a bit when washed, because at the moment it feels a bit dry and full of twig like sharp bits.

After a bit of searching DB has decided he liked the Techguy Sock pattern from Mag knits the best, but wants them plain, and also chosen black, which is probably one of the worst colours to knit with, so what I think I shall do, is to take these to work with me and perhaps if I just do a few rows at lunchtime etc, it won't be so bad and after all I did promise and he did buy me a place in the STR Club. Talking of which I have ordered a couple of extra STR skeins;-) as they have now sorted the payment system out and I was able to purchase these myself, I can't wait for them to arrive, I am not sure how long the postal system takes, but I am looking forward to it, and I also believe the new Rowan magazine is out this week too, So there's lots of thing to look forward too...

See you next time!