A belated mystery catch-up

Back in early summer fans of the designer Stephen West were excited to hear him announce that he’d be running a ‘Mystery Knit-a-long’ through the month of August. Although I’ve long been a fan and have several of his patterns in my Ravelry queue I’ve never actually knit one so this seemed the perfect opportunity. It seems lots of knitters agreed and before long there were over 2000 (yes, you read that right!) projects up and running on Ravelry, eagerly awaiting the next instalment of the pattern.

If you’ve never participated in a KAL before I can highly recommend it! The beauty of Ravelry (well one of the many beauties!) is that it’s easy to form a quick mini-community to provide cameraderie and support for project of this nature.

I have to admit that after keeping track with the first 3 clues (emailed each Friday through August) I fell behind for the last – I think my gold wedding stole ended up taking priority! – but a couple of weeks after the KAL was officially over I wove in my ends and declared my ‘Earth & Sky’ shawl a success!

I knit the medium size, perfect for a slightly Autumnal trip to a local beach… my colour choice coordinating perfectly with the nuclear reactor in the background! Yes, that’s Sizewell B, one of our local ‘landmarks’. We don’t visit the beach nearby very often – too spoilt for ‘unspoilt’ choice with Southwold, Walberswick, Dunwich and Aldeburgh also nearby – but we do occasionally take a stroll here and partake of a toasty and a pot of tea and the little beach cafe. It’s a strange other-worldy type place with the power station perched behind and the recent news that it will be added to is cause for debate for sure…

Pattern: West Knits ‘Earth & Sky’

Yarn: Manos del Uruguay ‘Serena’ in Azure, Emporer & Tezpi

All Ravelled here

Mystery Shawl

Now, it’s no secret that I have an ever-expanding collection of scarves, shawls, cowls and other neck adornments (well, a lady can never have too many scarves…) so I was very excited to stumble across a fabulous Shawl KAL (knit-a-long) running this August.

If you’ve not taken part in a KAL before I can highly recommend it! Patterns are divided into chunks that are released weekly and it’s a fun game of show-and-tell as mystery projects emerge in a multitude of amazing yarns! Not knowing quite what you’re making (aside from the obvious ‘sock’ or ‘shawl’) just adds to the interest. Hunt Ravelry for ‘KAL’ patterns to get more of an idea about this addictive communal knitting process…

Stephen West is a fabulous designer of all things neck-related, if you haven’t come across him before please do check out his amazing designs. Even so, I’ve somehow managed not to knit any of his patterns thus far! To rectify this sorry situation I shall shortly be casting on for the Mystery Shawl KAL. With these…

Azure/Tezpi/Emperor

It’s Manos Serena, which I’ve been dying to knit with ever sice it arrived this Spring. Local customers from my Tuesday night ‘Stitch & Sip’ have been suitably wowed by its drape and general knitterly behaviour so i am sure I won’t be disappointed…

I just need to turn those beautiful skeins into something more manageable (the ball winder and swift will be in action tomorrow!) and then I will be off. Watch this space for weekly updates!

nice weather for lizards!

Just in time to coincide with the start of Summer ‘proper’ (for once the solstice has coincided with what looks like a nice long spell of warm, dry weather in the UK!) I posted off my Lizard Ridge square to the organiser of this year’s ‘community knit’ project.

Lizard Ridge is a fabulous pattern, originally published on Knitty (one of the very best free pattern resources and if you don’t already know it get yourself over there right now!) and the designer very kindly agreed that the wonderful p/hop fund raising group could make one to auction for MSF later this year.

Each square will be knit with a random shade of Noro Kureyon so the end result will, I am sure, be spectacular. The square was great fun to knit and I am seriously tempted to embark on an enormous Lizard Ridge of my own! We’ll see.

Meanwhile, I urge you to check out the p/hop pattern collection. They are all wonderful and the concept is inspired. In a nutshell, designers donate patterns to the p/hop cause and buyers decide how much they would like to pay for each pattern and donate to MSF via the ‘Just Giving‘ site.

And if you feel inspired to join in I am sure that more squares would be appreciated. Find the details here on Ravelry.

Olive anyone?

teeny tiny sock needles!

Yes… it does feel a little like knitting with cocktail sticks!

I’m road testing these 10cm double pointed needles from Knit Pro… and I like them a lot! After a couple of rounds feeling like I’d somehow been transported into the pages of Gulliver’s Travels I soon developed a nice easy rhythm and in no time I’d got half a sock – and Chris has now stopped asking me if I’m going to do some teeny tiny knitting…

They are smooth and pointy – as you’d expect from Knit Pro – and the short length does make for very speedy, tidy knitting as well as making the sock-in-progress very portable, which is always handy!

(Especially when you are up against a deadline… yes, that is indeed a Through the Loops Mystery Sock that you are spying… ssshhhh!)

The yarn is Natural Dye Studio Dazzle Sock in Aqua… and it is gorgeous!