Tuesday 26 August 2014

Neapolitan Toes

I am a great fan of knitting socks and when I saw this gorgeous self striping yarn from the sirdar heart and sole collection I could not resist making another pair! The colour way I chose was hello cheeky, with a gorgeous mix of yellow, pink, blue and purple (it reminds my of Neapolitan ice cream). It is a blend of 75% wool and 25% nylon. I used a combination of my standard sock knitting pattern and the pattern on the wool band, however I did modify the pattern to allow for a larger circumference around the ankle, reducing 3 stitches per row every 5 rows down the leg to shape for the ankle. The finished socks are great! I think I will keep them for myself this time. They will be nice and snugly in the winter months.




Friday 22 August 2014

Bits and bobs

I have been busy finishing lots of little projects lately. Here are some of the finished items...

Silver kumihimo necklace made with silver galvanised beads. 
Made as a gift for my mums friend Alison


Cute little knickers made with heart lace and striped jersey fabric.
Made as a gift for a close friend, don't worry I won't name names!!


Love the bow!


Hand knitted cowl made from handspun Shetland fleece, I even processed the fleece from scratch too.
This one was made for my dad to keep him warm in the winter months. 


I am finishing off some hand knitted socks, handwoven scarves and working on some reverse appliqué at the moment so watch this space! 

Also I will be at the Aylsham show on this bank holiday Monday demonstrating beaded kumihimo with the Worstead Guild of weavers, spinners and dyers if anyone wants to visit us.






Fantastic natural dyeing course by Ros Wilson

Last weekend I went on a natural dyeing course lead by Ros Wilson, it was very inspiring and made the prospect of the whole dyeing process a lot less bewildering. She showed us how different mordants effect the final colour and I was very surprised about how vivid the colours I could achive!

Here are the colours we achieved with 3 different mordants and 4 different natural dyes. We used onion skins, weld, cochineal and logwood, can you guess which ones are which?


Ros has a wonderful garden and workshop, here are our skeins drying in the sunshine.



If anyone is interested in any of the courses Ros teaches you can find out more at her website: http://www.roswilsondesign.co.uk

She is a great teacher. She also does talks on how to design your own knitting patterns which I hope to attend.




Tuesday 12 August 2014

Hand quilted cushion cover

At the 2013 Festival of quilts I bought a kit from Sandie lush to make a hand quilted cushion cover. I finished it a couple of months ago. I completely forgot to blog about it.. Here it is...


I loved making it!

This years festival of quilts was amazing! I bought a lot of lovely things....


Including a cot quilt pattern and another cushion cover from Sandie Lush. I also fell in love with Lynette Andersons gorgeous hand sewn designs and bought a cushion cover pattern called the orange tree. As you can see I bought some of Lynette's Fabric range too, gorgeous!

So lots of hand quilting and sewing projects to get on with. Much of this hand sewing inspiration comes from Margaret Currie and Tricia Vint after a fabulous hand quilting/embroidery class last week. Thanks Ladies!

I will keep you posted with my hand sewing.




Monday 4 August 2014

Handspun yarn to fisherman style jumper

I spun 1kg of Shetland sheeps fleece into chunky yarn.....


I knitted it into a jumper for my dad...


I ended up using nearly all of the yarn I spun so it is quite heavy and very warm! I hope dad likes it!