Not Another Bag!

That's what my mum said when I told her of my plan to make Brea Bag from Berroco.I found the pattern ages ago, but never got around to looking for an alternative yarn, Berroco yarn isn't available in the UK. The yarn I'm using is some cheap and cheerful acrylic DK from my local market. I've done one side already. It knits up really quickly, because you decrease eight times every other row. Here is a picture of the first side of the bag, though I think in this photo it looks a pair of big knickers.



I decided to knit the bags gusset next after reading on a forum that someone found it really tedious to knit, because it's just moss stitch. I'm over half way along, she's right it is tedious, but the good thing about it is that you don't have to concentrate very much.



I've also finished the first half of Backyard Leaves scarf from Scarf Style and am half way down the other side. The colour of the yarn is actually paler than it looks in this photo.

Perfect timing finishing this post, have just enough time to go to the loo, get a drink and some biscuits and get parked in front of the TV in time for Jericho.

Funny Fruit

This year my mum decided to try growing tomato's, she's always liked gardening, but never tried growing anything to eat. The result of growing her own tomato's has produced some weird and wonderful shapes.

Firstly we have a duck. Quack


And then we have the old English gent with a big nose and a magnificent moustache. 'what what!'

I know it's daft, but I have a very small brain and they made me laugh!

Sorry again.

Sorry for the long gap in posts again. I was just thinking a few weeks ago that I really should update my blog, but then my nana past away suddenly, so as you can imagine blogging was the last thing on my mind.
Strangely I've been knitting more since my nana died, she was always interested in what I was making, so it seems like quite a good way to remember her.

I started thinking about what Christmas gifts I was going to make a couple of months ago, I so far have have 2 projects on the go, a scarf for my auntie and socks for my uncle. The scarf, which is Backyard Leaves from Scarf Style,
was almost a non starter, it took a little while to suss out the first 8 rows, once I'd worked those rows out, I then got stuck on row 9. No matter how many times I pulled it back and knit it again I always had 1 too many stitches, I decided to leave it alone for a while 'cause I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. I picked it up again to give it another go earlier this week and as soon as I looked at the pattern I realized where I'd been going wrong, instead doing SSSK like the pattern tells you to, I'd been SSK.
Note to self, pay more attention when reading patterns.
The biggest issue with the pattern is that there is no written stitch pattern, only a chart. I can knit much quicker if it's written, otherwise I have to remember what all the squiggles and whosamwhatsits mean.




The socks that I'm making for my uncle are Spey Valley from Knitting on the Road. I'm about half way through making the first sock, but I wanted to give the scarf another go, so they are on hold for the moment.



That's it for now. I'll try not to leave it so long before I blog again, though I think I've said that before.

Another Bag for the Collection.

I very seldom buy bags - it's not really my thing, but I do seen to have a habit of making them. My latest is a felted clutch from One Skein. It took no time at all to knit, though the fact that it was knit on a 10mm needle was slightly problematic when it came to placing stitch markers, I didn't have any big enough, so I improvised by using some key rings.
Anyway, here it is before felting.



Here it is after felting, finished off with a brooch that belongs to my mum.



I made the clutch to go with an outfit I'd got for my cousins wedding.
I don't have a photo of me wearing the said outfit, but I did do have one of the dress, shoes and clutch before I packed them.



The wedding was in Poland, the bride is polish, so all the family went over to Poland for 5 days, the wedding celebrations lasted for 2 days. We all had a great time. We drank vodka and had a bit of a dance, had more vodka and danced a bit more, which was remarkable for me, bearing that I don't normally do either.

Bookmark and Stuff.

It's a while since I've done any cross stitching and I made a couple of little mistakes on the bookmark, but unless you know where they are you can't really see what I've done wrong. I also wish I'd made have made it a little bit longer, but it doesn't really matter. The pattern came from a 1998 edition of Cross Stitcher magazine that my mums friend gave me.



Thought I'd show you some of the other cross stitches I've done. I made my mum these silhouettes several years ago. I haven't really done much cross stitch since making the silhouettes, apart from the odd bookmark, because I think you are quite limited as to what to do with cross stitching, but that could just be my lack of imagination.



I've added some new links to my blog in a little music section, if you're interested. They are all MySpace sites, cause it's the easiest way to hear some of the bands/artists music. My current favourite is Kate Nash, I heard Foundations the other week and at first I wasn't really sure, but by the time the song had finished I loved it. The only trouble is that there isn't an album yet.

Progress

Well a bit of progress anyway. I've started knitting my Jaywalker socks again, after giving the other one to my mum to rip out for me - I never have the heart to do it myself. Now I've change up to bigger needles it's turned out fine, though I did get a bit carried away when it came to decreasing for the foot, so I had to pull it back about four rounds. I've finished one and am now onto the second sock, which is really quite appalling considering I would normally have knitted a pair of sock within a week, I must have been working on this pair for at over a month.



When I blogged last it was supposed to bring up to date everything I've made in the past few months, but I forgot all about these placemats that my mum and I made for Christmas. Mum made the mat's and I then sewed the snowflake onto them. You can't really see in the photo, but the snowflake is sewn in silver coloured thread, which wasn't much fun to sew with, it kept snapping. One of the many, many times it snapped it whipped up and hit me in the head, lets just say that a few expletives were used!



The only other thing I'm working on is a cross stitch bookmark. Cross stitch was kind of my introduction to craft and I've made several of these bookmarks for family a few years ago, but I never made one for myself. I've started to run out of bookmarks recently, because if I get a bit bored of a book I put it down for a while and read something else, but I've done it quite a few times now, hence my decision to make one.

Back to Blogging

It hasn't taken quite as long as last time to post again, just over a month, but in my defence I was on holiday for 2 weeks during that time. I was in Corralejo, Fuerteventura getting prickly heat instead of a tan, oh well maybe I'm just destined to be "pale and interesting" forever. I'm really annoyed though, people always used to tell me I'd grow out of it, but I'm 24 and I still get prickly heat.



I made a summer skirt before I want on holiday, before I posted last actually, but to be honest with you I couldn't be arsed to take a photograph. I got a chance to ware it while I was on holiday, though I had to careful because Fuerteventura is quite a breezy island and it's quite a full skirt, it nearly ended up around my ears a few times. I don't have a photo of me wearing the skirt in sunny Corralejo, but I do have one that I took the other night, which is better than nothing.




Right now I'm working on a crochet bag for myself. I'm not following a pattern as such, though I am using a Essential Crochet pattern as a guide. I've been finding it quite difficult to concentrate on things that I'm making for myself lately, I haven't picked up the bag for days. If I'm making something for anyone else I'm more disciplined and I'll get of my lazy arse and pick up my needles or hook and crack on with whatever I'm making, but at the moment I would rather go on the internet and play games or look at random photos.
I've go a few months though before I need the bag, so hopefully my crafty slump will have ended well before then.
There really isn't much point in showing you a photo of the bag so far 'cause it's just a white rectangle at the moment, so I'll show you a photo of the latest pair of socks. I started them while I was on holiday, but it wasn't until I'd nearly finished the ankle part of the sock that I noticed how narrow it looked and realized that I couldn't get the sock over my heel. So that has been temporarily abandoned.