Debbie Bliss sandals

A while back, I posted about getting the Debbie Bliss Baby and Toddler knitting book for Christmas and the teddy that I have made for my bump!

I've also been knitting him/her a lovely dressing gown-type thing from the book (they call it a 'hooded carrying bag', which sounds a bit brutal!), but I like a short project to knit alongside a long one, and so I decided to knit the sandals in the book for my name twin (Suzy)'s baby, Felix.  He was born in December but has been growing very quickly so I wanted to make him something for a proper little boy, not just babyish bootees!

I must say, the pattern wasn't the easiest in the world to follow.  There were definite moments where I was drawing on my knowledge of knitting to work out what needed to be done rather than the instructions making this explicitly clear.  There are rather a lot of points where you must bind-off so many stitches and then start knitting in a different place, which need clearer wording, or better still, a diagram!

Nevertheless, I am very pleased with how they turned out, and have received a lovely photo from Suzy with the young man himself modelling them.  They fit very nicely (though probably not for long!).

Knit Relief - final total!!!

Excitingly, the Knit Relief auction finished yesterday evening to much buzz, particularly on Twitter (which is apt, since we are the TwitKnitClub)!

Scarlett has now totalled up the combined sales and has announced a splendid sum of £2,038 raised!  She really does deserve massive congratulations for the brilliant achievement of organising this (at the tender age of 16!!). You can read more on her post about it, here.

This was a really fun project to be part of.  I hope Knit Relief becomes a regular fixture for years to come!

Knit Relief - update

Just a quick update to say that Scarlett a.k.a TeenGranny has announced the brilliant news that the running total of the Knit Relief auction is over £1000!

The auction ends on Sunday evening, so get bidding!

Happy Mothering Sunday

Just a quick note to you all to say Happy Mothers' Day to all the Mums out there!

It's an exciting one for me, as at five months' pregnant, my next one will be as a mummy.

I'm really lucky to have my lovely Mum nearby and also the support of a wonderful mother-in-law, Georgie.

So to them and the rest of you, have a lovely day!

Teddy

For Christmas, knowing that we were expecting a baby and of my love of knitting, Mark bought me the Debbie Bliss Ultimate Book of Baby Knits.

The first thing that I knitted from it was something that I consider key for every new baby to have: a teddy.

He was really fun to knit and was pretty much done by January 3rd, when my Christmas break from work finished, but the poor thing had no face for well over a month as I adjusted back to being at work after ten luxurious days of lazing around, eating and knitting!

So here he is, learning all the best teddy skills from my teddy:

I hope he is as well loved as my ted is! If you look closely you can see he is a little threadbear around the edges (pun intended!) from being cuddled so much and (though he won't thank me for telling you) the reason he is so dapper in his suit is largely to protect his precious tummy where the cuddling obviously reached critical levels!

Knit Relief Bootees - the pattern

So yesterday I posted this post about Knit Relief and the the bootees that I have made which are currently up for auction amongst many fabulous items knitted by the members of #TwitKnitClub. 

I thought that it's only fair to give you all the pattern, both so that you can have a go at making them yourselves (but only after bidding on mine!) and to give proper acknowledgement to the lovely lady who designed the original pattern.

Both pairs of bootees are adapted from the free pattern that Saartje Knits shares on her website.

The white ones are simply the same pattern, with the exception that I simply didn't change the colour of my yarn as I felt that the interesting texture of the wool was enough. 

The 'ballet slippers' used the same pattern for forming the sole and shaping the instep, but I simply cast-off along the whole row at the point that the straps are formed on the original pattern.  The pattern is really easy to follow and produces such a lovely result.  I really recommend it.

Happy New Year-- Knit relief!

Yes, I am a little late, but as this is my first blog post of the year, it'd be rude not to!

Apologies for my prolonged absence; who'd have thought growing a baby could be so time-consuming and tiring.  Rest assured I have still been knitting away merrily, I just have been forgetting to tell you all about it.

Anyway, I have been spurred on by Scarlett Curtis a.k.a Teen Granny who has organised a most exciting venture to raise money for SportRelief/ ComicRelief.  You guessed it, organised by the founder of the famous TwitKnitClub, it could only be KnitRelief!

The fantastic idea is that members of TwitKnitClub and others have contributed their knitted (and generally crafy) items which will be auctioned to raise money.

My little contributions are:

White bootees (approximately newborn size) knitted in Patons Fairytale Velvet:

 And pink ballet slippers (also approximately newborn size) knitted in Rowan Kidsilk Haze:

There are lots of other fabulous items from other very talented people, so do pop in and have a look!

No-count, spiral-patterned cowl

Every hat needs a scarf, and luckily, the product of TwitKnitClub 3, which I have given to my Mum, didn't use the whole ball of gorgeous Rowan Creative Focus, but perhaps didn't leave enough for a decent scarf, so I decided that a cowl would be a good alternative.

I had a quick look at the cowl patterns available and they all seemed either a bit complicated or very, very simple, and not very pretty.  I knit on the train a lot, and patterns which are too complicated can easily go wrong if you get interrupted at the wrong moment, so I decided to make my own pattern up to suit my own needs.

This is the first time that I have gone completely off-pattern.  There are couple of things that I've knitted multiple times and feel comfortable enough to tweak (for example, the brilliant Saartje's bootees), but to make up my own pattern, well, it's a bit scary!

However, I came up with an ingenious plan, which is definitely worth sharing.  I'm sure I'm not the first one to think of this, but it is so beautifully simple and has a lovely effect and I haven't seen it explained before.

The principle of the idea is based on the fact that, with a cowl, it is basically a tube that is being knitted in the round.  A bit of trial and error in my knitting career (mainly error!!) has highlighted the fact that if you are working in the round to a pattern with a fixed number of stitches and you accidentally drop or gain a stitch, the pattern shifts along by one stitch each round.  I seized upon this as a brilliant way of making spirals without having to learn a very complicated pattern.

So, to my actual pattern.  I cast 120 stitches on my 5.5mm needles and joined to make my round.  120 stitches seemed about right for a ladies' cowl and is also important for the pattern.

I then worked 6 rounds of 2x2 rib, though at the end of the sixth round, I knitted the final 2 stitches together so that I have 119 stitches.  I then began to work my pattern rounds.  I have chosen to have quite wide bands of stocking stitch with narrow band of purls spiralling through it, so my pattern is k9, p3 repeat.

I know that the title says no-count, but really, most people can count to 9, and once you've done the first couple of rows the pattern appears and you can see where to knit and where to purl.

And that's really all there is to it.  The pattern is 120 stitches and there are 119 stitches on your needles so you will shift along one each time, thus creating your spiral naturally. You can adapt this so that the spiral bands are even, or even add a more complicated combination, as long as total number of cast-on stitches is divisible by the number of stitches in your pattern and you knit two together on the last round of ribbing to create your shift.

Here is my progress so far.  Pictures of the finished product to follow...

Team Baby Blanket

One of my colleagues is expecting a baby in January, so our team, having a few knitters in it, has decided to make a team blanket.

The plan is simple; we've bought some wool in 5 colours that complement each other and we will attempt to knit squares of roughly the same size to sew into a blanket for the small-one.

There are various levels of skill and confidence in our group, but most people are having a go, which is really nice.  To make sizing easier as well as keeping things simple, we've opted for garter stitch. We've also got a volunteer to crochet an edge around, though I think sewing up will be a team effort from the more experienced amongst us as it doesn't seem to be a job that people are clamouring to do!

We're about two-thirds of the way through the knitting part, and here is our pile of squares on my desk at work!

I look forward to seeing the whole piece assembled, and most importantly, the look on our friend's face when we give it to her!

The Anniversary

So, two years ago, M and I were doing this:

 Happy anniversary, my sweet! x

TwitKnit 2 - Peppa finally has a face!

TwitKnitClub 2 was all about toys, and I decided to do Peppa pig as a commission for a little girl, who loves both knitted items and Peppa.  Perfect!  I found this excellent pattern.  The last TKC 2 update I made was this one, where poor Peppa had yet to have a face.  The knitting had gone very well and I was super pleased with my handiwork. 

Then came the task of embroidering her face.  Could I do it? No. I was rubbish and my many attempts all ended up being unpicked.  So below, is the finished Peppa with a face, thanks to my Mum!

I promise to practise my embroidery!