*shrug*

another test knit i've just done was a puffy sleeved shrug for lexi!

it's a brand new design & very easy to knit

i used some yarn that i had spun myself from purple & white hand-dyed merino fleece that i was gifted!

i'm very pleased with how it came out, it's very snuggly & soft, and fits lexi well! It used just under 100g of yarn for a size 6 shrug too..

and it has very cute princessy puff sleeves!

(my poor sweet baby was having a particularly bad outbreak of psoriasis, or eczema - as yet undetermined - at the time, hence the slightly obtuse pics!)

fuzzy

after recently being terribly jealous of kate's spinning efforts, and being the lucky recipient of generosity combined with a dose of right place/right time which netted me a smidgen over 100g of hand dyed merino fleece....

i whipped up this-
it's 173m of roughly DK weight yarn, i say roughly because i haven't spun in a good while, and was only very much a beginner then! and this was my first time trying merino, so it's a wee bit thick'n'thin lol (ignore the giant bit in the middle - that's just the end) rather pleased with how it came out though!

homespun

the colours aren't so true, but you get the idea :-)

(and nic, the pink is halfway between DK & worsted ;-) but inconsistently so lol!)

where did my day just go?!

oh yeah... *blush*

this is half of that.. umm.. swirl of roving spun up :)
(what is the proper name? anyone know?!)
i've managed a fairly ok sport weight/'5 ply' this time, and once i've got the other half done i'll ply the two together!

more fluffy stuff

didn't turn out at all how i expected - the wiltons pink was a lot darker & redder than i thought it would be, luckily pink lemonade koolaid to the rescue, and the purple split into lilac & blue.. but i still like it & can't wait to see how it spins up!!
*note to self- get more reliable dyes*

introducing-

the Home-meal Bagette!!"tha wha??!" i hear you thinking...
well it's home spun yarn, that i made a meal of, and it's a little bag = bag-ette, and it's rather rustic, just like a wholemeal baguette!

yeah ok, worst pun ever.

and just in case you *desperately* want one for your little girl (or yourself!) this is how it goes-

take your homespun bulky-worsted-aran yarn
slightly too small needles - 6mm should do it

first things first, finger-crochet a handle, cos then no matter how badly it goes from here at least you've got *something* to hold onto.

then CO 40sts using turkish cast on, ie 20 wraps
knit into your cast on stitches making one round
*k1, kfb, knit to last 2 stitches on that side, kfb, k1*
rep * - * once for 2nd side
knit round & round until you are starting to get worried that you are running out of yarn
*k1, ssk, knit to last 2sts on that side, k2tog, k1*
rep * - * once for 2nd side
cast off in purl, cos that's the way we roll round here.
finish leaving less than 1cm of yarn for weaving in the end. try a crochet hook.
attach handles how ever you like, block, then embellish, cos judicious use of embellishment can save the day.

enjoy!
and don't forget to start a hugely popular flickr pool with your bagette creations.

or not.

(and please don't use this pattern to sell. partly because there are much better ones out there & mostly because i would laugh at you *a lot*)

actually it's really quite cute in real life, and only took me a couple of hours to knit, which means for a normal knitter it's a blink-and-you'd-miss-it project :-)

and another...

couldn't resist spinning up the roving i dyed any longer...
i'm pretty pleased with it, my tension is getting better & is getting closer to an aran rather than bulky lol... i'll probably knit it into a bag for me..???
and i've already started wishing that i had a jumbo flyer & bobbins for my wheel, cos i could only *just* fit this all on!

and speaking of my wheel, here are before & after pics of it-
possibly not the most obviously striking transformation in photo form, but i think it had been left out in the damp a bit, and had had cheap oil used on it too, so it had black stains & general grubbiness all over it. i managed to get rid of a lot of it via much sanding & polishing with beeswax, so it looks vastly better in person!
still a lot of 'vintage character' however ;-)

success!

my first attempt!
as is

plied with itself & plied with the remaining yarn i received from erin in a yarn swap!

i'm planning to make lexi a little felted bag to go with her birthday crown, which was knitted from the erin yarn :-)

ta da!

it came out *exactly* how i had hoped! don't you love it when that happens?!now i just have to learn to spin...