New Project

Ding, ding, ding, we have a wiener! Kylie guessed it correctly, my new project is a Kim Hargreaves design. (It wasn't that much of a stretch really, was it?)

I'm knitting Arielle. I know, I'm a lunatic. The weather has finally started to turn cold after an extended Summer and I'm knitting a summer top.

Lunatic.

In the last post I mentioned that I'd matched up my stash (well, most of it) to patterns and sorted through my Ravelry queue. So, when I cast off Water and Stone, I got David to pick a number between 1 and 46, and the number he picked was the item I cast on. That's why I'm knitting a summer top just as the weather starts to turn.

The yarn I'm using is a backroom bargain from Bendigo Woollen Mills. It's a 4ply 30/70 Wool/Cotton blend that I picked up when David and I visited Bendigo nearly two years ago. That's my other reasoning for the new matchy-matchy system. I find the stuff I buy and stick in the stash sometimes never sees the light of day again. I'm hoping this way, it'll all have it's day on the needles!

But my head may have been turned by something new (already!)

I got a little Rowan delivery, courtesy of Cucumberpatch in the UK. It's such a pity that the Rowan brand is so badly mishandled in Australia. The Rowan Studio books from Cucumberpatch cost me $9.50. RRP in Australia is ~$27. Ridiculous.
But I now have my grabby little hands on a skein of the new sock yarn, Fine Art in Raven, and a couple of balls of the new Softknit cotton. The softknit cotton is nice - it's a chainette construction and feels quite squishy in the skein. It may hit the needles sooner rather than later...

Bits and Bobs

Where have I been? Here and there. Doing this and that. It feels like my knitting production has bottomed out, but I think I've just been busy. With the sad, sad demise of Calico & Ivy, I'd been panic buying. Yarn, and fabric too, particularly Liberty. The only place in Sydney that I'm aware of that stocks it now is Tessuti, and they don't have a huge range. (At last count at C& I, there were 248 bolts. Thats a lot of Liberty!)
Theres a lot of Liberty in my stash now. Maybe even too much. Nah, no such thing!
There's also a *lot* of Rowan yarn. So I've been through the stash and through the queue and matched yarn up to projects, scanned patterns for the iPad, and I'm set. Probably for the next four years. Looking at the stash this way is kind of illuminating. I definitely don't need any more yarn!

I finished the knitting on Water and Stone.

I'm pretty happy with it, although the last 30cm or so was a long, boring slog. It's blocking now, and I think it'll be a great garment this winter.

I've started something new. Any guesses?

And the other thing I've spent a lot of time on this week is finishing my mums quilt for Mothers Day.

Binding. It takes hours, and it's boring. I get so easily distracted! I did the piecing months ago and sent it off to be quilted. It was with the quilter for a long time, and panic was beginning to set it in, but I got it back in time and I'm really pleased with the end result.

I haven't given it to her yet, because she's been away for the weekend, but I hope she likes it!

(I'm still not a Quilter though! ;)