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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 4 Comments

When push came to love, I ended up doing a Valentines wreath for February.

I did toy with the idea of a heart shaped wreath full of flowers, so I could make some plant puns about how I was pine-ing fir some good ideas, if you would be-leaf it, but I didn’t.

I wanted to take this wreath to the nest level.

Anf you can’t fall fowl with lovebirds when it comes to romance and the rest of it. The lovebirds are knit following Songbird by Sara Elizabeth Kellner, which is an amazing free pattern that provides the base for any small bird of about that shape. Change some colours, do a little intarsia, and voila, it can be any bird you want it to be.

I have actually sort of knit this pattern before, as an Alice in Wonderlands Hammer bird and Pencil bird for Rabbies unbirthday party during lockdown.

But let’s stop fluttering around and get back to my wreath. Felix wrapped it, and used a lot of my scraps and even some odd balls of wool. The birds themselves knit up pretty quick after I spent ages trying to pick just the right colours, and the branch was a last minute addition – a bit of wire wrapped in yet another scrap of wool. It all came together really well, but not going to lie, the moment I hung that wreath up, I started to debate what my March wreath should be.

Suggestions welcome!

With that, I shall leave you to this swift post as it’s been a crazy busy week and this viking needs to chill out before more madness tomorrow…

Till next post, stay safe.

Starting total – 841

Wool used – 7 (Up by three!)
Wool bought – 2
Wool given to me – 1
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 6

Total – 843 (Net difference: +2)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 2 Comments

Yep, its more clawsome cat puns this week! They’re just too purrfect to resist!

I’m still juggling numerous crafts at the moment, but with the cold snap we’ve recently had, and the one about to start any minute now… I decided to finally finish my warm wooly cat set.

We’ve had the cowl, we’ve had the arm warmers, we now have the hat!

I was going to spread this out over two posts, but didn’t think seeing the same design in the same wool but as a different shape would be all hat interesting fur you all. So we will skip straight to the fun part – the pompom.

So, the hat needed something when I finished knitting it, and the pattern ( Slouchy Cat Hat by Marna Gilligan from her book Cat Knits) recommends a pompom in all the colours used to knit the hat.

Too busy.

Straight up solid colour pompom?

Too boring.

I mentioned this to Felix who immediately told me it should be a cat pompom! At first I was about to say no and then I paw-sed and remembered a certain pattern in a different book that calls for fluffy wool to make a ball like cat…

That pattern happened to be Fluff Balls by Sue Stratford from her book Knitted Cats and Kittens. I changed the fluffy wool for knitting the purple in loop stitch before cutting and letting Felix brush it for extra fluffiness.

Subsequently, I have worn this hat twice as Felix claimed it as hers and it has barely left her head since…

Even though I have lost my hat, I’m feline happy with the final result, and having finished this winter set. But what to work on next? So many crafts, so many possible projects, not enough time…

I mean, I only have a nalbinding project or three I want to start, another spinning project I want to begin, a tablet weave partially warped on my loom, one knitting project on the needles and three more already lined up, a sewing project involving 12 bags, a hand sewing project involving mine and the kids viking kit…

Plus some needle felting and natural dying, oh, and a weaving experiment…

…yeah, I need a lot more time…

Until next post, stay safe.

Starting total – 841

Wool used – 4 (Up by two!)
Wool bought – 2
Wool given to me – 1
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 6

Total – 846 (Net difference: +5)

Yep, still feeling im-paw-sible that I’m going to make a good dent in the stash this year…

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

As I mentioned at the star-t of the year, I’m doing a lot of non knitting crafts at the moment, so content may be a bit scarce. The thing is though, I quite enjoy coming up with various sunny puns to inflict upon you all, and I like the routine of having a little time to look back and reflect.

Although a lot of my posts do come across as cut and sun.

Ok, ok, I’ll get on to it. I don’t have knitting to share this week, I have however picked up a project I started a few years ago – my window wreaths. I want to have one for every month of the year, and January is one of my missing ones. I had lots of possible ideas, and a few maybes and possibilities but…

It was a proper frosty morning, I was corralling the terrors to the car, when Felix just slammed on the breaks and went, ‘look Mummy, it’s so pretty’.

So I did, and we all just paused and spent longer than we should admiring the intricate crystal of ice and frost, trapped in a spiders web, glistening and sparkling in the artificial light if the house.

It is not as beautiful, or intricate as that spiders web, but I think I caught the sparkles and simplicity of it all. The kids both very much love this wreath, and even when I had just started the web part, where enthusiastically picking out beads to be ‘caught’ in it.

Now to decide what my February wreath should look like…

Its been a very quiet week, both this and last, as I’m recovering at the moment. Just about back in my feet though and itching to get cracking on with all my projects – to which there are many, many, many…

And with that, I bid you farewell. Stay safe, take care, and my next post should be back to its more normal knitting chaos.

Starting total – 841

Wool used – 2
Wool bought – 2 (Yep, I know, but there are just certain wools I need in my stash that I use all the time, and black DK is one of those)
Wool given to me – 0
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 0

Total – 841 (Net difference: 0)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

Gourd you believe it, this is the last of the boo-tiful spooky season knits to share (until next year) with you all. All’s bats are off on guessing the theme!

This all started, out of the boo, when my friend OwlLady gave me a handful of mochimochi teeny tiny ghosts. They were fa-boo-lous by themselves, but after recieving some spook-tacular kumihimo braid from Timbercat, I just new it would need a few additions…

First of all, I enrolled my gourd-geous assistant Felix to needlefelt me some pumpkins. She’s definitely the pumpkin of my eye when she’s stabbing fleece furiously with a sharp needle… This is actually fleece dyed with beetroot from a few summers ago, and some nettle dyed fleece from last year.

Then after that, I whipped up some bats that practically flew off the needles and added them to the garland. Pattern used is a free Ravelry one, Bat by Linda Dawkins, which I have used quite a few times.

But alas, Halloween has passed and I never had the time to add more. That’s how it ghost though. Until next year. But what to knit? Cats? Witches? Witches hats? Broomsticks? Cauldrons? So many ideas!!!

Until next time, stay safe!

Starting total – 880

Wool used – 53 (+1)
Wool bought – 24
Wool given to me – 17
Wool gifted to others – 8
Wool handspun – 2

Total – 860 (Net difference: -20)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 7 Comments

So I have knuckled down and tibia honest with you all, it’s paid off.

I received a commission for a skeleton cat, and tooth be told, I was really looking forward to this one. The final toy is knit loosely following the free pattern grisig the cat by Julia Weiss. Tweaking was done, details added and a lot of colour changing. I did have to go back to the jawing board a few times in this one, but he was done in good time.

In other crafting news, I have narrowed down the to do list so I can focus on things one at a time. There is spinning to be done to finish some wool to nalbind myself a basket. There is a bag strap on the tablet weaving loom, mostly to work on my tension before a fun pattern, which when finished, will be used with some fabric to make some bags. I have a Hedeby braid on the marudai for Felix’s viking kit (she’s mostly working on the braid herself but I am helping) and I have finished braid to sew to my kit. Theres also a pile of mending to be done…Oh, and miniatures to paint – Sea fox clan battletech mechs first, then a list of other things to work on after, including a 28mm scale Tudor house.

It looks worse typed out than it does in my head…

In non knitting news, life has been manic. Like break neck speed manic. Hoping for a quiet weekend to catch my breath and all the things that have been put to one side until ‘later’. The mending pile falls into this category…

Anyhow, I’ll leave you with one last photo and until next week, stay safe!

Starting total – 880

Wool used – 52 (+1)
Wool bought – 24
Wool given to me – 17
Wool gifted to others – 8
Wool handspun – 2

Total – 861 (Net difference: -18)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

Not bored of the puns yet!

This one is from last month really, but Felix had been invited to sleepover at her besties as part of her birthday celebrations. I had asked weeks before if there was anything in particular she might like as a gift, and Felix kept shrugging.

We settled on a D&D style starter game as Felix’s bestie has been enquiring about RPGs and has seen D&D in various films and media, so…well, who can resist the urge to spread the geekery?

Two nights before the sleepover, Felix informed me that her bestie was wanting arm warmers. But they had to look awesome. And be green. And be cotton or some such fibre as her bestie was having eczema issues…

I shopped the stash, and found some beautiful deep green silk yarn and, after a brief consultation with Felix, it was decided.

Its a modified version of the free pattern Dragon Scale Gauntlets by Annemarie Pearson – all I did was remove a portion of the stitches from the underside, and use a smaller needle to get them fitting little 10 year old wrists.

Oh, I did ask Felix why she waited until the last minute to tell me about these, her response was ‘but you said to tell you when I thought of something.’

I mean, I did. Hence, the flameous last words…

Alright, its been a reasonably quiet week this week, a few little things, some major stress that has now been resolved, and compared to the rest of this year, that’s a win.

The only thing really left to say this week is that I did a bit of wool shopping for mothers day, but I was good! I only bought one thing for the stash, an its actually needed for a gift I’m going to knit.

I mean, what’s one cone of nearly 3km of lace weight yarn?

Starting total – 880

Wool used – 8 (+1)
Wool bought – 11 (+1)
Wool given to me – 2
Wool gifted to others – 3
Wool handspun – 2

Total – 884 (Net difference: +4)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

Or ‘Autumn Adventures Continued’…

And it has been adventure. Spent the last Saturday to Saturday in Dunbar, about an hour and a bit East of Edinburgh. Right by the coast, so lots of beach trips and rock pooling! There were also many spooky shenanigans, pumpkin picking and carving, fancy dress contests being won…but a lot of our bigger plans got curtailed as one of our friends came down with a sickness virus.

So I spent Thursday night in A&E with him, but he got all the medicine and was making some recovery by the end of the week…

A good trip, but an exhausting one.

All that aside, my knitting!

Same wool as Felix’s jumper, this is knit loosely following Moonbow Slouchy Knit Cardigan by Jessica Reeves Potasz, a free pattern, with the addition of another free pattern 117-8 Elephant Ears by DROPS design as I wanted to add a shawl collar.

Its big, it’s warm and it’s squishy, which is exactly what I wanted, so very pleased! And every last bit of wool was used, meaning the 20 balls of it that entitled my stash, has officially left! Woo!

And with that, have a good Halloween and I will leave you with my wool count!

Wool Count

Starting total – 843

Wool used – 93 (3 since last update!)
Wool bought – 48
Wool given to me – 32
Wool gifted to others – 1
Wool handspun – 3

Total – 832 (Net difference: -11!)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

To explain the title of this post, Stray (the amazing post apocalyptic cat game) has of course swept through our house and we’ve all become obsessed with the adorable ginger kitty.

Then, when I went to type this post, I realised that B12 didn’t ever give the cat a name. The only time anything like a name was used, was by Momo, who called the kitty ‘Little Outsider’.

Anyway, why am I telling you all this?

Because of this:

I intend to knit his little harness and a tiny B12 to go with it so that he’s ready for Walled City 99!

In non knitting news, it has been a very busy two weeks – last week was the first cthuhlu session with a new gaming group, followed by three more days of socialising and catching up with friends. Then work, which was very busy as we had people on holiday plus three new starters all needing training.

This weekend saw more socialising of the kiddy kind as Felix’s birthday is this week. There was pokemon card playing with one friend, a sleepover with another, and Chester Zoo with that friend and Felix!

I am all socialed out. However…today is also the first day of my new role! I changed departments (not company) and today was my first official day! So socialising and learning lots of new things!

And with that, it’s an early night for me!

Wool Count

Starting total – 843

Wool used – 68
Wool bought – 48 (+25 there was a yarn sale at Abakhan and with me starting a new job!

Wool given to me – 32
Wool gifted to others – 1
Wool handspun – 3

Total – 846 (Net difference: +14, yeah…I fell off the wool wagon big style…)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 2 Comments

I’m not the one who acquired new skills – Felix has!

I’m taking a moment to be a very proud mum, please do indulge me a little! Felix has long been able to do the knit stitch. Not necessarily well, but she understands the option and mechanics of it. We bumped it up recently to include Purl stitch and…she took to that like a duck to water.

I don’t know if it’s because she’s left handed and knitting right handed like how I knit, but the purl stitch just seemed easier. We did rudimentary increasing and decreasing as well, and more importantly colour changes, to make the super cute rainbow square rabbit pictured above.

Ok, I’ll stop now. The finished knit I had planned to show you is still sitting, unsewn. Not due to procrastination, but because I need the teapot it’s meant for before I sew it to ensure a perfect fit! I could guess, but then it runs the risk of not fitting, of being lop sided…nope. We’ll have to wait.

In non knitting news, Inklings room had a long overdue overhaul. The weekend was spent ripping out his old bed and building a cabinbed – essentially a bunk bed with a desk underneath – where his computer, cannibalised from the parts of others lying around, sits, waiting for his e-learning that is due to start at the beginning of the next school year.

So, without further ado, I shall say cheerio and get back to tidying up and reorganising Inklings room!

Wool Count

Starting total – 843

Wool used – 56 (1 since last update!)
Wool bought – 23
Wool given to me – 29
Wool gifted to others – 1
Wool handspun – 3

Total – 841 (Net difference: -2 I am below my starting total!!!)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

So I imagine for those who read last week’s post that the first thing you want to know is:

What did the Reliability Raptor get called? Well, drumroll!

Flapjack.

Yep. Flapjack.

An independent audience (friends and kids) picked the top three names – Dendrite, Roar-y and Flapjack – and Flapjack won. There was lemon cake as a celebration and…

This little tiny cutie decided to follow her mum and come to work too and be the main prize. For those curious, I modified Bag of Troodons from ‘knitted dinosaurs’ by Tina Barrett to match the velociraptor in colour and fluffy wool.

Immediately the competitive atmosphere was in full swing debating a name for what I was calling ‘Flapjack Jr’, much to my initial surprise.

But you know…

I think Flapjack and Cupcake make a very cute pair.

In non knitting news, the blog is a day late due to Engels work commitments (drinking beer with his work counterpart from the German branch) but a good laugh was had by all.

My mum was supposed to visit this weekend gone but, alas, finally caught covid despite avoiding it this entire time. So we had a very spur of the moment type weekend which had me giving Felix and her best friend knitting lessons during a heritage diesel train engines day!

They are both doing amazing! And I blame them both entirely for once more falling off the band wagon and purchasing some wool they both felt was ‘amazing’, and some they thought was ‘awesome’ and a few that where ‘squee! It’s so fluffy!’

Thats why there are nine more balls of wool in my stash. Though I have used three this week. But still.

Eventually I’ll have the same number of balls of wool that I started with this year! Maybe. Hopefully.

Wool Count

Starting total – 843

Wool used – 54 (3 since last post!)
Wool bought – 32 (9 new balls…)
Wool given to me – 27
Wool gifted to others – 1
Wool handspun – 3

Total – 850 (Net difference: +7 Sigh…)

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