Back on planet Knit

Umm, I seemed to have disappeared for a while, but I'm back. I've been composing posts in my mind ever since the last one, but I just lacked the will to sit down and do it. Story of my life...

So what have I been doing? Apart from working and eating and sleeping, I've managed some fibre folly as well. I finished the Transverse Cardigan (Ravelry link). It has been much too hot to actually wear it, but but I should get some wear out of it when it gets cooler. I might move the buttons a bit higher; it looked right when I sewed it on, but when I wear the cardi the button bands do not quite line up at the neckline. I need not have worried about running out of yarn - I only used 8.5 skeins, which means I have 4.5 left over. I've just cast on Sonja's cardigan (Ravelry link) with the left over yarn - my friend Antoinette's 3 year old daughter is in a pink phase, so this should be perfect for her. I love the 'in threes: a baby cardigan' pattern by Kelly Herdrich, and will probably be knitting the same pattern for another 3 year old. The yarn for the two projects are quite different (one in the rather dense 40% wool/60% cotton of Mirasol Cotanani, the other in very soft and much loftier 100% merino from Coldharbour Mill/ Fibre Harvest/ John Arbon), so I'll be able to compare how the same pattern knits up in different yarns.

I've also finished another shawl (my third one this year) - it's the Travelling Woman by Liz Abinante of feministy.com, using some sock yarn by Nurturing fibres (bough from Purewool) that I brought back from my Christmas holiday in South Africa. It is destined to be a Christmas gift - better not say who for, just in case!

Lastly, I also knitted some fingerless mitts from some of my own handspun, inspired by the SpinDoctor podcast KAL. This was lovely fibre from FeltStudioUK, which I totally mangled on the Ashford Joy. The Joy and I are not getting along very well, and I was trying to do a thicker yarn than usual, which did not work. The result was a very uneven yarn, but the knitted product looks nice, in my opinion. Only one problem, the one mitt is noticeably (when feeling them) chunkier than the other... I might have to keep them for myself!

That's enough for now - don't want to overwhelm anyone with a 3000 word essay just because I've not posted for ages. I'm on leave this week, so I should be able to fit in another post of two before I'm off to Knit Camp in Scotland this weekend. Cheers!