Spitting Yarn

Jump to Comments

If only every week had a long weekend. 4 days off work makes for a near perfect live-work balance. It doesn’t quite alleviate the tedium of having the wrong job, but it certainly eases it.

This long weekend featured dinner here (the braised peas were a hit) and lunch here (unspeakably good all round), and a wonderful roast chicken prepared by my DB. I think I’ve put on half a stone, but who cares!

Aside from venturing out for tasty morsels, most of the long weekend was spent in doors, bar a walk each day to “take the air” (wasn’t the weather good for a bank holiday weekend?). DB wrote his speech for an upcoming wedding. I created an almighty mess in a crafty whirlwind.

I’ve decided I’d like to decoupage a papier mache bowl. Stage 1 was completed this weekend, which was making a proto-bowl. It has some cracks in it which were an inevitable consequence of trying to get the damn thing off an inadequately greased bowl(!) Stage two will entail building up the layers and papering over the cracks. I’m having fun thinking of a theme for the decoupage. I thought I might imitate those sardine tin label emblazoned bowls like *this* one. No pictures yet, though.

Kirsty over at Cast On Cast Off has agreed to share some of her sewing wisdom with me via a one-to-one session some time. So I took this weekend as an opportunity to re-familiarise myself with a needle and thread, inspired by Kirsty’s post *here*.

A Wee resulted, by which I mean a small object as invented by Hillary over at Wee Wonderfuls. Here’s mine…Babushka.

Cute, niet?

I also finished Clapotis. Hooray!

I really enjoyed the knit. If I wasn’t increasing, I was decreasing, and even on the straight section there are the drop stitches to keep one entertained. I’d definitely like to knit another. I followed the pattern exactly. If I were to knit it again, I’d do more repeats in the straight section as it’s not long enough for my liking. I wish I had anticipated this, but as the pattern is likely to reappear on my knitting list, I’ll just knit the next one to my specification. I would also use a finer gauge yarn. Rowan Wool Cotton just doesn’t drape enough. A soy yarn like Oasis would be wonderful.

I also cast on for Maggie. When I say cast on, I have to admit that what you see below is my gazillionth attempt to get past the first twenty rows, as may be evident from my re-wound yarn. I have some kind of mental block over what is not a difficult pattern. I’ve frogged so many times that actually progressing with this lower back trim has escalated into a task of herculean proportions.

Aside from my inability to follow the pattern, I’m also having some issues with wrapping stitches. The pattern calls for 3 wraps in the first few rows. I’ve watched an instructional video over at Knitting Help and if I’m doing something wrong, I don’t know what it is.

Actually, I think I may be doing something wrong when I knit the wrap and the wrapped stitch as I encounter it on the next row. Take a look.

It’s ugly. Any suggestions or advice? Clearly I’m going to be frogging again, but that’s ok so long as I get it right eventually.