Spitting Yarn

The body of the Everlasting Bagstopper string bag is complete.  I’m on my way towards doing my bit for the plastic bag campaign.  If you look carefully, you can see where I fudged the pattern a few rows up from the base.

I was planning on knitting a tweed or seed stitch strap, but the hemp yarn produces irregular stitches which look untidy in the dense fabrics which those stitches make.  I may well follow the pattern and sew a fabric strap instead.  I have a couple of sewing projects I want to tackle in any case, so it will encourage me to get the sewing machine out.  I have several pieces of gorgeous Liberty fabric which really should be shown the light of day.

A friend of mine is incubating her second child and, inspired by Anna’s lovely Old Shale Baby Blanket, I have cast on for a feather and fan blanket.  I ended up not using Anna’s pattern, because my Blue Sky Alpaca Organic Cotton was a bit bulky.  I found this pattern using the yarn, which seemed a good alternative.  I think Anna’s pattern makes for a generous blanket.  F.pea’s pattern is smaller.  I did consider extra pattern repeats, but the cotton is quite bulky and I don’t want the blanket to be too unwieldy.

All these babies are doing wonders for my knitting!