Lacing along

The red shawl I’m knitting for my Grandma, has grown quite significantly during the last week.

It is knit in two equal halves, which then are grafted together in the centre, and I have alternated knitting both halves, so it would be easier to finish. The first half is now finished, and I have started the second of two charts on the other half.

I had dreaded the second chart, because there is patterning on every row (as opposed to only RS rows on the first chart), but I actually think it went faster than the first. I can really see the end of this now, and I think it’s going to turn out great. Phew :)

A picture of the first chart is here.

Knitting mail

Today, my copy of Ysolda’s Whimsical Little Knits finally arrived! I pre-ordered it in January, and have gotten the individual patterns as pdf-files along the way.

It’s the cutest little book, with ten lovely patterns from one of my favourite knitting designers. Ysolda even signed every copy!

I’m so happy I chose to get the printed and digital versions, for just £2 extra it was totally worth it.

I will probably be knitting the Hap Blanket ravelry and the small Ishbel shawl ravelry first :)

I’m still waiting for my copy of the British Yarn Forward Magazine, where there is a huge interview with Sir Terry Pratchett about Ankh-Morpork Knitter’s Guild's Pratchgan! It will probably be here tomorrow.

Yarn dyeing 1.1

As promised, here are the finished skeins from my first yarn dyeing experience. I'm quite happy about the result, and looking forward to see how the yarn looks when I knit with it. I'm thinking baby cardigan or possibly a blanket. Or something entirely different...



The first colourway, the one with blue in it -


The two other skeins were kind of supposed to be the same colourway, but the red is a bit brighter in the last one -




And all three skeins -




What do you think?

The process pictures from the yarn dyeing are here.

Yarn dyeing 1.0

Today I finally got to try dyeing some yarn with Kool Aid, that I bought here a few months ago.
I have had a hard time deciding what yarn to dye and how to dye it -what kind of colourrepeats and so on. But I decided just to jump in today... :)

I started out with some light blue Gjestal Superwash Sport that I was bored with the colour of. I used Cherry (red), Grape (purple) and Berry Blue (blue), but I mixed them a bit with each other to get a more suitable colourway. I wound the yarn, one skein at the time, around two chairs placed 246 cm apart (I measured afterwards, it was just the lenght of the livingroom).

Here is the wound yarn, soaking -


Then I put one third of the looong skein in each colour -


In the microwave -


The first colourway (one skein) -


And the second one (two skeins) -


I like the second one the best, the colours blend more. I think the blue got a little too bright in the first one. It might look fine knit up, though.

The yarn will be drying overnight, and I will try and post pictures of the final yarn as soon as possible!

Baby giraffe

After work yesterday, I got the chance to go see the tiny new giraffe, who was born on February 24. He almost didn't survive at first, but is now happy and healthy, although not fully in control of his legs yet ;)

Here he is with his mom, for scale...

The baby with the kid from last year.

He doesn't really need the tall doors that the other giraffes use, but he's the only one who's short enough to get to try and open them...

Had to lay down for a while.

So glad I got to see him before he grew too much :) He's sooo cute!
And I'm always amazed at how tall giraffes are in real life.


On the knitting front, a pair of plain ribbed knee socks for me. The storebought pair I have, are slowly wearing through on both heels, so I needed a new pair.