A trip down Memory Lane

I had a little trip down memory lane over the weekend. I was scrolling through some old photos on my phone and looked at the oldest, originally transferred from the pc years ago, before phones had cameras, never mind when I had one! They were of some of the quilts and baby playmats I have made over the years. (I used to be an avid patchwork and quilter and it was my obsession passion for over ten years. I still have the fabric stash....

One photo was of this quilt -

This was a very special quilt, made for my best friend's son Will, for his 6th birthday - just after he started school. He has just turned 18!!!! So I thought it was appropriate to share it on instaram, along with the other pics I'd found. 

Will's quilt was a single bed size but the other's were all cot sized or just playmat size. Will had lots of different quilt blocks and some aplique pics, like the castle - he loved castles! But the smaller items had some very detailed aplique scenes - all my own designs and ideas.

Apologies that the pictures are rather low res... I still have the originals on my laptop but it takes forever to power up.... Speaking of which, I can remember my first digital camera had a memory card that held just 512mb!! My current one has 8g......

I used to make greetingcards for my friends and some framed pictures too. This is one of the cards for a lady who had a passion for sailing.

I stopped quilting many years ago. Sitting in front of a sewing machine for 8 or 9 hours at a time at the weekends started playing havoc with my back, so I stopped. But it was good while it lasted and I made some amazing quilts. In my opinion anyway!! And I still have a sizeable stash of fabic, even if most of it is in small 50cm square pieces!! 

Before I was a quilter, I was a cross stitcher. But that was in my pre-digital camera days, so hard to share a pic or two of those!!

Looks Like Rain Scarf

Believe it or not, I started writing this post more than 2 months ago..... where DID those 2 months go??

This was supposed to be a proper Ta-Dah post of my new design, the Looks Like Rain Scarf. But I'm so late finishing it that I have published another design since!

Ah well, I might as well write a few words about it now I'm here.

This design was born in the autumn last year but not quite finished. I got stuck over adding a proper traditional 2" pompom at each end - when the answer was actually to start the crocheted pompom trim right on the corner. It just took me 6 months to think of that and get it written! Originally it was going to be called Cirrus - but then I found that one of the 'big' designers had recently used that name herself.... so after a lot of thinking, I came up with Looks Like Rain. And that's when the hot weather broke and it began to rain...

This is one of my early pics of it - 

I was a VERY lucky girl indeed - as soon as it was published, it got picked up by someone who runs a forum group for people who like making scarves and shawls and it got posted there. Hence, it got a lot of views and it even got into the top twenty most viewed ptterns on Ravelry - for about ten minutes!!  

If you would like to take a look yourself, you'll find it HERE. 

During the final design process I had 6 fabulous ladies who tested the design for me prior to publishing and they did an amazing job! They all had their own ideas about what yarn to use - and how many colours to use  - one lady even added tassels! 

Just take a look (and you will find links to each lady right at the foot of this post too) -

                         

(Liz of Bizzymits (the pics just above) put me to shame by very quickly writing her own amazing blog post!!!! I really am out of practise at this.... Pop across and have a look at her blog for a read!!)

                     

Having seen what my testers were doing with the pattern to add their own twist, I tried it with a very fine alpaca and silk blend and added beads along the edge instead of the pompoms. And, oh, those beads!! They looks so sophisticated!

But I was also keen to show what could be done if you only had one skein available, so made this next one. By simply adjusting the number of increases and then reducing the number of repeats to shorten the length, and finally, replacing the pompoms with a picot trim, I came up with this -

And I wish you could see the yarn in real life too as it is the most amazing hand dyed yarn. The colourway is called 'Demelza', by Biff Sugar Yarns. 

The I tried it with a hand dyed double knit merino yarn (unpicked from a previous unworn project), and inspired by my testers, I teamed it with a plain ivory for the border. Then added tassels!!

 

And how come I suddenly started taking pics with the assistance of a tailors dummy? Well, I finally looked into buying one and when I realised they were actually quite reasonably priced, I couldn't really hold off buying one any longer. Her name is Lottie - because she's going to live in the Loft when she isn't on a job!! And where did I set her up to take pics.... take a look!

As you can see from the heap on the corner of the sofa, I had to move a lot of (crafty) clutter out of the way first! But it worked quite well really.

Making this design gave me ideas for the next one. Which in turn, might well inspire a future design!! Although, to be honest, I really would like to write a 'written' version of my Tooty Stripey Blanket first. But that will take a lot of work, so may be a long way off...

If you're really lucky, I might make it back before another 2 months have gone by... But then again, it might just be easier to follow me on Instagram....

Here are some links to my testers instagram pages, so you can pop across and visit -

Pat aka @indigipobble

Jan aka @Perky_Puffin_Crochet

Liz aka @Bizzymitts

Elspeth aka @CraftyKoalabear

Helen aka @Florahoneypot

Robyn aka @3Littlepears

Marguerite Ta - Dah!!!!

She's finished and - even though I do say so myself - she's beautiful!!!! 

Thank you to everyone for all the love on Instagram and facebook - it's much appreciated!! 😁

Here's just one photo for now, although I have taken lots!!

Nearly there!!

My Marguerite Blanket is almost finished!! I'm working on the border now - it takes almost a full hour to work one row, and each 50g ball will only make about 1.25 rows!!

I'm still working on it but there's a separate page of how I worked my join if you care to look. (Pattern belongs to Sandra Eng of Mobuis Girl, not me!!)

Marguerite Blanket progress

Remember those gorgeous flower circles I showed you last time?
They were made from the amazing pattern by Sandra Eng of Mobius Girl 

If you've been following my progress on instagram and her fb group, you will know I had all the motifs made and joined with a granny stitch, and had nearly filled in all the triangular spaces.
Well, not only are they finished - with ends stitched in too! - I have also filled in all the fiddly half triangle spaces! I drew some hieroglyphics of that little filler but I don't know anyone else will understand it!

So it's now in one big blankety piece!! No pics yet though I'm afraid.

I'm considering giving it a quick wash and block before I tackle the border.  I also need to try and get some more yarn for the border - the granny join and all those triangles have used 300g already! I managed to get another 100g from my LYS but I know that won't be enough.

I have also been busy writing a separate page dedicated to my version of the blanket and will be showing how I did that granny join, the triangles, the half triangles and the border. (See the separate tab at the top of the screen, or click the link.)

Take a look at the top of the page for the link. And in case you're wondering,  yes, I do have permission from Sandra the designer to share my method.  I will NOT be sharing any part of the paid pattern - you will need to purchase your own copy HERE. It's worth every penny!!

I'll leave you with what turned out to be a very popular pic on  both IG and fb -

Still here!!

Yes, I'm still here - I just haven't posted in a long while....  again...

I have been very busy on the crafting front though - in fact my hooks and needles feel like they've been on fire for weeks on end now!! And I've been very naughty and bought loads of wool already this year ready to make up samples.
I've been working on a couple of designs recently - a cowl and a scarf. The double loop cowl is crocheted in aran merino and has been made and frogged twice now! I just can't get the effect that's in my head, so I'm going to give up on that idea I think and maybe revisit it in the summer. We all want to wear a nice thick cowl in summer right??!

The other design is a crochet scarf but it's not ready for testing, never mind revealing to the world yet! This is mainly due to deciding to do 2 versions of the same repeating pattern, firstly on the horizontal and then on the diagonal as well. It gave quite a different look but working on the diagonal threw up all sorts of issues that I hadn't quite anticipated, so there was quite a lot of frogging going on as well! I think I need to consult a crocheting friend before I proceed any further but I've put too much time and effort into it to abandon it, so watch this space...

At the same time, I was also knitting another Tail of Two Dragons Scarf, this time using King Cole Riot DK. This yarn moves gently from one shade to another giving a self striping effect - it's also slightly brushed (it's about 20% wool I think) so feels lovely and soft and squishy. However...  I wasn't very far into it before I came across a knot. And before you know it there's another one. And then another one!! I was not happy believe you me.

It's bad enough with any ball of yarn but when it's self striping you never know how many colours got skipped when it was rejoined - depending what you're making it can really show up, as you'll see in one of the following photos.
I was so annoyed I emailed the Customer Service Team at King Cole about it and attached a photo of said knots. As you can see from the copy of my email below, I didn't ask for anything, just wanted to make them aware of it - for all I know it happens a lot but no one ever tells them.

"Dear Sirs,
I have just purchased 2 balls of Riot DK online to make a specific pattern but I am very disappointed to find that there was not one, not two but THREE joins in the yarn within a 150 cm stretch!! I'm used to coming across a knot on occasion but 3 knots in such a short space is surely unacceptable??
As this yarn moves gently from one shade to another throughout the ball, this will leave some big jumps between colours if I continue to use this section of the ball - I am inclined to scrap it and start again! Luckily I had only just started the project and the knots were near the start of the ball, so there is only an hour of work lost but that is still a frustrating hour of re-working.I'm not impressed at all and am surprised that a ball which I would consider to be "seconds" was sent out for sale at all by the factory.
Normally I would not complain but felt this was so poor I should bring it to your attention.

Regards
Tina "

This is their reply -

" Hi Tina,

Thank you for getting in touch and we truly apologise for the quality of Riot DK you have received.
Unfortunately, despite rarely occurring, knots are created at our spinners because yarn needs to be tied when it comes to the end of its spindle.
Please be assured that we try our best to keep the occurrence of knots in balls to the absolute minimum, but unfortunately it is not something we can avoid without surplus yarn and waste.
However, we are very sorry that your balls had 3 joins in such close proximity, which is far from usual.
We would advise you to return to the shop where you originally purchased the yarn and they should either refund or exchange the Riot DK for you for free, even if you have begun working with it. We can then reimburse them for the cost and investigate the issue further.
Thank you again for taking the time to send your email, we’re grateful for bringing it to our attention, and do let us know if you require any further assistance.

Kind Regards,
Philippa "

I'm so glad to hear they are trying to avoid waste. Their waste. What about MY waste?? At my expense?? Had there been a big jump between colours - and with the second ball I used there was! - I would have to wind off potentially quite a lot of wool to keep the sequence correct. Wool which might not then be used.
(And as I had told them I purchased it online, I didn't want to wait days while I sent it back, waited for a response, waited for replacement yarn...)

When I posted pics and comments on IG, some people said they hadn't had any issues with the yarn and really liked it. Several people were not impressed any more than I was that King Cole thought it was perfectly OK that the wastage would sit in my purse and not theirs. Needless to say, in future I might have to think twice about buying their yarn again.
(Edit: by the time I got round to posting this, someone said they were using the same colour and hers was full of knots too...)

Everyone on IG liked the stripes on my scarf though and it did turn out well in the end. I had enough left over to make a matching hat - although due to the occurrence of yet another knot and a BIG change in the colour sequence, it doesn't actually match when you compare the stripe sequence...

I used another hat pattern by Irina of My Knitland (find her on Ravelry) as she works the most amazing cables but I really must make one in a plain colour to actually show off the cables, rather than hide them with stripes!

I've also been busy on the baby blanket front. I decided in January to make some bright rainbow blankets and bought a few colours of Women's Institute DK. It's really thick though and is almost like aran - but so far I have come across one single knot 😂😂😂.
I started with my Tooty Stripey Blanket (see the tab at the top of the screen) and it worked up really well -

And now I'm making another Daisy Chain Blanket by Kerrie of Harlow Monroe Handmade. I wasn't sure about it at first with these colours but the more rows I work, the more I like it. There are a few more rows to do yet but I really must start thinking about what sort of border to give it - it's so vibrant I think it just needs white with a tiny pop of colour really. But before I can do the border, I'll need to tackle those ends...

I've also been desperate to have a go at the Marguerite Blanket CAL by Mobius Girl! (I'll try and add a link later, sorry. ..)

I made one motif just to try out the pattern and it was so simple, yet clever, I knew I had to make it!! But I couldn't quite decide on a colour palette. Initially, I wanted to use exactly the same colours as the original, then I thought maybe bring in silver grey and burgundy instead of the dark grey. Then I thought palest aqua and pink with bright pops of raspberry and turquoise, maybe with vanilla and stone. Or maybe with white! And tomorrow I'll think of another combo probably! And then another! It would be really nice to include some self striping yarn too - as long as it isn't King Cole!!
This is the sample I made in grey and gold to try the pattern but the grey is rather thick, so it worked up too large to use... here it is having some Fluffy testing!

I very nearly made a visit to the wool shop, intending to drag out all their Stylecraft and have a play around and see what I could put together. But then I gave myself a firm talking to about wastage and decided to get out all my Stylecraft leftovers instead (from my Tooty Harmony Blanket) and make a start with those. I know there won't actually be enough to make the whole blanket but at least there will be enough to have a play around with layouts and get a general idea of what I as actually need to buy, rather than a random pick and mix!
Here are some of the motifs I've made so far.

Like I say, these are just a starting point really before I buy more yarn to make a full blanket. Although I must confess,  I did buy a ball of magenta yesterday as it looked so good I knew I wanted more of it!

But one thing's for sure - I'll be making it with my new crochet hook from Pedro's Plaques - isn't he just gorgeous?!!! I'very called him Pedro (what else?!) and we'll be going on lots of yarny adventures together!! The first of which (apart from the Marguerite Blanket) will be to make him a friend we saw in a magazine. He made me buy the book to get the pattern and then picked out a ball of wool from my stash to make him (there's just ONE 50g ball though,  so I hope it's enough!)! One thing at a time Pedro!!

'Til next time,     T   xXx

PS it's taken me at least 10 days to get this written, so apologies if you've seen all of this on IG already!