wip

I finished knitting the remaining sleeve of my Tilted Duster last night, which is blocking as we speak, and I'm now ready to seam the sleeves. I have a feeling I'm going to need an extra dose of patience to do this, it's going to be my first attempt at seaming a set-in sleeve and I'm terribly afraid it's going to come out all wonky. I usually use mattress stitch for seaming my handknits, which works so well on side seams, but for sleeve caps I have no idea.

In the meantime I also finished the Scoop Neck Vest I had started in the beginning of winter, so I'll try to take some photos during the weekend.

And thank you all for the nice comments about my skirt on the last post. It really got me motivated to finish the dress I mentioned so I'm going to try and work on that soon. I got it out last night and it's now hanging on the studio so I won't forget. I've basted it so I could try it on and it fits perfectly, but as you can see, it's got a lot of pleats, which is probably the reason why I keep postponing to seam it.



On the other hand, here are some fabrics I purchased lately which I hope to turn into summer dresses. Now I just have to find the right patterns for them. Speaking of which, I got the latest Boden catalogue this week and I fell in love with yet another of their dresses, but none of the colors are right for me (and I'm not the biggest fan of polka dots anyway). Has anyone seen a pattern similar to this one anywhere ? If you have, please let me know, I think this would look really good in some linen I have in stash.

This weekend promises to be a relaxing one. There's a concert to attend, which A. is really excited about since it's one of his all time favorite bands, but apart from that I hope I can fit in a lot of crafting time and finish some orders, and maybe a couple of other things for a shop update next week (probably some bags). Have a great weekend :)

new skirt

It's been a long time since I've sewn something for myself to wear. In fact, I don't think I've sewn any clothes this winter, my enthusiasm has been so much more on the knitting this season. But when I saw this piece of fabric on the sale section at one of the local fabric shops I immediately envisioned a skirt out of it.



That was weeks ago, of course, and since I usually procrastinate a lot when it comes to sewing clothes it didn't get done till last week, but now it's done, it fits and I'm quite happy about it turned out. I adapted a pattern out of "Skirt à la carte" (japanese pattern book by Machiko Kayaki), a very simple A-line skirt design which always works well for me.



And now that I'm on a roll with the sewing again, maybe I'll finally finish a dress I cut up last November, who knows ?

knitting report

I've been doing some yarn shopping, it seems :)
Actually, that red yarn was something I had ordered a few months ago but only arrived recently, and I'm now to decide whether to use it soon or leave it for next winter. It's for the Gilet Col Tailleur, from Phildar 480. I'm dying to knit one since I got the magazine, and even more so since I saw the lovely one that Glaucia made.

The aqua yarn is the beginning of my spring/summer stash. I think it might be perfect for the Sylph Cardigan from the latest Interweave, but I won't even think about that for the next couple of months (although it was already very spring like this last weekend)



And here's my Tilted Duster. I'm so happy about this, I think it must be the piece I've knitted with more pleasure so far, which is strange because it's mainly a lot of stockinette and ribbing. It's probably the yarn I'm so crazy about, it knits beautifully and the color is one of my favorites.



Anyway, I'm almost done with this, just half a sleeve to go and then the dreaded seaming and it will be finished. The rest is being blocked right now on the studio couch, I hope that fixes the curled edges on the body hem or I will need some expert advice soon.



And this ? This is the Gathered Pullover wip, which I cast on at the same time that the Tilted Duster, but as you can see I got carried away with the other one so this hasn't been getting any attention at all. The fact that I had to restart it once didn't help (my gauge was way off the first time, so I changed to 4mm needles instead). And it's a lot of stockinette in the round, so quite boring, but I guess perfect for watching the latest episode of Lark Rise later tonight. And I'm actually doing it in the reverse side (I purl way faster than I knit) hoping that when I get to the cabling part I'll be able to just reverse the piece and continue knitting. I really hope that works.

organising my circulars

Remember I once said I didn't have a good solution for storing my circular knitting needles ? Well, a few weeks ago my needle bag (a small necessaire where I would throw in all my circulars and other assorted needles) was such a tangled mess I couldn't find anything inside. And when I did, it was hell to untangle the needles I wanted. So I decided something had to be done. I went online and researched several needlecase designs, and I really liked this one by the wonderful people at purlbee, but unfortunately I couldn't find a suitable binder (although I'm still looking for one, and will eventually make that). So I opted for making a larger pocket version of the normal needlecase, and it actually doesn't work so bad. I can store all my circulars inside it (and I own quite a few) and quickly find the one I'm looking for, which was what I needed. And now I'm off to enjoy the weekend, which promises to be a sunny one for a change !

shop update

The first batch of notebook sleeves flew out of the shop so quickly I decided to make another one. There are more available here now





and here's a custom order, a taller version for the bigger moleskines and suitable for A5 notebooks as well