More knit pretties

I do love Birthdays that stretch on for weeks. Mainly due to the fact that I haven't been bothered to arrange an official Birthday party this year, I am meeting up with friends in dribs and drabs. I find this is better sometimes as it enables you to actually have a coherent conversation, rather than constantly play hostess and flit from one person to the next. It also means unexpected presents!

Catching up with L last week, I was presented with this absolutely gorgeous shawl:

What I particularly love about this shawl is it's perfect shade of turquoise. Not too green, not too blue - just right (photos never do colours justice). It's also just the thing to get me through the Spring chill.

Birthday beauties

 Ah, Birthdays are awesome. Although I must admit that they seem to sneak up on me faster and faster every year. Still, the excuse to catch up with friends and spend some quality time is always great. Oh and the presents of course...

A couple of months back, L and I decided to undertake one of our crafty swaps again. I sewed one of my boxy zipped bags, in exchange for these super-cute flamingo gloves. Fair Isle still seems beyond me, despite taking that class at Knit Nation.

So you can imagine my delight when these beauties arrived:

Love the kitschy colours! But that was not all.. L had very sweetly included a Birthday pressie for me too:

Note the symmetrical nature of the shawl, which enables you to properly sweep it around yourself without it falling off again. The tweedy look is lovely, and the extra 'arm' drapes very prettily when worn.

Spoiled again this year :)

Unravelled

Finally here is some unequivocal proof that guerilla marketing works.. at least on me. While wandering around Farnham last weekend, I noticed a proliferation of knitted items draped on or covering various items of street furniture; a yarn-encrusted lamp post here, a knitted spider sitting on some metal fencing here. Attached to each one was a QR code. Being the inquisitive sort, I took out my mobile and scanned the code. What's the worst that could happen? A) my phone might combust B) My entire bank balance might be sent to Outer Mongolia C) I could find out something interesting.

Thankfully 'C' was the outcome as the QR code connected me to a website for 'Unravel' an annual knitting festival in Farnham, which happened to be on THAT VERY WEEKEND! Score! After suppressing the desire to look smug, I decided to check it out the next day.

A warm welcome awaited me:

Knitted frame *and* plinth. These guys are serious.

I was too late to book in any classes, but just checking out the market stalls was enough for me. This place was well-stocked!

Even saw a couple of things which *almost* made me want to take up crochet again.

Temporarily tempted by some pretty Jawolle, but convinced myself that it would probably pool funny..

Sadly I missed the official Unravel tote bags which had the same print as the cushion below. As with all things knitterly, you snooze, you lose.

The workshop and cafeteria area were also buzzing.

Even the loos had not gone undecorated.

En route to the exit, I made one last excursion to the other end of the building and found another massive hall full of goodies:

Damn you Unravel, you know my weakness for buttons!

I also found this book (sadly not for sale) which was hilarious. It contained various projects aimed at keeping young ladies busy at the weekend i.e. knitting, setting your hair, cooking, baking, sewing etc. A part of me thought 'how sexist' and other part 'sounds like fun'. In the end I decided that it probably makes a big difference whether you have chosen to do any of these things yourself, rather than having them forced upon you by society.

On the way out, I took a closer look at what I initially thought were some knitted ducks. Nope, they are knitted mole hills, complete with moles!

Some rather bored-looking sheep.

So did I buy anything? Well, obviously it would have been rude not to!
In the end I picked up a couple of things from the Skein Queen stall: two hanks of cashmere DK from Lotus Yarns and a skein of cobweb merino/cashmere/silk from Skein Queen.

I also fell for an assortment of buttons which I reckon will look good on future baby clothes projects.

So there we have it. A rather lovely and unexpected knitting indulgence. Who says that technology and knitting don't mix?

Sprinkle, sprinkle little star

So my somewhat ambitious aim to finish two shawls, one adult jumper and one baby jumper in the month while I was on holiday obviously didn't pan out. I did manage to finish one shawl and the baby jumper though, so not too bad..

The mini jumper was 'Sprinkle' from Loop's new book. A very cute design, although the wavy chevron pattern did require a little concentration to begin with. The only disaster was dramatically running out of yarn.. So the yoke had to be somewhat, erm, imaginatively finished off - a little ruching around the shoulders anyone? It also turned out somewhat larger than I imagined.
















Anyway, hope that E's little one will grow into it eventually!