FO Friday

 Peerie Flooers Hat 
I knit the mittens a few months ago now, and the yarn was sitting, waiting patiently to be turned into a hat. I am happy with it - tension a bit off in some places, but it felt good to get it done with!

 Joris
I bought this as a kit while I was in Amsterdam - I fell in love with the display model they had and had to have it.  It is the first, and probably last toy I will ever knit.  It resides on a shelf far away from grubby little fingers and will eventually be moved onto a craft table (whenever I get one...).  I love the back of his head, so colourful!

 I have also been doing some sewing!  I've not used my machine for months, but when the urge to sew hit, I went a bit crazy.  I have so far sewed 5 box bags, and 4 zip pouches.  I am wanting to do more, but need to get more interfacing first!

 I am very pleased with them, and I can now sew in a straight line!  I made up the pattern for the zip pouch, though I did read a few different ones first but none of them were easy or quick, whereas it takes me 15 minutes to do one, from ironing fabric to closing the zip.

I cannot remember the pattern I used for the box bag, but I stuck pretty rigidly to it and went from taking 2.5 hours to sew one, to just under an hour!

That's it for today, to read more FO Fridays go to Tamis Amis.

Stash Enhancement!

I'll cover our trip in another post, but want to flash my many new goodies first!

I already posted a bit about Knit Nation, but I took better photographs of my purchases today, so will include them here again.

Schoppel-Wolle Zauberball

Socktopus Sokkusu

Love the colours of this!

Noro Kureyon Sock

Wollmeise Twin

Wollmeise Twin

Crystal Palace Mini-Mochi

Toft Alpaca British Alpaca Yarn

Fibre Harvest 4ply

Fibre Harvest Lace

Alpaca & Bluefaced Leicester

Alpaca Merino & Silk

The Kureyon Sock, Mini-Mochi, and Zauberball are for my Year of Projects, the Toft Alpaca has been earmarked for a crocheted scarf pattern that came with it.  The Wollmeise and Sokkusu were my guilty purchases.  I have always been very curious about Wollmeise, and almost choked at the price tag (which was a 50% increase on last years prices apparently!), but now I can say I've owned some, and will eventually try it.  I can see why people rave about the colours, but Easy Knits also had very vibrant colourways available at Knit Nation.  I obviously don't know what it's like to knit with, but it doesn't feel like it holds much stretch and seems quite tightly plied.  I don't think I'd buy more, purely because of the price tag.  Sokkusu was my one really guilty purchase, having said previously I'd be buying no more single skeins (Wollmeise doesn't count since it holds more yardage), but these colourways really are unique so it's not really something you can buy 2 of.  That's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it!

Schoppel-Wolle Zauberball

Borgs Bavgarner Mora Lace 

Cascade 220

Malabrigo Lace

Ruler & stitch markers!

Cascade 220

GGH Baby Alpaka

GGH Baby Alpaka

Ribbon - 10m in each thingy, and dressmakers rulers

vintage fabric, 1.75*0.80m each

Black/grey thick jersey, and thinner blue & white striped jersey

Cottons

Light grey linen, grey cord  and black cord

Amsterdam was more of a trove than I initially thought.  The markets were fantastic for cheap fabrics, between 2 and 3 euros a metre!  The ribbon was 1.80 euro each, which is jaw-droppingly cheap!  Some of them I already have ideas for, and went shopping with those projects in mind.

The yarn stores I visited were good.  First one was de Afstap, which sold mainly Rowan yarn, which I could get cheaper here, but there was also some others, hence the Schoppel-Wolle and Mora Lace!  I'd never heard of Mora before, but it's feel lovely and came in some gorgeous colours!

Penelope Craft was the highlight, as even though they sold yarns that I can get here, they sold yarns that I actually want to buy!  The prices were marginally cheaper for everything, and the GGH is just divine, both in feel and colour.  It has already been set-aside for some special projects, as has the Malabrigo Lace.  The shop has such a nice feel to it, and the owner was lovely.  I will for sure be returning next year with more money, and hopefully the pound will be stronger then.

I still need to order the rest of the yarn for my YoP, but I may hold off a couple of months as I can't make my mind up on colour.  Stash also has another sale on which has proven very dangerous, I am looking forward to visiting Yarn Cake next month while in Glasgow, and picking up some more Shilasdair.

I have promised Jitterbug after this, that is it for a long long while (but in the same breath mentioned the Knitting & Stitching show in London in October, which doesn't count)!

That'll teach me!

We went into Horsham today to get some stuff, and as we wandered the shops, we went into one discount chain (The Works) and I found an A3 cutting board for £7.99!  And a rotary cutter for £3.99!  Both work really really well, and I was feeling all smug and proud that I remembered while I was there that I needed  them.

Shame I forgot about the black childrens paint I went in there for, and now I also need the large clear ruler that was on the peg to the left of the rotary cutter, with which to draw lines and unleash my inner sewing goddess!

FO Friday

I've no knitted or crocheted FOs today, but I do have sewing, and I have pictures!  Way to trump this weeks WIP Wednesday post!

Three drawstring project bags.  I am not a fan of ironing, so these are quite wonky and uneven, but they are for personal use so I don't care too much.  They are 3 different sizes, clouds being the smallest one.  The largest was made for a particular project for which I don't have a bag big enough for what it will eventually become.

In other news, Jitterbug was in Germany this week (well, technically Switzerland, France and Germany, but only in Basel airport, and kept crossing the French border while driving to Baden Baden) and came back with souvenirs!

To add to my slowly growing snow globe collection is this beauty

And something new is adorning my not very tacky souvenir, a Hindu calendar.

Can you say "more cow bell"?

There won't be an FO Friday post for the next couple of weeks, but I should have something to show off when I return!  To see more of todays FOs, head on over to Tamis blog!

ps I adore Will Ferrell.  I'd totally do him.
pps LOVING the new blogger look - head to draft.blogger.com if you don't already have it!  Googles re-branding is looking very very nice!

More car boot finds!

Part of the charm of car boot sales is never knowing what you might end up finding.  The car boot sale we went to on Sunday isn't the biggest, but is slowly growing, and as it turned out was quite good!

Not  the biggest pieces of fabric, the orange is the largest at 2.5 yards long and a yard wide!  The others are fairly useless for adult clothing, but I'm sure I can find a use for them!

I also bought the kids more books, because as you can see, they are lacking in the book department.

Bubba also has an overflowing shelf in his room, and I often find childrens books placed in random locations round the house.  As I told Jitterbug on Sunday though, children can never have too many books, we just need to get better storage in place!

Some things old, Some things new

A year or sometime like that ago, I saw a post on freecycle offering a late relatives knitting and sewing 'stuff'.  I didn't expect much, but came home with 2 black bags of yarn (mostly acrylic in rather garish colours, and half of it was given to a friend) and a box of sewing paraphernalia.  In that box were some of the most beautiful buttons and items I've seen, some of it reeking vintage.  I found 4 brooches, and I often find myself thinking about this ladies life, a life in which she was a girl guide

where she wore a turquoise brooch (which incidentally is my birth stone and if I wore brooches, I'd wear this every day)

where this gorgeously simple black pin with small flowers was on her jacket

where she gave blood willingly.  This one makes me think most - this badge is from the 50's, how many times must this woman have given blood in her life?

The buttons are not hugely varied, lot's of different sizes, but not many different colours.  Enough for me though!  These are my favourites

 

They came in an assortment of jars and an old biscuit tin, I cannot wait to have a place where I can put these 'out'. 

I think the jars are old, but I am basing this purely on the price tags on top!

24p for a jar of branston pickle!

In addition to the buttons, there were threads, needles galore, stitch markers, row counter, knitting needle, crochet hooks, stitch holders, ribbon, bias binding, lace, zips, and some rolls of stuff I have no idea what it is!

Look at the packaging!  One thing I noticed on it all was it was all made in England, something very very rare now!

In stark contrast to this old, well-loved and valued box of goodies, I received an order of needles today.  I needed new needles for my Bohus class, as I didn't have the small sizes required.  I ordered 3 Knit Pro fixed circulars, 80cm in 2.25mm, 2.5mm and 2.75mm.  I have heard that these break, but I'm willing to risk it.  I also got some new interchangeable needle tips, in 3mm, 3.25mm, 3.75mm, 4mm and 4.5mm, along with 4 new cables, 2 in 80cm and 2 in 100cm.  Some of the needle tips I now have 2 pairs of (or 2.5 pairs of in 3.75mm), but I've found myself wishing I had more than one set in different sizes.

I have seen small needles before, but only steel.  2.25mm wooden needles feel very fragile, and look how small they are next to the cable!  I really hope they don't break during my class, I may take my DPNs as back up, but only if I can get rid of the sticky substance currently coating them!