cosmicpluto knits!

the yarn…and a first!

I bought a lot of yarn while I was away. A lot. I only bought one piece of clothing (an expensive but amazing, made-in-France skirt) and the one pair of shoes (which, by the way, are Doc Martens for anyone who asked), but I bought a hell of a lot of yarn. I hadn’t really intended to, but whatever. Yarn makes a great souvenir!

I got some at k1 in Edinburgh, some at Le Bon Marche in Paris, but most of it came from iknit day.

In the top left, there’s cashmere from Devon Fine Fibres, some for presents and some for me – they raise their own flock, and have a very limited supply of yarn, but it’s sooo beautiful. And inexpensive, for sure.

Top right is organic merino from ColdHarbour Mill, a working mill and textile museum! They had 100g skeins of the undyed organic merino on for 5 pounds, and I bought a sweater’s worth of the 4ply plus some others for gifts.

Bottom left is two skeins of Bowmont wool from Devon Fine Fibres, a new rare cross breed. It’s a mix of merino and shetland, and is really soft in a still-wooly way! They didn’t have much left when we got there (I blame erqsome, she bought a sweater’s worth of the grey) so I just got the two skeins. Now, what to make?

And in the bottom right, not yarn of course, it’s fabric from Liberty. Expensive, but sooo pretty. I’m going to have to make a few more practice skirts before I commit to cutting this up!

And the first?

Last night I held my book for the first time – a box came into the store just when I was starting to work last night. And I sold my first book, to my friend Jeff (I’m sure books have sold so far, but this was the first one *I* sold!). And I signed my first book.

Whew.

enroute

Dinner last night – Indian food takeaway (I’m eating a samosa in this rather blurry photo!). Yum yum.

Currently on the train from Edinburgh to London, with free wifi! We’ve been on for about three hours with nearly two to go – whew. I will say that the train is pretty civilized way to travel…even if no one is in their proper reserved seats!

little black whatchamacallit

Well, it only took four days to knit this little sweater, but over a week since then to block, photograph and blog about it! Oh well.

My own pattern, just a simple top-down raglan bolero/shrug thing with half-length sleeves and curved fronts. I had the yarn lying around and really wanted a simple super soft, black cardigan, so here it is! I used six balls of Sublime cashmere merino silk aran (there’s a mouthful) and used up every last drop. I’ve got a tiny length left (like 1 m) so I think I might crochet a little loop and do a button.

I was a little unsure about the chunkyness of this sweater at first – it’s on 5.5 mm needles, which is way bigger than I’ve used in awhile! But a good soaking opened up the fabric a bit and it drapes much better now. If I’d had some more yarn I would’ve liked to do longer ribbing around the edge, but as it was I had to tink back a row just to have enough yarn to bind off!

I’m thinking of writing it up (it would probably be pretty quick, too) but I’m not sure when I’ll get to it! So we’ll see. I want to write up that skirt from the last post, too, which is actually a bit easier…oy, so many ideas, so few hours in which to get things done.

I’ve actually had a really productive day “off” – it’s off work from the store, but that doesn’t mean I’m not working! I’ve laid out the patterns for the baby and child, top down versions of the Thermal sweater, so I’m hoping to release those very soon. Just as soon as I get some photos! I also did a bunch of stuff in preparation for my trip – calling the bank and credit card companies, finding a suitcase, making some lists, I even packed most of my clothes.

Now I’m down to the tough parts of packing – deciding what knitting and/or crochet to take! I want to take some crochet for the plane, I think, because I’ve got a design idea and it would also get around the whole are-needles-allowed thing. I guess the thing is that I’m sure to buy yarn there (especially at iknit!) so I can always start up a new project there if I get bored or something. Yeah, I kind of doubt it too. But we do have some longish train rides worked in there.

Five more sleeps, people. Whoa.

deadline knitting – fbs

Thanks for all the birthday wishes! I had a good day, and got some nice pressies (from others and from myself!), including a gorillapod and some new filters. Cool. And just a little yarn – Stephanie gave me one of her Tour de Fleece skeins (she blogged about it here). Isn’t it pretty? Now I just have to figure out what to make with it!

I just realized the other day that the party for a new baby girl in my family is coming up on Monday – so oops, I’d better get knitting! The parents are punky tattoo artists, and the mum (who is my cousin) wanted black and/or cats. I decided on the February Baby sweater in a gorgeous black…I figure the lace will offset the blackness a little.

It’s not quite as blue as in this photo, but it’s definitely a little bluey – the yarn is Dream in Color smooshy in Black Parade. Being sock yarn, of course, this is coming out a little smaller than prescribed, but the baby was a few weeks premature.

Man, baby things can be pretty darn quick! Right now I’m finishing up the first sleeve, so I should be able to finish off the knitting tonight. I want to do a little hat, too. Probably a kitty hat.

I do like the lace quite a bit. This little sweater is fun – I can see why so many people have knit it! I did change it a little – instead of knitting the sleeves back and forth, I just put the sleeve stitches on waste yarn and carried on like any other top-down raglan.

In other news, I decided to get in on the whole 365 thing – one self-portrait a day for a year. I think it’ll be fun, and a great way to document in an everyday sort of way! You can follow it, if you’re so inclined, on Flickr.