...then a pattern for a basic jumper might read rather like this... (NB: Photos are indeed of a jumper-in-progress, but not one based on the instructions in this post. In case you're curious, it's Jared Flood's 'Cobblestone', in Malabrigo Rios, colourway 'Tormenta'. It's taken years to persuade the Stoic Spouse that he might like to try wearing a jumper when he's shivering in our freezing cold house. Hope he likes it.) Instructions:- Cast on. Place pretty, Instagrammable stitch-marker Continue Reading
Babies!
Ah-ha, I realize now why Robyn-the-robin and I have a special bond. She figured it out way before I did. It seems that we have something in common. You see, we're both twin-mums. That would explain our shared under-eye baggage, at least. (Yes I know, other sources of chronic exhaustion are available. Parents - even twin parents - don't have a monopoly on tired, etc etc, etc.) But sometimes it feels good to hang out with a fellow mum-of-multiples. Look! Here are her babies! Twice this Continue Reading
The Voice Of Wisdom. (That’ll Be You.)
You were right, of course. All of you. That swatch was never going to work. Thank you for your comments. Can you believe it, we had a near-unanimous consensus. That never happens online. What even is the point of the internet if you can’t damage your keyboard by violently punching out vitriol like HOW VERY DARE U IMPLY THAT MAGIC LOOP IS BETTER THAN DPNS!!!!!!!!! I HOPE MOTHS EAT YOUR MERINO AND THE CAT CHEWS YOUR NEEDLES!!!!!! You folks are way too sane and reasonable to be pootling about on Continue Reading
If Freud Were A Knitter
The very last thing that I should be doing right now is beginning a new piece of knitting, just for fun. So... you can probably guess what I’m doing. If you're familiar with the Freudian analytic terms, 'superego', 'ego', and 'id', my knitting is, right now, all id. To clarify: your superego is that irritating voice in your head that earnestly lectures you about the wisdom of washing and blocking your gauge swatches before you measure them. Yeah, I tell that voice to shut up, too, especially Continue Reading
Hunkering Down
January is a good month for hunkering down and getting on with some serious stitchery. Time to put the hours in to those projects where you're well past the 'Ooh, this is new and fun' stage and on to the 'Only another eleventy thousand purls to go and I'll have finished the left sleeve cuff' stage. Speaking of which, I've finally, finally finished my 'Thermal', which is a good thing because right now, it's all that stands between me and acute hypothermia. Look at that ice-cold background behind Continue Reading
Knitting The New Year In
It's grey and damp here, which is pretty much perfect weather for keeping your head down and knitting. Oh hang on, who am I trying to kid? Any weather is just perfect for knitting in my book. This may be the only advantage of being the sort of person who feels cold year-round. With sadness about the fatal fire at work, I confess that I've been craving mindless stitchery as a wee break from that crazy-but-monstrous crochet project. I needed to switch my brain off and work someone else's Continue Reading
Channelling Escher
This post is entirely the fault of one Jack Of All Craft, who spotted this picture in my last post:- ...and mentioned that famous Escher drawing:- Well she had a point, didn't she? So of course I had to recreate this artwork just a little more closely. And because this plan had difficult-to-do and a-bit-bonkers-and-creative written all over it, I was powerless to resist. For anyone who hasn't been watching, the purple sleeve above is from the resurrected jumper-of-doom. And in Continue Reading
In Which The Toddler Twinnage Is Warehoused And The Knitting Is Knitted
I'm getting a bit shameless about knitting/crocheting anywhere and everywhere (except at work: my patients would be disconcerted to find their psychologist muttering over stitch-counts as they entered the consulting room. Unless they're knitters, of course.) Oh, and I'd best gloss over my recent attempt to knit secretly under the table at the pub whilst having a rare lunch date with the Stoic Spouse. I know he reads this blog, and I'm not sure his disapproval of that incident has worn off yet. Continue Reading
Jumpers for toddler twins
This old brewery that we live in is cold, properly cold. One winter we had ice on the inside of the window panes, something I half-remembered happening in childhood but had thought I must have imagined until it happened again here, in our bedroom, two years ago. Times like this, I have to stop knitting/crocheting housey stuff and make warm clothes for the twinnage. Actually it's weirdly mild here in the UK here at the moment, but it still manages to be chilly in the house, and I do live in Continue Reading