One evening this week whilst I was down in Norfolk I went to visit my godmother's friend Doreen who lent me some knitting and rag rug books a while ago. I got to visit her stash whilst I was there and have reached the conclusion that I am a failure in terms of stash acquisition. Mine is about 1/20th the size of hers. She also has a beautiful room at the top of her house devoted to crafty things with a knitting machine set up, lots of yarn on cones and in balls around and skylights to let plenty of light in. So my yarn diet is officially over (for the time being. I finally got paid this week too!)
So, Coldspring Mill sent me an email (I'd contacted them months ago about cheap Debbie Bliss yarn but they didn't have any in then. The email was to tell me that they now do!). The cone on the right of the pic is just over 1kg of Debbie Bliss Cotton Cashmere, which only cost around £20! (RRP would have been about £80!!!!). The colour is plummier than it appears below. I do have some ideas for this, although very much in the future once some WIPs are finished.
**forgot to say. To get your paws on the yarn at Coldspring you have to ring them up or email, they don't have the yarn on the website (just lots of camping equipment!). But they are lovely and helpful over the phone and on email!!**
Then I couldn't resist a visit to Creative Crafts - where I picked up the Finishing Techniques for Hand knitters book (which I'd been wanting for a while, it has good, clear pics) and two balls of wool from Norfolk (Southdown) sheep! BAAAAAAAAAAAAA.My attempts at getting Monkey to act as chauffeur came to nothing. He wanted too many bananas for it (he is SO greedy) so I had to do all the driving myself this week. Before I left home on Monday I got the sleeves sewn onto Psychedelic Stripes:
Just the neck to finish off on there and some buttons to sew on. Then I got the front (or back) of jumper #2 done in the evenings whilst I was at a B & B and the back (or front) done on the London train yesterday:
This is the smallest size and I'm knitting flat rather than in the round as it wasn't very comfortable on that circumference. Just two sleeves and some sewing to go then - so one sleeve tonight, one sleeve tomorrow and sewing up on Sunday? Still in with a chance of getting finished in time then?!?!Have just downloaded two new podcasts - Musings of a Peaceful Knitter and Pointy Sticks.
Maybe I'm getting a little obsessed with knitting podcasts, but now I've got itunes on my laptop I download them all over the weekend, then I have the laptop with me at work and in the B & B in the evenings and loads of knitting stuff to listen to! :-) What I like is that they're so different (so far) - not just in whether they have just talk or talk n' music but the way the presenters come across and talk about their knitting and other activities. I love hearing about the Fibre stuff on FiberCast, even though I haven't got the foggiest about spinning! Did you hear the anniversary broadcast of Knitcast, where Marie spoke to lots of other Knit Podcasters?
Also, I vaguely knew that occasionally books get retitled depending on which side of the Atlantic they're coming out. But I was highly amused to spot a book called "More Afghan squares to Knit" on the Webs website. The cover was very very familiar. Then I realised it was the same book I got out the library a few weeks ago, but called "More blankets and throws to knit" on this side of the pond! So thinking about it, we wouldn't wrap up warm in an Afghan cos we'd be wrapped up in a blanket or throw, and vice versa in the US? So what happens in Canada, Australia, Europe etc etc. If you're cold what do you wrap yourself in?!
6 comments:
Nice cheap yarn. Although please help me - I can only find camping equipment etc at Coldspring Mill - is this the same one, and if so, how do you find the yarn?
Stripy jumpers looking good - you can do it. (And I reckon you can probably schedule in a few meals/sleeps for the weekend too if you really insist...)
Team UK Charity Jumpers look like it's heading for a double gold :-)
that's very impressive Olympic progress! I'm drooling over the picture of that plum yarn, and what a bargain!
That cheap Db yarn is impressive! I hardly ever get to things in time to pick up a mega bargain well done!!
Love the stripy jumper!
Fi x
yep, think that link is wrong...?
Nice to see you back! That's a great tip re Coldspring Mill, I'll definitely get in touch with them!
OK - so I've had an email up from Coldspring Mill - now, before I go emailing him back and looking all stupid - is there any easy way to interpret the codes as colours? (If it was just for me I might just go for something random, but I don't think John wants a pink jumper...)
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