Man hat and Santa Dash

Hello all, 

I am happy to announce that the man hat is completed after all of the drama. As I did not have measurements, I felt it was safe to work with a 2 x 2 rib pattern. This would give the hat much give. I used DK weight yarn and cast on 112 stitches. I wanted the stripes to be distinct so felt it was best to change the colour of the yarn every 10 rows. I wanted the hat to be too big so this would allow a length to fold the hat back. This makes sure that the hat would not be too short. After much tea drinking and tv watching, I completed the hat!! I think it's fab but I felt I needed to make it clear where my loyalties are :)

West Yorkshire Spinners have gorgeous Christmas yarn, which I am now the proud owner of. They also have a beautiful sock pattern which I am currently working on. I only happened to find this pattern by going to my local knitting group at Stitch Solihull. The wonderful Anna showed me this pattern and I have fallen in love with it. The pattern has a new challenge for me as it is worked toe up. I will show it off when it is completed :) I found the pattern on the following link http://www.wyspinners.com/patterns/WYS_Holly_Berry_Free%20Pattern.pdf

I have now ordered my yarn for the Santa Dash I am taking part in. This is on the 13th December around Warwick. I will be dressing up with Santa with my friend and completed 2 laps of the park. To make this more challenging I have decided to crochet a scarf as I go around the course. I think it will be quite a laugh and hopefully I will be able to raise money for Myton Hospices which is a great cause. The charity support people through the final part of their life and also support families. If you are able to donate to this great cause please follow the link to my just giving page www.justgiving.com/sarahssantadash2015 

I have also now released my patterns on the Love Knitting website. Please check out the link to my designs http://www.loveknitting.com/catalogsearch/result/?order=relevance&dir=desc&q=sarah+reed

I think all of my Christmas knitted and crocheted gifts sorted to give to the family. I just need to sort out my decorations. I had a lovely time Christmas tree shopping but I still need to try and get other bits and bobs. I think I will be pulling out my Christmas stocking bunting and adding it to my fireplace. The dilemma is how soon can i put the tree up........

Right back to the Christmas socks

Until next time

Happy Crafting

Sarah :) 

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Autumn and the hunt for the missing leg

Hello all,

The weather appears to be changing quite quickly and I am currently............. freezing!!!!!!!! For a knitter, the change in season is great as it brings back more motivation to make woolly goods. I have completed my Christmas project for my sister.......with a lot of yarn left over, so I will need to think what other present I can create with yummy chunky yarn.

I have also finally completed my West Yorkshire Spinner's Mallard socks :) They are fabulous and really warm. I like the colour combinations and I feel they may come on holiday with me to the caravan. I have successfully recovered from the second sock syndrome and back to good health. I am now on my next project. 

Work has started on my nephew's dinosaur using the TOFT pattern. All was going well until I lost a leg that I had made..........I suppose there is a slight possibility it walked off (I guess more accurately hopped off as it is only one leg). The hunt to find it has began but it could be anywhere between Birmingham and Reading. If you do happen to find an orange crocheted leg about.....please tell it to come home!!!!!!

There are a lot of lovely knitted accessories coming out in the shops. Whilst with my sister, we found some sweet knitted jumpers for the nephew and gorgeous chunky cardigans for us in Primark. I am at the point where I am considering popping the heating on at home but I am trying to resist the urge...........until the real autumn arrives.

The holiday planning is going well. I am  trying to locate the local yarn shops near Bideford. (Please do share any recommendations) I have found a knitting cafe called 'Periwinkle' which I would love to pop in. Not only does it sell beautiful yarn but it also has tea and cakes. This sounds like a knitters dream to me and a must do on the holiday list. 

I am also still on my quest to find other socially acceptable place to knit. So far I have found on a train and a cricket ground. Tomorrow, my car needs to be serviced and I intent to be making my dinosaur in the waiting room. This is a new knitting territory for me and I hope it is well received. 

I am still fundrasing for Birmingham Children's Hospital after spotting all of the Big and Little Hoot owls. I am happy to say I have reached my target and I want to thank everyone who has been able to sponsor me. If you are able to help this great cause my page is www.justgiving.com/sarah-reed2015

Right....back to the dinosaur and the hunt for the missing leg.....

Until next time

Happy crafting

Sarah :) 

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Lounge Around Socks

Hello all

As you are all aware I have the curse of the freezing cold feet. I do love a pair of socks to chill out it and to keep my toes toasty. 

I felt that I had understood the basics of knitting socks that I wanted to challenge myself further. I had never crocheted a sock until I created this pattern. I very quickly found that the knitted and crocheted sock rules differed. For a start, with a knitted sock you tend to need to use smaller needles. If a smaller hook is used, the sock would become so tight that you cannot get it over your ankle!............which I sadly discovered by experience when I managed to cut the circulation from my foot. The only solution seemed to be to use a much larger hook size than recommended with the yarn. 

When crocheting, the pattern forms a spiral which was apparent in the yarn that I used. I absolutely love West Yorkshire Spinner's yarn and wanted to make a pair of socks in the bull finch colour. The way to compensate for this was to make the first sock starting with the hook on the inside and then have the hook on the outside for the second sock. That way the decreases and the stripes were on opposite sides so that they looked like a pair. 

I love the pattern as it combines working in the rounds with working straight which makes it really interesting. Hopefully, it will avoid second sock syndrome. 

The socks are really comfy and I was chuffed with the end result. I want to thank Inside Crochet for publishing the pattern in their latest magazine. 

I am truly in the knitting festive spirit. I have ordered some of my family members yarn and began the Christmas projects. Hopefully I can get them all dome before the big day :s

Until next time

Happy Crafting

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Hyacinth Cowl

Hello all,

Just to let you know that another holiday project has been completed :) and my holiday socks have been blocked perfectly. 

I attended a workshop at Toft Alpaca and it was brilliant. I was intrigued to master the hyacinth stitch as they had a pattern for a beautiful cowl. The workshop was ran by the lovely Caroline who is a great teacher. The workshop was relaxed and delicious cake was provided. The pattern suggests to use fine yarn but I wanted to treat myself and I splashed out on extra fine yarn so the cowl would be really soft. i would recommend anyone to attend a workshop held by Toft. Not only are you surrounded by beautiful alpacas but you are also provided a high quality session with teachers who know what they are talking about. 

 The stitch comprises of 6 rows that are repeated. The pattern contained a p5tog which I had never came across. This proved difficult until I learn the trick of slipping 4 stitches purlwise, purl the last stitch and then pass the 4 slipped stitches over. This made the project build up much quicker. 

The pattern also contains a row where you wrap the yarn three times before you knit. This is where I went wrong many times and had to begin my project once again. I learnt the magic of a 'life line' which is when you thread a piece of yarn through the stitches of a row where you can pull the work back to if needed. This gave me the confidence to persist and finish my lovely soft cowl. 

This is now another piece to take on holiday and I think I have now hit the limit of what I can make before I go. I have decided whilst on holiday to take a break from designing and to make a couple of animals from the new Edward's Menagerie book. I am a big fan of these designs and I already have the yarn sitting in my stash. 

I am plotting out where the yarn shops are whilst I am away on holiday. I will be in the Hastings and Rye area so if you have any recommendations please do let me know :)

Until next time

Happy Crafting

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Holiday socks

Hello all,

I love summer holidays! Enjoying the sun and wearing all your favourite summer accessories. However, when I go away with my family it is never in the summer. Cost is always a factor and so our holidays tend to be towards the end of September. Not only do we go when it's colder...but we also like to stay in a freezing cold caravan. However, there is a positive spin to it all....it makes the time leading up to the break brilliant for a knitter. 

Most people going on holiday will shop for new clothes or accessories. I on the other hand find lovely things that I would like to make. I have a long list of things and I hope my poor hands can endure then endless projects I want to knit. 

I am happy to announce that my freezing feet will not suffer in the caravan as I have knitted a new pair of socks. The gorgeous yarn was from West Yorkshire Spinners and it is the in the Country Bird range. My particular socks are 'pheasant' as apparently the colours seen are similar to this bird. The magical yarn stripes itself creating a great false fair isle effect. I used a basic pattern provided from Rachel Coopey at a brilliant sock workshop I attended at Guthrie and Ghani. I have booked myself onto their knitting in colours in the round workshop which I am really excitted about by the way. 

It was not all plain sailing. I completed the first sock and noticed I was 2 stitches short. After I had grafted the end........disaster struck!!!!! I could see the 2 dropped stitches quite early on in the piece. This brought much sadness as I had to frog (unpick) my work back to this point to repair. Most knitters have second sock syndrome. In this case...........I had third sock syndrome.

I worked on these socks at the Toft knit night and at another knitting group I attend called Sip and Stitch. This is on a Saturday 11am-1pm at Stitch Solihull. This is a gorgeous shop which is even open on a Sunday!!!!!!. It stocks high quality yarn and knitting supplies. Check out their website for more details and look at the workshops too. I am hoping to go to a more advance Tunisian crochet workshop soon. Eventually I had made my beautiful socks. I now need to meet with my sister to find a new set of pyjamas that will match them. 

As it will only be slightly colder it's too soon to wear my Super Moss stitch cowl...................maybe I need to make another cowl before my holiday. Now I did attend that hyacinth cowl workshop at Toft and I do have the luxurious extra fine yarn to make it up with. Check out the end result next time. 

Until then

Happy crafting

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Festival of Arts and fibre fest

Hello all,

I am now officially an award winning knitter and crocheter :). In my town there is a local competition called the Nuneaton Festival of Arts. Within this you can enter a number of different arts and craft ranging from poetry to quilts. I thought this year would be the time to give it a go.

My first decision was what I should enter. I was quite proud of my sockcessful knit so I wanted this to be entered. This did cause a couple of issues for the husband as it did once again mean that I had freezing cold feet. I also wanted other knitters to see a sample of extreme knitting so I had to whip my rug out from under the cat. She was also displease as she was cold. However, there was a lovely compromise as she now sits on my husband's lap. This means that the husband's lap is now too hot and I can help cool him down with my freezing feet :)

As there was also a crochet category that I wanted to submit some items here. My hook case was one of the first things I designed and I wanted it to be seen. I also loved my little hedgehog and he was my final submission. This did not cause any problems in the marriage you'll be happy to know.

Results were released within a few days but it seemed like a life time. When they were out I was over the moon as I found I was 3rd in the knitting category, 2nd in crochet and I got a certificate of achievement. I was honored to have been selected. 

I also attended Fibre Fest which was put on by the Fibreworks. This was a great day would as there was a range of crafts available from patchwork to lovely woolly gifts. The Fibreworks is a sweet shop that stocks an excellent range of yarn in gorgeous colours and fibres. There is a branch in Chipping Norton and Oxford. 

I learnt about Knit for Peace which is a brilliant charity. The idea is that it encourages people to knit and the items produced is sent off to different great knitting causes. Some knitted tops have been hand sent to India with this cause. This charity is something that I would like to get involved with. Please check out their website and help them out where you can (http://www.knitforpeace.org.uk/) 

There was an inspiring talk and workshop ran by the lovely Erika Knight. I feel so much more confident with using colour work within my designs. I loved the theory used and thought it was one of the best workshops I have attended. Check out Erika's work on http://www.erikaknight.co.uk/

 It was an extremely enjoyable festival and if you get to the chance to go next year, I would strongly recommend it.   

Until next time

Happy crafting

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My Sockcess Story

Hello all,

I am proud to say that I have created my first pair of socks :) This is something that I have wanted to do for a long time but never found the knitspiration required. It is also considered to technically quite challenging. This is an essential project as I am fed up of my husband nagging me for putting my cold feet on him. If I had a lovely cosy pair of socks I felt that this would put an end to this argument once and for all. 

My knitspiration came in the form of a lovely ball of yarn from York. Whilst away in February, I went to a great knitting shop called Ramshamble. I love this shop as it has a great variety of yarns and most of them are natural fibres. My eyes fell upon a beautiful yarn from the Yorkshire Spinners. This was from a range called Signature and it is magical. Not only is it a lovely combination of wool and nylon, it is self patterning. This means that when you knit it the wool colour will change certain points to make the sock stripey. It is so soft and perfect for that lovely pair of socks that I crave. 

With this magical yarn, I finally got to work on my marriage saving socks. In order to create them, you need to use double pointed needles. Although it looks like a medieval torture device, I can assure you that it is not. It is a method of knitting where you need to use four needles as opposed to two. This means you knit a tube shape and reduces the amount of sewing needed at the end :)

When working on a sock, you tend to start at the top, also known as a cuff. This is usually started with a rib stitch for elasticity which is followed by a stocking stick. You will work to the desired length and then need to create a heel flap. This is achieved by working some of the stitches at the back of the sock so that a length for the heel is created. In order to make the part of the sock that is along your foot, you need to pick up stitches from the heel flap so that you are able to knit on the double pointed needles once again. The tube shape is continued until you get the foot length required and then sewn at the end. Looking back at this written instruction, it looks confusing but if you have practised each element in a different pattern, I can assure you it isn't :)

One difficulty I found with a self patterning yarn is that you need to ensure that your second sock is started in the same place in the pattern as the first. If this is not achieved the pattern and colour order on both socks would be different. Some people don't mind this but I do !!!!!!!!! After four attempts, I got this right. I no longer freeze my husband, I now have nice toasty warm feet. 

On Thursday I will be heading to TOFT for their knit night. It runs 4pm-8pm every other Thursday :) I love going here as its a cosy environment full of knitspiration and a lovely gang of knitters attend. I also love it as there is tea and cake a plenty. If you are in the area, I strongly recommend that you go. All skill levels are welcome.Check out www.thetoftalpacashop.co.uk for more and details and the great range of workshops they have.

 Toft also have a great open day on Easter Monday running 10am-4pm, this is soo much fun as you can see the studio, sign up for mini workshops and go on a tour of the farm to see all of the lovely alpaca :). This is well worth a visit if you are free. 

Until next time

Happy crafting

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