WIP Wednesday

It's half term this week so the children are at home. Unfortunately the weather is rubbish, I don't think it's stopped raining since Saturday evening. So instead of visiting to the park, going for walks and picnics we are at home being crafty and enjoying some chill out time.



I'm flitting between projects at the moment depending on what mood I'm in and how much time I've got. The one thing they've all got in common is that they are very simple, my brain is not in the mood for anything complicated!



I'm doing the waist decreases on my Grace Cardigan, I think I'm going to make it quite a bit longer than the pattern says. My favourite store bought cardigan is around 22 inches from the underarm, Grace is designed to go to 16 inches. I'm not sure if I'll go all the way to 22 inches but I want something that stops below the waistband on my trousers. I've got a long torso (and long legs!) so lots of commercial tops are a little shorter than I'd like. A longer cardigan buttoned up will keep my wobbly bits warmer!



Mr Soaring Sheep's socks are slowly progressing. I've got another 30 rows before I do the heel so over halfway there now. I like working on these in the car as they're simple and portable :-) I'm using the stitch pattern from Jeck socks but using my preferred toe up sock pattern instead.

Linking up with Nicole, Tami and Ginny

Halfway There?

It's been a while since I've shown you some progress on my big granny squares blanket. I start each round with a different colour in the sequence. I've got all 7 squares for the first order of colours and I'm now working on number 5 for the reverse order



I've still got a few ends to deal with although I have mostly been crocheting over them as I go. I'm not sure yet if I'm going to do 5 x 4 squares or 6 x 4 squares.  I think I'll aim for 5 x 4 and see how it feels when they're joined together



I think it will need a big border too so it's framed nicely. It's nice getting a hint of how it's going to look. It's intended to be a sofa blanket really, just something cosy for the children to snuggle under and to add some colour to the room. Not that it needs it lol!



There's been some exciting developments going on in the Soaring Sheep household, we've been applying for a mortgage for our first house and last Friday we were finally approved! No moving date yet but it's so exciting that after 11 years we're finally going to be able to own our own home.


And I can fill it with colourful projects! :-p

Two new projects

Thank you for the lovely comments on my Rays of Gold cardigan. I thought today seeing as I posted a finished project on Wednesday I'd post some WIP's on Friday. I'm such a rebel lol.

My main knitting project at the moment is a Grace cardigan. I've wanted to make one of these ever since I saw the one Truly Mrytle made last year. I'm making mine with yarn I got from frogging another cardigan that wasn't getting much wear. I think I'm going to like it much more in this incarnation. I like cardigans which button up :-)
 


So far I've finished the lace sections and now I'm on to the stockinette. Nice gentle knitting, just what I need right now :-)



I love the lace pattern. It's so simple to work and looks so pretty. I did muddle myself at one point with a yarn over in the wrong place, I undid that section and picked up the stitches again and made exactly the same mistake. What a muppet! I fixed it properly after that :-)


I also have another pair of socks on the go which I can work on in the car. These ones are for Mr Soaring Sheep, even if they do have pink in! He chose the yarn :-) I've told him they are for Father's day next month but I think I might be cutting it a little fine. Hopefully he won't mind if they are a few days late!



The pattern is Jeck which is a free pattern on ravelry. I've tweaked it by changing to my preferred needle size and method of knitting toe up. Ignore the safety pins, the bottom one marks the 1st row and the top one marks the 30th row. I need to knit to 82 rows to fit Mr Soaring Sheep's feet :-)

Linking up with Fiber Arts Friday and Creative Friday. Have a good weekend everyone! It's a bank holiday weekend in the UK, Mr Soaring Sheep hasn't realised yet, shall I be mean and let him get up early on Monday? :-p

FO - Rays of Gold MKAL

I'm working on a project for me today. Not much to see yet so I'll save photos for another day :-)  Instead I'd like to share this FO with you.

I was very excited when I learned there was going to be another mystery KAL by Elena Nodel and as usual this one didn't disappoint.



This sweet little cardigan was easy to knit up and is such a versatile garment

   

The stitch pattern is simple to do and works beautifully in both multicoloured and solid yarns. I chose to use this particular yarn because I'm trying to knit down my stash and it was the right yardage and gauge for the pattern! It's worked beautifully though



Ravelry page: here. I knitted the 3T version which was a size bigger than my daughter needed so hopefully she'll be able to a couple of year's use out of it. The stitch pattern is very stretchy and grows while blocking.

I'd definitely knit this pattern again although probably not for a while as I don't have any yarn for it and my daughters have rather a lot of cardigans already! Maybe next year lol.

Linking up with Tami, Nicole and Ginny.

Inspiration Monday

Wow, what glorious weather we had in our part of the world this weekend. We had a day out with the in-laws on Saturday and I managed to get some photos of my finished MKAL to share with you later this week. Yesterday we had a lazy day at home and as well as casting on a new project (details to be revealed later) I had a chance to do some browsing on ravelry and start thinking about a future stash busting project.

I bought this Malabrigo lace almost a year ago and planned to make a Spirited cardigan with it. I've changed my mind a bit though and fancied something more fitted

I've been enjoying playing around with the option to search through patterns that people have used a specific yarn for and I've short listed 3 designs I would like to knit with my yarn

Laika is a design by Ysolda Teague (photo taken from her flickr page) and knitted top down with this gorgeous lace pattern. I think this one is my favourite, I like the thicker button bands made with the yarn held doubled but not sure about the hood. A couple of people have done a shawl collar though which looks wonderful so very tempted to go down that route

Rocio by Joji Locatelli is another one I like. Can't link to the designer's picture so hop onto the ravelry page to see it. It's a simple looking cardigan from the front but then has an interesting lace design with bobbles or nupps. Not sure if there is actually a difference in how they are constructed as I've never done them! Could be nice way to learn how.


Lastly is Laar by Gudrun Johnston, again no photo for this one so you'll have to look on the ravelry page. It's another cardigan with lace and delicate picot edging. The bottom up construction put me off this one a little, I'm a top down kinda girl when it comes to sweaters lol. It is lovely though and it's good to work outside your comfort zone occasionally I guess!


Have you played around on this function on ravelry? I guess it would work best if you're searching for ideas for a more well known brand rather than something by an indi-dyer but I guess you could get lucky. Anyone knitted any of these three patterns? Which one would you chose to knit?

I'm linking this post in with Inspiration Mondays at A Baby's Smile

FO Stripey Birthday Socks!

I've been "Cold Sheep-ing" (not buying yarn) for over 7 months now but as a surprise for my birthday last month my husband bought me some gorgeous self striping sock yarn from Laughing Yaffle. Naturally I had to cast it on ASAP and look at these beauties I ended up with



I managed to match up the stripes almost perfectly. I had to break the yarn in the second pair near the start to make sure but I don't think I did too badly



I tried an afterthought heel for these which I blogged about here. It fits quite well although I'm not too happy about the holes. Not bothered enough about them to sew them up though *lazy*



I wish I'd made them a bit longer but I was worried about running out of yarn for the heel. Maybe next time I could use a contrast yarn for the toe and heel and have really long striped socks :-D I'd do them top down though so I could make sure the heel started in the middle of the stripe rather than slightly further one side. Not a problem really though.



I loved every stitch of making them, my favourite colours, stripes and a simple pattern, perfect.

Linking up with FO Friday, Fiber Arts Friday and Creative Friday.

Have a good weekend everyone, enjoy the sunshine if you get some :-)

Stripes everywhere!

I'm enjoying these two striped projects I've been working on. The socks seem to race along because I knit really quickly to get to the next colour!



The ripple blanket is working up quickly too although it is starting to slow down a bit now its bigger and one extra row makes less of an impact. I'll be doing a purple stripe next although it's shown up as more of a black colour in this picture.

I've finished my Rays of Gold cardigan which was a mystery KAL. I just need to sew the buttons on and take some photos so I'll probably share it with you next week. I'm going to try to get the socks finished for Friday :-)

Linking in with Keep Calm Craft On, WIP Wednesday and Yarn Along

Cycles, Roses and Knitting

Had one of those great weekends where you get lots of jobs done around the house that have been waiting for ages. Things feel a little bit easier now :-)

Last week stage 2 of The Women's Tour of Britain came through our village. All the school children lined the route and I took my littlest girl down to watch as well



As you can see it was rather wet! There was a great atmosphere though and my daughter was very excited when the police motorbikes driving past waved at her





The leader had a huge lead on the rest



It wasn't long before #2 and #3 appeared





And then we had the rest of them or the "peloton" google tells me!





Amazing listening to the sound of them cycling past, and the speed of them... wow!

This lady was bringing up the rear, she got a special cheer from the crowds



Mr Soaring Sheep treated me to some roses on Saturday, I think he chose some good ones :)







Now as I promised you knitting in the title of this post it would be rather rude of me not to post some photos. I finished the 6th clue of the MKAL yesterday so just the sleeves and possibly some sort of collar to go, looking forward to seeing what they look like



There's some funky pooling going on, hopefully I'll be able to show you the finished cardigan :)



I'm hoping to get it finished this week and possibly my stripy socks too. I'd best stop waffling on and do some crafting then! Have a good week everyone :)

Yarn Along/ WIP Wednesday

I've got a bit of a cold at the moment which has been waking me up at night so I'm feeling a bit tired and sorry for myself. Perfect excuse for some crochet!



I've got the latest copy of Simply Crochet which I'm looking forward to having a look through in a minute with a nice cup of tea. I'm liking the cushion in the top left, would be good for some stash busting and for learning some new stitches. I've had my eye on Little Woollie's stripey blanket pattern for a while so looking forward to reading more about it.

I'm working on another big granny square for a blanket. I'm changing the starting colour with each square and this is the last one I think. Next I'll do the colour sequence in reverse which should give me another 7 squares and then I need to decide what to do next!



I'm still working on my Rays of Gold mystery KAL. I've tried not to show too much in this picture but I'm loving how it's knitting up. The next clue comes out on Friday and I need to do another couple of inches before I'm ready for it. This stage is quite straight forward though so I don't need to concentrate very much. Just as well really, my brain feels very fuzzy!

For more projects visit Yarn Along and WIP Wednesday

Keep Calm Craft On

Firstly I'd like to say thank you for the lovely comments on my spotty cushion that I posted photos of on Friday, I'm so pleased with it :-)

Yesterday was a bank holiday in the UK so we had an indulgent 3 day weekend. We went for a 10 mile cycle ride on Saturday along the Brampton Valley Way which is described as a linear country park and runs along the route of an old railway line



For part of the route it runs alongside a tourist steam and diesel railway. We did hope we could try racing against a steam train but our timings didn't work out right and it was either in the station or heading the opposite direction when we went past





We had a fairly lazy day on Sunday with a bit of painting. It's not finished yet so I won't post any photos today. On Monday we went to the beautiful Belton House for a walk and a picnic with my in-laws









The bluebells were out and they were absolutely beautiful







Such a wonderful day :-)

Now it's Tuesday, the children are back at school and pre-school, the weather is grey with the occasional rain shower and it's a bit of a jolt back to normality. I'm going to get on with some ironing and then have some crafting time with a cup of tea. So this isn't a completely non-crafty post here's a picture of two of my current WIP's



I've got to knit to the next pink section of my stripy sock and then I need to start counting rows ready for doing the afterthought heel. My ripple blanket is getting steadily bigger, I'm enjoying picking out the colour combinations and watching them merge together :-)

Have a good week everyone, I'm linking this post in with Nicole's Keep Calm Craft On

FO Friday - Spotty cushion

This cushion was a project I've been wanting to make for a while. It's not particularly original, there are probably a 101 other versions in the blogosphere but here is mine :)



I used this free pattern to make the squares and then slip stitches them together. The colours were chosen to tie in with other crochet projects in my lounge and because they were a sort of rainbow together.

For the back I used Little Tin Bird's Elmer Squares pattern and alternated between cream and one of the colours. I would modify the pattern slightly if I was to make anything bigger than this cushion as it does swirl a little. As it's for the back of cushion though I figured it didn't really matter very much



To join the two sides together I took inspiration from another blogger (and I forgot to make a note of who it was) and used the double crochet stitch to join. This gives a raised edge which looks a bit like piping and finishes the cushion rather nicely I think





Now the cushion lives happily on my sofa and looks rather at home I think :-)



The flower cushion on the left was blogged about here and the Zigzag one was here. The blanket was a stash busting project that was originally intended to go on my daughter's bed but it seems to have stayed down here instead!



Speaking of stash-busting, look how much progress I've made on my scrappy ripple blanket. I'm using the interlocking pattern so the colours merge nicely together. Lots of fun :-)

Linking this post in with FO Friday, Creative Friday and Fiber Arts Friday. It's a 3 day weekend in the UK so I'm hoping to get out for some walks, cycling and picnics. I might even squeeze in some crafting time too! Have a good weekend everyone!