Hello Friends! I’m still far behind with updating the blog, so today I decided to take a break from work and show you what I made during my sock knitting spree in January, and post some pictures of my cats adjusting to their new home.
I mentioned before that January was a stressful month, with the move approaching and my mood not in the best place. That’s exactly the kind of mood that demands simple, fast and comforting knitting – and what fits that description better than socks, right?
As I mentioned in my last post, I have some finished projects I’d like to show to you. The first one is a cardigan designed by Andrea Mowry; the pattern is called Little Yellow Sweater (LYS). It’s slightly similar to the Sweet As Honey cardigan that I had knitted in 2018, but the lace panel is different, and it’s shorter.
I wanted to find the right match for my three skeins of DyeDyeDone Alpa-Si-Li (an alpaca, silk and linen combo in fingering weight) in the Curcuma colourway, and as soon as I found the pattern, I knew that was that. This yarn is so great, it’s very, very light, and the cardigan weighs almost nothing at all. The alpaca fibres give it fuzziness, while the silk provides a slight sheen and sturdiness, and the linen adds the overall ‘rustic’ look. The colourway fits into the recent trend in my colour choices I think, and in general, it was such joy to knit it!
This is my first post written in our new apartment because yes, we managed to find a new place and move! I am relieved, exhausted (with a painful cramp in my neck after carrying all the stuff), happy and excited at the same time. Honestly, January had been super stressful for me due to the combination of house-searching stress and illness, which in turn resulted in my mental state plummeting significantly. Like last year, I’ve been in and out of infections all the time, and I really lost the resolve to exercise or go out much at all. My meditation routine and therapy, which generally keep depression at bay, stopped working, and I had to increase my anti-depressant dose. It seems to be helping and finding the new apartment made even a bigger difference.
When I came back from Poland, I was planning to start knitting a sweater. I have a few of them in my queue, and I bought some gorgeous yarn, so it seemed like a natural thing to work on next. But I’d also ordered some very colourful yarn cakes before leaving for my winter break, and I just couldn’t get them out of my head. I needed to start my crochet project and enjoy all those colours immediatelly!
Hi everyone! I haven’t updated this blog for a while. I’ve been busy since returning to Ireland, and to be honest, not in the best mood. But works starts again now and there’s no more time for whining and bad moods, or for procrastinating – so here I am!
What do you knit when you have plenty of bright red and white wool that was initially meant to be a Christmas jumper, and when you are in festive, Christmas mood?
That’s right, you knit socks! And because you can’t decide if you prefer them white with red Scandinavian pattern or red with white pattern, you just knit two pairs. And then you like them so much, that you decide to knit more for your Mother and for your Friend, because you know they love warm, cosy socks just as much as you do 🙂
I’m getting better, but it’s a slow process. I’m not taking antibiotics or steroids (other than my regular inhaler) anymore, and I started taking daily longer walks this week. I’m still quite weak, and still cough a bit. I’m also terribly bored… seriously, I’m a person who loves being on my own and spending time at home, but I also like being outdoors, and being active. 3 weeks of very low activity seem to last forever and I’m already planning some awesome hikes and trips once I feel strong enough.
The weather matches my mood perfectly (although today it’s actually quite nice for a change); it’s windy, rainy, and dark. So in order to defeat bad mood, I took out some Noro Kureyon sock yarn from my stash and decided to knit with it, just because working with all these beautiful colours make me feel a little better. I used it in two of my most recent projects.
It’s still not blocked so it looks a little rugged
I’ve been in such good mood recently, I’m loving these chilly, early fall days and beautiful colours around. And knitting with wool without any discomfort like it happens in summer!
I’m also busy with the video-conferences for work this week, but at least today my projects were only discussed in the morning (next days are going to be much more intense though) so I could still clean up the apartment, do a few loads of laundry, go for a walk, prepare dinner and I’m planning to hit the gym in the evening too. You know, to make up for hours of sitting in front of the PC in the coming days!
One thing regarding video-meetings: cats and internet cameras don’t mix well. Especially if one of your cats tries to eat more than she should (because I wasn’t watching so she could eat both hers and her sister’s breakfast) and then throws up on the floor behind you while you are desperately trying to ignore it, but also remember about it to avoid stepping in that by accident and hoping that none of your colleagues noticed anything.
But let’s focus on pleasant stuff, shall we? May I present you my latest finished knitting project, a new autumn/ winter skirt:
Of course I made a mistake in the top lace pattern repeat but I’m just quietly hoping that everyone will assume that it should be this way.
Look at my new crafty purchase! It’s a beautiful yarn bowl from the Flying Tiger. Not something I’ve been planning to buy, even though I’ve thought about it a couple of times because of my cats. They always hunt my yarn so I have to be extra careful not to drop it while knitting (and the ball of yarn tends to jump all over my desk or coach which gives them many opportunities to catch it), and they always shed, even if it’s much less now than in summer. We buy lint rollers in Ikea in crazy amounts and I keep vacuuming all the time, but I can’t eradicate the fur in 100%. And when I drop the ball of yarn to the floor, it inevitably collects some cat hair which end up knitted into my work and I hate it. So yes… that, combined with a good price (6 euro) convinced me to give it a try and buy a yarn bowl.
I really had to correct the placement of the third lowest button!
It took me two weeks to knit my new cardigan, a Drops Design free pattern called “Sweet as Honey” – and it’s definitely one of my favourite finished projects so far! I usually find that raglan cardigans tens to slide down my shoulders a little, which can be really annoying – but this one doesn’t. It fits just as it should. It’s also knitted in my favourite yarn weight, fingering – thin but warm enough for this time of the year. I used hand-dyed Irish Fairytale Yarns merino with silk and I love this yarn – merino wool gives makes it warm and soft, while silk content adds a little sheen and makes the yarn more sturdy. The colourway I chose is Old Oak – it’s a very warm, medium brown shade, just perfect to pair up with red or green.
