Happy 60th Birthday

Remember the shawls I've shown you (you actually haven't seen Renate's yet) well here is the reason, well partly....

These two ladies start the season of decade birthdays. This is Monica and Renate (either side of the counter, Monica on the right) who were 60 on 29th June and are two good customers of my shop and regulars to SnB, so how else would you treat twins on their birthday...


but with fruit cake, made and decorated by my mum; who very ingeniously arranged it so if I took the candles out, I could cut the cake in 3, we could all share in the centre portion but yet Monica and Renate could take home an 'individual' cake each.....


and flowers, I thought the florist had done a lovely job of making the flowers the same but different!

and finally the unwrapping of presents from various friends.....

Monica

Monica, Cathleen, Enid, Christine, Diane, Renate

Renate with her candy bracelet on!

The scene from behind the counter, I had lovely wafts of perfume all afternoon :o)

Monica and my mum (Cathleen)

Christine, Diane & Renate

Renate

They had a lovely time and were completely surprised and over whelmed by it all, they got shawls, socks, Etui boxes, stitch markers, and sweets that brought back memories of childhood; love hearts, sherbet fountain, Parma violets, candy bracelets

Happy 60th Birthday Monica & Renate

More from the Repetoire

As promised another update...

Finished mid May this was started back in February and I got halfway and just simply stopped, not just this but lots of other things too looking back now....

For those of you who don't know what the pattern is, it is the Leaf and Nupp Shawl from Estonian Knitted Lace by Nancy Bush.

and for those of you who like detailed close ups:

It has come out a respectable 18 x 63" when blocked and is destined for a 70th birthday present foe December.

I know I'm well in hand but the yarn said it wanted to be this shawl and as I'd spun it why not knit it! The fibre was from Enchanted Knoll (see my sidebar) and was the 'fern' batts which were lovely to spin. I used 3.75mm to knit the resulting 2ply yarn.

For the eagle eyed among you, you may notice that I have omitted the border all the way round and just used it on the top and bottom borders. I initially did this because I thought I wouldn't have enough yarn, but with hindsight I'd plenty, enough to work 4 extra repeats of the main motif, but I have to say I think I prefer it this way...

I have another shawl to show you in my next post that was completed a few weeks ago and other things too.... I think now things are a bit more settled in the household I'm having a 'finishing' off session which is making me feel good; projects that have been hanging around for too long are slowly getting finished :o)

I've also been working on my crochet in the last few months as well so there will be creeping in as well... but I will leave you with a link to a newly found blog which is very inspiring Attic24

Dare I show my Face?

I can't believe it's been 4 months since my last post... but being honest I just haven't felt like doing so and the same has been reflected in my knitting and spinning...

But this looking back has coincided with problems with my husbands work which in a nutshell has equated to he does the work and he may get his wage or not and also to when it may turn up; actually on payday is a novelty!!!

Anyway things are looking up he now has 1 week and 4 days to work his notice.... and while this may not be the best of times to do so he and a colleague are going into partnership together and basically carrying on doing what they're doing now. They already have work lined up for the 1st of July onwards which is definite..... so while 6 months ago when he mentioned he would like to do this and when I got down off the ceiling basically said we can't afford to do this.... the last 4 months have made me realise what have we got to loose at least he will be getting paid for the hours he puts in!!!!

Anyway you didn't come to read this and it's no excuse for not blogging but really I've had nothing to show....

I do however have a couple of finished knitted objects to show you and a further 1 nearly completed.... I've mainly been crocheting small things... things I don't feel I have to commit a lot of time and energy to IYKWIM?

Anyway here's the 1st of the 2 finished objects.....

Lilac Leaf shawl from Estonian Knitted Lace by Nancy Bush

and with close up...

This is worked in my own hand spun from 'Pumpkin Juice' Batts from Enchanted Knoll, and is for a friend who is 60 at the end of this month... I'm just completing another shawl for her twin sister....

Anyway I've promised myself no waffling so I'll be back at some point and show you the next completed object!

Progress...

Well progress on 'Leaf & Nupp Shawl' got halted for a couple of days while I did this.... yes another Swallowtail, I can't believe it but this is my 5th and still I don't find it boring, but it's something I know I can do quick and in most weights of yarn. This was for a lady who know who needed a black scarf quickly, so as you can see I've done the mini version with only 9 repeats of budding lace.

Other adaptions include omitting rows 3&4 of the peaked edging due to stitch count and rows 16 & 16 of the same chart as I didn't want the edging too scalloped seeing this is for a sombre occasion. Oh yes! almost forgot it's done in Patons Diploma Gold 4ply and used 1 full 50g ball and not quite half of the 2nd worked on 4.5mm needles...


Finished size 48" across the top and 23" down the spine...


So far so good with the 'Leaf & Nupp Shawl' I've done 2 repeats of the pattern, but I did stop to do the bottom edging before progressing further as I didn't want to run out of hand spun and thought at least if I d this bit now I can work out what weight of yarn I'll roughly need to save to finish the other end.....

I didn't want to do a border all the way round so I opted just to put it on the top and bottom edges. It worked quite well as by simply just doing an extra knit/purl stitch at either end the 75sts worked into the edging pattern nicely.

I also opted not to do the Nupps as well to reduce yarn usage.....

With all this lace knitting I now have a sore index finger and a hole were I keep pushing the point in to it :o(

On a happier note my 1st installment from The Happy Hooves Sock Batt club came from Enchanted Knoll this week... 'Roses in the Snow' its a wild card set of batts hence the contrast batt in a beautiful Buttercup gold.... I have to say I can't see myself spinning and knitting into socks they're far too nice I can quite envisage these becoming lace.....

Moi obsessed?

Sunday 8th February...

I know uninspiring title.... but I couldn't think of anything else... anyway first of all if you're reading this Fleegle I hope you're feeling better and up and out of hospital...

After several weeks on the needles I finally completed the 'Embers' socks for Mike; I bought the yarn in 2007 as part of his Christmas present...

The yarn is 'Bonny' (75% wool & 25% polyamide) from Natalie of The Yarn Yard (keep checking back for updates) and was lovely to knit especially like orange/grey combinations...

On the lace knitting front or should I say knitted lace as the 'Leaf & Nupp Shawl' has no plain rest rows... I've completed the bottom edge and have actually managed 7 rows of the centre panel; mainly due to the fact that I had to have 3 attempts at getting the 1st row right!!!!

The 1st attempt saw me getting to the end of the row with an extra stitch as I'd missed a K1 at the beginning of the row. My 2nd attempt saw me as far as half way along row 3 before I realized that I had not purled the appropriate stitches on row 1. Finally on the 3rd attempt I got to the end of row 1 with no extra stitches and purling the stated stitches as well!!!

I should add the yarn is my own hand spun, which came from 'Fern Batts' produced by Josette of Enchanted Knoll so far I like the bottom edge but perhaps I've done insufficient of the centre panel, but it does feel like that the 'leaves' aren't showing up...

Finally this arrived in the post last week again from Natalie of The Yarn Yard, it's my Fibre club installment and its 80% Merino % 20% Nylon blend which is so soft and squishy, it's an absolute dream to spin (I got to test spin some over Christmas)... this is 'Faded Jeans'... and as you can see they're based on an old pair of jeans that are getting a bit faded and thread bare and have been splashed with mud from the garden....

I love Natalie's dying skills she truly comes up with some fantastic inspirations for the colourways :o)

Lilac Leaf Shawl

From this.... to this...

and finally to this...

in approx 5 weeks :o0

I used 3.75mm needles and all but 7g of my hand spun lace weight which came from Pumpkin Juice batts from Enchanted Knoll...

I however only got 10 repeats instead of 14 due to lack of yarn and was concerned it may not come out sufficiently long enough... it ended up a respectable 19.5 x 55" when blocked which is actually generous enough for a scarf or a shoulder shawl and with hindsight I think the recipient will get more use out of this than a bigger shawl....

I am pleased with this and have started Leaf & Nupp shawl in my Fern lace weight spun from EK batts :o) but I'll save that for another day.....

Of all things spinning & knitting....

OK on the knitting front... I got round to casting on for the Lilac Leaf Shawl last week with the Pumpkin Juice lace weight yarn I spun from batts of the same name purchased from Enchanted Knoll a few weeks ago so far this is the end of the border chart and am about to commence on the 20 row pattern repeat how many times (should be 14) will depend on how far the yarn goes.... but all said I've enjoyed knitting with the yarn and it doesn't mask the lace pattern which is what I aimed for when spinning it; although the nupps aren't very prominent....

The rest of the post content is spinning....

After Pumpkin Juice I spun up 'Fern' again from Enchanted Knoll and this time, I think because my plying was a little looser I ended up with 606m / 105g of 2ply lace weight (30wpi)

This is destined to be a shawl for a 70th birthday in December this year! and at the moment I'm thinking Leaf & Nupp Shawl (can't you tell I got Nancy Bush's Knitted Estonian Lace for Christmas)

Not quite lace weight but getting there with the next one.... A 3ply (21wpi) Merino & Alpaca blend (338m / 114g) from All Spun Up. This was Kristen's Jan/Feb spin along fibre that people are taking part in on her Ravelry group.... I must say it isn't a colour I would have bought but none the less I rather like the finished colours.....

Also on Ravelry in Spinner Central a skein swap was organised wherein you had to spin 4oz of fibre into a yarn for your recipient... you saw the one I sent to Regiknits in my last post. Anyway this arrived from her yesterday.... it's a beautifully squishy Merino / Silk yarn originally purchased from Funky Carolina which she's spun longdraw... have to say the colours are one of my favourite combinations... I've no idea what to make with it yet but am thinking hat at the moment....

Finally a little stash enhancement :o) both from Enchanted Knoll; although I know my Fibre Club from The Yarn Yard is in the post and I bought 2 beautiful braids of 'Copper' from Natalie the other week which she is going to 'enhance' for me....

8oz of 'Black Magic Woman'

& 4oz of Snow Moon, wish I'd managed to snag 8oz after seeing them up close and personal!!!