Mad Squishy Bear Hat

A finished object! And it almost knit itself, it appeared so quickly!

This is Mad's Hat by Jodi Brown from the Grocery Girls podcast. The gorgeous yarn is from Bear in Sheep's Clothing which I bought at Woollinn this year (post here).

The pattern called for two strands of 4 ply held together with one strand of mohair and I knit it in the Romance colourway. It has a cream/ rose underlying colour with speckles of deeper pink and green. The snippets of green on the hat really give it depth and makes it look like a hat from an expensive brand! The mohair is so squishy and soft and I have found myself automatically grabbing this hat every time I head out the door.

The pattern is really effective. It looks complicated but really isn't and it highlights the speckling of the yarn  well. I know some people don't like mohair as it's fluffy and can moult, however I haven't had that issue yet with this particular skein.

Pattern rating: 5/5 easy to read and understand, produces a nice finished piece. Rav link here.
Yarn rating: 5/5 lovely to work with, very silky, good price, big fan of the colourway and will definitely buy more from Bear in Sheep's clothing in the future. They are currently on a pause in their shop but the link for them is here.

Finished Object - My first colourwork hat!

Afternoon everyone, just a quick post to say I finished a project! It's still really hot here, well for the UK anyway and it's been difficult to knit when you're already overheating. I have found that any small project made with 4ply yarn or lighter is manageable as you don't have a load of yarn covering your legs as you knit. You may have already seen a picture on my Instagram but I wanted to show it here too as it's my first real attempt at colourwork.

This is the Dorothy hat, which was a free kit included with a Knit Now Issue although I can't find which issue and it doesn't say on the pattern booklet. The yarn could have been used to make Dorothy and friends from the Wizard of Oz but I'm not a huge fan of knitting toys at the moment. I really appreciate being given an alternative pattern such as a hat or cowl to knit instead rather than having random small amounts of yarn sitting, gathering dust. Also that pom pom... Love it!

Here's a close up of the pattern:

It's designed by Kate Heppell, the editor of Knit Now magazine. I haven't blocked it yet but couldn't wait to take a photo! The hat came out a lot larger than expected so this might have to go to the boyfriend. He's already hinted that he likes the hat so it's lucky it came out so big!

Charlotte and Harvey x

The Cotswolds featuring lots of sheep

I spent last weekend cycling around the Cotswolds in England on a rickety bicycle called Hortense with my boyfriend, Will, on a matching bike called José to celebrate five whole years together. I can't believe the time has gone so quickly and I feel so lucky to have him in my life. 

Anyway onto the important bit - sheep! Featuring other animals too. On the Saturday we went to Adam Henson's Farm Park which is a mix of rare breed sheep, rabbits, cows, chickens, goats and an educational centre for school groups and children.

I discovered bantams look like a squashed version of real chickens when they sit down.

But are so fluffy when they stand up. Look at those legs!

Goats will only pose for photos if there's a handful of food just underneath the camera. And that my Garthenor cabled hat is very warm!

Herdwick sheep are very friendly and incredibly soft to touch. They are going on my sheep wishlist (everyone has sheep wishlist right? Right?!)

More sheep but I can't remember the breed. Soft and friendly although mainly for the food we were giving them.

We finished the afternoon with a sheep show which explained how sheep have developed since early farmers a thousand years ago due to breeding, Roman and Viking invasions and what we needed them for.such as wool or meat. Can you guess which are the Roman and Viking sheep from the names?

In the corner of the barn were two gated areas full of fleeces. I was very tempted to get one but the thought of cycling it all the way back to the B&B was too much even for me. Although the farm park is very knowledgeable about sheep, they didn't seem that aware of the uses for the fleece. Hence why it was labelled 'wool' rather than fleece. The different breeds would have been interesting to spin but as I haven't bought fleece before I had no idea what I needed to look for. I'm going to go back once I have learnt a bit more about fleece, staple length and spinning in general. 

It was a fantastic weekend! My legs were pretty sore by the end but the cooked breakfasts and cream teas certainly helped cure our aches and pains. 

The Frog and the FO

This seems to be a week of firsts! I finally frogged a project and I finally finished a project. I started the Hermione socks but having changed both my needle size and starting number of stitches the sock was going to be far too small. So the logical choice was to rip back and start again. It's amazing how reluctant I was to do this! I think the knowledge of the time spent knitting up to that point meant that every stitch I pulled off the needle felt like time lost. Conversely poorly fitting socks would be far worse in the long run and would remind me of time wasted making a whole two socks that didn't fit.

The sock

Back to the start

Another exciting first for this week is my first ever finished object!! I counted the other day and I have 16 works in progress (WIPs) currently sitting in my room. I can now say that's down to 15! Still a huge number but I'm getting there. No new projects can be cast on until I'm down to 10 projects. I think I'm going to set that as my new maximum. What's that I hear you say? You don't care about WIPs, what's the FO? Fair enough really, I am rambling...

Well back in July I went to PomFest (see my post here) which was a combination of a yarn market and a series of talks. I made it to PomFest late on Saturday afternoon so missed the talks but still got to see all the yarn stalls (yay!). I got chatting to the lady running the Garthenor stall and ended up standing there for a good twenty minutes. Garthenor is a company based in Wales which sells 100% British wool yarn and has been around for a few years now. Inspired by her enthusiasm and humour, I bought 100g of Llanwenog DK yarn which is naturally a beautiful creamy white colour.

Garthenor has a huge range of yarn from different sheep breeds from around the UK and on their website they have a page for each one explaining their origins. I really like their story of the journey from sheep to finished ball of yarn. Their website is here.

Less than ten minutes after getting home from PomFest, I cast on the Llanwenog to make a hat! My first ever hat as well. The yarn is described as giving good stitch definition so I chose a cable hat pattern. My Ravelry pattern notes are here

It started as a moustache of a hat while doing the rib.

Then a fringe:

I quickly got to the cabling, the best bit! I think basic cabling makes a plain hat more interesting without much extra effort. At this point I went to Tanzania on holiday so of course I took some knitting.

This hat was knit on a plane: (with a cheeky G&T)

And on a beach in Zanzibar: (yes those are my pale english legs)

And then finally finished! 

It's surprisingly hard to take a photo of a hat on yourself! The first three photos looked a bit manic because I was concentrating so much, looking at the floor seems to be the way to go!

If you would like to try Garthenor yarn but want to squish it first, they are sponsoring the Great London Yarn Crawl after party and will be there with a stall. Tickets are already be sold out but there may be a waiting list. More details on the Yarn in the City website here. I think I might take my hat and show the people at the Garthenor stall :)

Freedom! AKA the holidays have arrived!

Today is the 5th day of my long awaited three weeks off. I have been catching up on sleep, podcasts, more sleep and my languishing knitting projects in that order. It is wonderful. I have sat down to knit without the normal niggle that I should be working and found that half an hour can go by without realising. Does anyone else ever have that feeling?

I finally put pen to paper and worked out how many works in progress (WIP) I have. 
9 knitting WIPs including 4 lonely socks without partners, half a scarf, a hat, a jumper and a bunny that just needs to be sewn together. 
2 crochet WIPs, a crochet blanket (Moorland from Attic24) and a virus shawl. 
And last but not least a weaving sample that's been ignored for nearly six months.

I think my current time off might not be enough.... Better get cracking!

What are you working on?