flash your stash, three months on.

My stash in January.
Rather big, I know, even more so if you consider that I've only been knitting intensively for the last three years or so. But one of my new year's resolutions was to reduce it's size. And because I intend to keep that resolution, I'm going to flash it every three months, to keep it under control.

My stash today.
It seems to have shrunk a bit, which is definitely a good thing. The black and grey yarn is still there, and it probably won't budge now until autumn/winter, but as long as it gets used before the and of the year it should be okay. The three remaining skeins of white yarn will be used shortly, as will at least one of blue-white-metallic ones.

The Miró blanket keeps growing. I thought the result would be rather small in the beginning as I'm using the yarn held double, but it's already rather big and I still have 4 skeins left...
I've also started a new pair of socks for my mother. my next break-time WIP, which I will be needing, as the last term starts tomorrow... Oh well, before I realize it, the summer will be upon us ;)
Mnz

holiday knitting

Remember that white yarn that I didn't have a project for? Well, it told me it would like to be a blanket. I listened to it and thought for a while. We'd just received our exam plan for June, and I read that for the Aesthetics exam we'd have to produce a work of art inspired by a twentieth century artist. The art could be of any form: drawing, painting, music, dance, textiles,... Wait a minute: did it say 'textiles'? It did.

So, my choice was made fairly quickly. I was going to knit something. Next problem: what could I knit? While I was analysing my stash, I heard the call of the white yarn again. The choice was made. I'm going to knit a white blanket and use it as a canvas to recreate a work of art.The perfect pattern? One that has been in my queue for some time: the famous 'Ten Stitch Blanket'. I'm using the yarn held double and knitting with 7 mm needles. It's not the perfect mindless knit as you have to look at it to see where you need to pick up the stitch to join, but hey, it's good enough!

I plan to leave the spiral side as it is, and do some embroidery on the 'wrong side' to turn it into a 'work of art'. I'm not 100% sure of my artist, but my favourite -and my original- idea was to do something in the style of Miró. On the one hand because he was Spanish (yes, Catalan still counts as Spanish) and he's not that famous in Belgium, on the other hand simply because I like his paintings. I like the idea that art doesn't necessarily have to represent a certain object. As long as it's aesthetically pleasing, it's fine on me. Another reason for my choice is that it shouldn't be too difficult to crochet/embroider something in the style of one of his 'Constellation' paintings onto the blanket.




I've also finished my first pair of autumn socks. When I took the photo they still had to be grafted and have the ends woven in, but that has been done since and the socks are on my feet at this very moment. Autumnal socks for spring. Sort of sounds like singing Christmas carols in summer, slightly weird, but hey, the socks are comfy, so who cares?

Mnz

March

 March is over and that means the holidays are back again :)
 Due to an amazing amount of schoolwork I've only been able to do half the usual amount of knitting, but I plan to make up for that during the holidays...
I finished the Wingspan shawl and I must say I think the construction is pure genius. It's so simple and yet it looks so spectacular (to non-knitters mostly, people who knit themselves tend to see the construction quite easily) I think I might knit another one next autumn because I'm a bit disappointed about the colour outcome. I wanted a green shawlette and this one turned out rather blue. It's not that I dislike that, but I just want a green shawlette, that's all...

The blanket is also progressing.
I've sewn seven squares to date, I've now posted photo's of six because I dropped one off at my grandmothers without taking a photo of it. I've now decided how the colours are combined within the blocks, but I'm still thinking about how to put the blocks together in the blanket as a whole. There will be 3 squares composed of different blues, 2 with pinks and purples and 2 green and brown and then one grey and turquoise-green (in Dutch they have a fantastic word for that colour: 'appelblauwzeegroen' or 'appleblueseagreen' which always amuses me as, in the normal world, the apples tend to be green and the sea blue) and one red and white. It won't exactly be what you might call stylish, but hey, the recipient wanted it to look home-made. And what looks more home-made that a slightly mismatched monster blanket?

I've also started a new jumper, a little 'printemps' cardigan. The method used to shape the sleeves is a new one on me, we'll see how they turn out.
 I've had the yarn in my stash for some years now and although I like the colours, I never really knew what to do with it given the quantity of yarn in the pack (400 gr.): not enough for a full sweater, but too much for a little shrug, although it seams that I might have got a -more or less- full sweater out of it as, at this stage, I still have 2 & 1/3 skeins of yarn left... Anyway, it's not finished yet, so we'll see.

Termtime also means socktime. Blocking my autumn shawl reminded me that I had some of that yarn left, but I wasn't sure whether it would be enough to knit a pair of stripey socks, so I divided the leftover ball into bits. Apparently I failed to keep them in the right order ;) Anyway, the second sock is on the needles, but I can't find the camera at the moment, so no photo yet.
A quarter of the year has passed now, so I'll be flashing my stash again at the end of the holidays to check my destashing progress.
Mnz

February

 The February addition to my stash is shawl-yarn. The blue yarn is for an Echo shawl, something I'd like to knit this Summer in Spain, where I'll have the time needed for the lacework. Lace is also the right temperature scale for an Andalusian Summer...











For the other yarn I've already started the project. It's going to be a Wingspan shawl, warm enough for the colder weather that can still come in Spring, and easy enough to finish before it gets to warm to wear it this year.

 

 The rainbow puerperium cardigan has been finished and I just love it. Rainbow colours are one of my favourite colour schemes and baby clothes are just so sweet.

The other baby things have also been finished. The  hat was a quick and easy knit, the baby shoes were a bit more complicated and they're not absolutely perfect, but they sill look really cute :)

The burgundy socks are also finished. They're not spectacular, but they're finished. I'll be knitting a second, longer pair for my mother, because she loves the colours...







Mnz

Rainbow babies

Last day of the half-term break, so it's time of an update.
I've been way off my 3-WIP's-at-a-time target these last weeks, because of the birth of two babies...
The first one is a Canadian baby girl called Charlotte. She's going to get a rainbow puerperium cardigan, knitted with the yarn I had left over from the rainbow blanket.

As parents tend to get loads of stuff for newborn babies, I decided to knit the cardi with two strands of yarn on 6.5 mm needles. The downside of the rainbow stripes is that every change in colour creates more end that have to be sewn in... Apart from that tedious job, it's proving a very simple and beautiful pattern!

 The second baby is a little boy called Leon. He'll be getting a pair of little shoes, made with the leftover yarn from the rainbow socks. I wanted to knit another pair of those socks, but they'll have to wait for a while, until I find some more multicoloured yarn, as the little hat I've got planned for this baby will probably use up all I've got left... The pattern is 'Saartjes Bootees', which I found on Ravelry.

 

I also finally got round to blocking the autumn shawl. It's now huge, which I like because it gives you more ways to ware it. Blocking that also hugely helped the stitch definition of the pattern reach it's full potential. I've also started my next pair of socks, for the mindless knitting I needed during the first few days of the break.I should finish them this week, they'll be perfect to take to school and finish during the breaks... 

I've also finished my Safire shrug. I knitted it in a smaller size than it should be, and it was still a bit too big to wear it normally. So, instead of frogging it, I sewed the ribbing part closed (leaving the buttons on, I love them) and sewed it up a little further to make the neck smaller, to make it a better fit. It fits fine now and as I loved the pattern and the detailing given by the buttons I think I might knit another one someday... The lovely squishyness and softness of the yarn and it's wonderful smell make this cardi feel superb. :)

My last WIP isn't really a knitting WIP. My grandmother is knitting a garter stitch blanket, and it's my job to combine the colours and to do the seaming and blocking. Seaming isn't usually my favourite part of the knitting experience, but I find that, once you get started, it gets quite enjoyable. The seaming adventure begins! There are lots of different coloured squares, so I don't know how the whole thing will look with all the colours, but I suppose clashing colours aren't that much of a problem. I'm sure it'll be a snug blanket :)

Mnz

January

Last day of the month today, so I thought I'd update.

First: yarn.

Added to the stash: 5 skeins of Rowan Tapestry I picked up half price in the last few days of the sales and 2 skeins of yarn from the 'Workshop' , a new little shop that sells material and some yarn and that also organises workshops. I got a voucher for Christmas and decided make the most of the last day of the 30% off sale :).





Out of the stash: the last of the Rowan Colourscape Chunky and a load of green yarn. 2-and-a-bit skeins of acrylic from Wibra, one of Katia Promo Fin and 3 different sized balls of unidentified yarn.

My stash now looks like this:







Next: projects.

The centre square of the green blanket is finished and has been blocked. It is now ready to have another band of squares sewn round it, but I'm not sure whether to add them straight away or to do a dark border first, then sew on the next band and then do the outside border in the same colour as the inside one. Actually, I think I'll probably do that. The blanket is a scrap blanket with lots of different colours, so it'll be good to have something that binds it together as a whole.

Inspired by Stichnerd's wave cowl I decided to use up the last skein of Colourscape to knit myself one of these. The pattern is really nice to knit and easy to memorise, but I'm not sure about the length of it. I like cowls to either be short enough to wear in one layer close to my skin or to be long enough to wrap around two (or three) times. This one is slightly to long to wear singly, but also slightly to short to have a nice drape when worn double... I just hope it'll give a little with some slight blocking...

The yarnbomb is growing some more flowers and is starting to look nicer, but there's still a way to go...



Mnz

The finishing touches

The slow start of the winter term has given me some time to put the finishing touches to a few projects that had reached the 90% mark.

The Annis shawlette has been blocked and the two ends have been woven in. I myself am not the shoulderette type - I prefer big shawls- but my mother is very happy with it.

This silver cardi has been on the 'to be finished'-stack for some time, but I had a hard time finding the right buttons for it. This was mainly due to the buttonholes being rather big in comparison with the lightness of the fabric. I have no idea what yarn it is because I picked it up from the pile of yarn my LYS gifted to the yarnbombing project. I initially planned to use it for my yarnbomb but never got round to it. After the do I decided that it would probably make a nice light cardigan for wear during spring and autumn. The pattern is 'Gilet court d'été' with buttons all the way down.

 

The colourscape cardi has also had it's buttons sewn on. As I've said before, I think this yarn is vastly overpriced,  but it has made an incredibly warm and soft jumper that I'm over the moon with. I always have trouble finding warm jumpers that could be worn with a skirt and because it's a cardigan model it doesn't look all that bad, I must say. The colours are just marvelous.

The next yarnbomb has also been started. I've got a place in mind for it, but I think I'll wait until the weather clear up to put it there. The basic structure is a boring-coloured granny stripe tube, but I want to cover it in crochet flowers in lots of nice colours. I've still got bits and bobs left from the patchwork bag, so I'll be able to put them to good use. Looking at the photos now it doesn't look like the most beautiful of yarnbombs, but that should change soon enough... I'd like to put it out in May, so it can be called 'May flowers' as in 'April showers bring May flowers' :)

As part of my new year's resolutions, I'm using up a variety of green yarns by crocheting another blanket. (I have absolutely no idea where it's going to go) The middle section is now sewn up, but there are a lot more squares to make and sew... But who cares? Aren't blankets supposed to be long term projects?

My last FO -as usual- is a pair of socks. These are the toe-ups I started in the Christmas holiday. Having worn them once I find that the short-row heel isn't as comfortable as the usual heel-flap-heel, but it's not that they're uncomfortable or anything. The long ribbed calf holds them up nicely, so at least they don't sag like other long socks tend to do.

I've got a few more WIP's on the needles (a cowl and some mittens) but so far I'm managing to keep to the 3-WIP-target I set myself. :)
Mnz