Salted

Despite vowing not to have too many projects on the needles at any one time every now and again I put something aside for what seems like a very good reason and then it gets forgotten until I suddenly wonder whatever happen to it.  This project is one of those projects.  According to Ravelry I cast Salted by Alicia Plummer on in May 2016, long enough ago that I now have absolutely no idea why I stopped knitting it or really any idea about knitting most of it. I vaguely remember putting it aside while I was working on the lace at the top and then picking it back up a bit later to complete that and then I thought I’d put it aside again because I got bored with working the first sleeve but on picking it back up again I can see that I had only actually worked 2 rounds on the sleeve so I clearly didn’t give that a fair go!  Embarrassingly it only took me a very few days to finish off the sleeves so I’m a bit perplexed as to why I didn’t just get on and finish it 2 years ago.  Of course I hadn't noted on my project page which size I had been knitting or which needle sizes I'd gone with so a good bit of that time was spent working out what I was actually supposed to be doing which wouldn't have been a problem if I'd just got on and knit it in one hit.  Seriously, get it together 2 years ago Hannah!

Unfortunately the answer to that is lost in the mists of time but as I was looking for a quick project to fit in before the OAL started it seemed like a perfect moment to actually finish this off.  I must say that June wasn’t really the best time to be the proud owner of a newly completed sweater but the yarn (DROPS Belle) is a cotton, viscose, linen mix so not too overly warm.  The weather we have been experiencing recently has been a little….. changeable shall we say with some days managing to show case all 4 seasons in a 24 hour period so I have managed to get some wear out of it.  On the day I took these pictures we were experiencing a rather exciting thunderstorm which led to me taking this picture just as a very loud bang happened!

LOOOOOL!

There’s not really much more I can say about this, I think it was pretty straightforward to knit but I don’t remember most of it.  I know the sleeves were fine though.  I opted not to bother finishing the neckline in any way (the pattern gives you the choice) because I thought it looked fine when I tried it on and I just wanted to finally finish.  I’m really pleased with how it turned out, it’s a bit slouchy and casual but not too much so.  I like the lace at the top a lot and I’m really in love with the colour.  I think this will be a really useful in the Autumn when it’s just starting to cool down but hopefully I’ll get some use out of it on cooler evenings throughout the summer because now I’ve finally finished it I really do want to wear it!

Tilly and the Buttons Frankie T-Shirt

After a bit of waffling over whether to or not I recently bought Tilly Walnes new book Stretch.  I felt like I didn’t really need an introduction to sewing with knits, I’m already pretty competent in that area, but some of the patterns looked up my alley so I went ahead and got it.  My first project was going to be the Joni dress, a fit and flare affair with a twist in the upper front bodice, but it suddenly got really warm here and I decided that a dress with sleeves was not what I wanted so I went for the Frankie baseball T-shirt instead.

I first went about trying out the pattern in some slightly horrible red fabric that I wouldn’t be sad to lose if the size was wrong.  Unfortunately it turned out fine and now I feel compelled to actually wear it on occasion even though I don’t like it!  I have no problem with the way it looks but the fabric is really shiny and think and feels sweaty and weird.  When Stu was hanging it up to dry he commented how surprisingly heavy it was for a t-shirt, it’s really very odd.

Frankie no.2, however, is much nicer.  I chose this yellow fabric, which is described on The Textile Centre website as a sports jersey because I’m in a bit of a yellow phase at the moment.  It’s lovely and soft, smooth on the outside with a loopy texture on the inside a bit like sweatshirting but not warm at all.

I had little trouble with the construction of these tops.  I pretty much glanced at the instructions, noted the order of construction and went for it.  I’m sure the directions are brilliants and very detailed but I had no need to wade through them so I didn’t really read them.  The only issue I had is that the neckline on the yellow one is a bit puckered but that mostly happened because I did my topstitching a little further from the neckband than I normally do and I will unpick it and do it more carefully at some point when I can be bothered.  It’ll do for now.  The raglan sleeves were really easy to stick in and even the curved hem didn’t give me any trouble so I’d say that this is a really easy project that can be completed in an afternoon.  I can see me making a few of these, I think it would be especially nice under something like the Pippi pinafore I made a few weeks ago due to the slightly fitted shape.

All in all this is a nice little wardrobe builder of the type I’m sorely in need of and a few of these will certainly help towards my goal of sewing some more seperates.  Hopefully the rest of the patterns in the book will be as useful as this one but I’m already pleased I bought it.

Challenges past, present and future

Just a quick catch up post today, I've got a couple of finished projects to get up over the next few days but I thought I'd pop in with a few thoughts and plans for now.

Me Made May finished a few days ago and although I initially wasn't going to bother this year I made a last minute decision to participate.  I felt like it wasn't really too much of a challenge and that I didn't have too much to learn that hadn't already come up over the last 2 years, but I thought I'd feel left out if I didn't do it so here we are!  In a lot of ways I didn't really learn much I didn't already know, i.e I have loads of dresses and not enough separates.  This year seemed to really hammer home that point and I'm really resolved to actually deal with that situation over the coming months.  I think the weather here this May was incredibly variable so I wasn't able to coast through the month in sun dresses and little cardigans and found myself having to mix self made and shop bought separates on cooler and wet days.

This leads me nicely on to this year's Outfit Along which runs throughout June and July.  In a nutshell the idea is to knit a garment and sew another garment to make an outfit.  In previous years I've sewn dresses and knitted cardigans and made some lovely outfits (except for last year I sewed a dress, hated it and then lost all motivation to finish the coordinating cardigan) but this year I figured it would be much more useful to do a top and bottom combo.

The official patterns this year are the new pattern from Untangling Knots, Waters and the True Bias' Lander Pants.  These aren't really for me so I'm planning to knit Lycka from Knitty S/S last year and the Closet Case Patterns Ginger Jeans, although this is subject to change!  Before the OAL began I decided to try out the Ginger pattern to see how much work needed to be done in terms of fitting.  I finished that pair a couple of days ago and they are just straight up too large so I'll be trying them again in a smaller size and see if that does the trick.  If not I'll go with my plan B which is to make a Grainline Moss skirt instead and keep working on the Ginger jeans in the background until I get the fit right.

Ordinarily I like to shoot for 2 outfits during the OAL, it's 2 months long so it's doable but the next Boo Knits MKAL is happening in July and I won't be missing that so my personal OAL deadline will be the end of June.  The MKAL is entitled Dreamscape and calls for 3 colourways of fingering yarn using a mixture of solid, semi solids and speckles.  The 'official' yarn is Skein Queen Wiggle and there are some really beautiful kits available for this MKAL but I decided these were a little pricey for me so I ended up ordering this combo from Knit Picks instead.  Obviously I have no idea how this is going to turn out given that this is a mystery knit a long, but these colours are all making me happy so I'm good.

So I think that's all I've got going on knit/sewalongwise at the moment unless anyone has any recommendations!  (Seriously don't, I just can't help myself!)