We had a stupendously have rain and hail storm during Youth Club last night. We were fine but there was flash flooding up the road, with several roads closed and one or two cars semi-drowned. https://tinyurl.com/y5apmqyg (Link to Facebook via "Wales Online" local paper website).
We have a scarecrow trail around town this weekend, which I suspect will suffer from the weather conditions as it's still wet and miserable this morning after the real wind and rain yesterday. We made a scarecrow in Guides on Wednesday to go outside the Scout Hut. The trail starts at the Community Garden and as it's also Worldwide Knit in Public Day some of the fellow members of the Knit and Natter group were planning to knit in the Community Garden this morning. I suspect they will now be knitting in one of the coffee shops instead.
Can you make a few scaretories and scarerightwingersingenerals? I'm sure the scouts would be up for it, all with protecting the land, Queen and Country and all that.
The Scouts haven't made a scarecrow at all, not up by the Scout Hut. Lots of the shops have, great ones in the butchers and Oxfam bookshop from our trip back from putting ours up. Nor did the other Guide group, tut tut.
The trail starts at the Community Garden and as it's also Worldwide Knit in Public Day some of the fellow members of the Knit and Natter group were planning to knit in the Community Garden this morning. I suspect they will now be knitting in one of the coffee shops instead.
Oh no, I never knew that! *Runs off to put Worldwide Knit in Public Day in diary for next year*......
We must have your sunshine rations at the moment - it's been a glorious couple of days here.
We had a lovely jaunt down to Rothesay, got ourselves ensconced in the borrowed flat (which was beautiful, and had deer in the garden), and then headed into Saint John for dinner. To say that it was excellent wouldn't begin to do it justice: we couldn't fault it at all.
We began by sharing a cheese-and-pickles board, which was interesting without being silly; then D. had the best chicken fricassee he's ever tasted, and I had equally delicious duck. The waitress apologised for a substitution on the pudding menu, but as the replacement was crème brûlée, I think they must have known I was coming. D. had a v. good lemon tart, and the whole thing, with a half-litre of white wine and a glass of red and including a tip, came to $140 (about £82). It was worth every cent.
The wedding went off very nicely: it was really a perfect day for it (18° with just a sniff of a breeze and sunny). We enjoyed singing with the local choir (D's done a couple of choral workshops with them) and everything went off very nicely.
ION, D's just informed me that Stephen Cleobury, who's retiring from King's this summer, has got a knighthood in the Birthday Honours List. Good on him!
The trail starts at the Community Garden and as it's also Worldwide Knit in Public Day some of the fellow members of the Knit and Natter group were planning to knit in the Community Garden this morning. I suspect they will now be knitting in one of the coffee shops instead.
Oh no, I never knew that! *Runs off to put Worldwide Knit in Public Day in diary for next year*......
There have been big outings down here at some times for knitting in public. I have never gone as I knit when and where I want to. A small girl in the bus was fascinated once but her mum did not know the difference between knitting and crochet.
I was on a Central Coast train once knitting a sock on four tiny double pointed needles. The elderly lady opposite was so pleased to see it that she cried. She was German and like me, had three sons for whom she once used to knit. One had just asked her for more socks and she was overjoyed as none had been made for years. I showed her my lacy socks I was wearing and she was amazed and asked for details. What she did was all plain. All this in very basic English and my remembered German.
I don’t need a day to knit in public and socks are good as they are a small project to manage.
Any chances of a pic of your lacy socks? They sound great. Plus I am most impressed that you can knit them (using 4 needles!) 0_0
My knitting is very basic, but I really enjoy it - as I enjoy my knit and natter group. I like the idea of celebrating it on a special day in public. I could set myself a challenge....like 'sit and knit in the library until at least one person comes up and talks to you.'
I have lots of lacy socks. Unfortunately when Yahoo took over Flickr I stopped using it as it was such a mess. Hearts, lace , diamonds and many more.
Double pointed needles are not really difficult. You are really only ever knitting with two needles at any one time. It just moves around and around. Some people use magic loop with a circular needle, but not for me for socks. I do use a circular needle for some jumpers, something which may be flat but has lots of stitches, hats and similar. No purl stitches in a hat knitted like that. Just knit around and around and around.
Do you belong to Ravelry? Thousands of patterns for all levels of ability and an advanced search function which works well most of the time. Free. Unfortunately it is easy to spend far too much time there.
How wonderful that you have a selection of lacy socks!
And yes, flickr has really gone downhill. I stumble along with it, but with a lot of eye-rolling, sighing and growling. I often come close to giving it up.
Thank you for pointing out that you are really only ever knitting with 2 needles when you do the socks. I have seen people use circular needles, and I can see that I might get to use them one day.
Just the other week a knitting friend introduced me to Revelry. It is amazing! What a wonderful resource... Regrettably I am already enmeshed with three or four other websites (like Ship of Fools...) and really can't squeeze in anything else.
I’m occasionally driven to circular needles for something with a great many stitches, but I find trying to knit with them is like wrestling a small python.
I tend to work exclusively with dk cotton yarn - any other fibre abrades my fingertips too much. However since I also like riotously colourful intarsia, for which it is very suitable, I can do quite a lot.
Anyone do modular knitting? My current (self-designed) project features mitres squares in place of ribbing. The diamond shape is then repeated in horizontal zigzag stripes. Colours mainly greens and turquoises with black, purple and yellow.
I can’t knit (tried many times but can’t get my head round it) but am an experienced crocheter - I make socks, shawls, clothing, toys etc. Ravelry is my go to source for patterns. Like Lothlorien, I take my projects out in public all the time, my most regular outing being to church where during the sermon I make prayer shawls as gifts for members of the congregation who are going through hard times. I’m currently finishing a circular cardigan as a gift.
My next project is a blanket for my eldest before he goes to university. I’m using the Attic24 ‘Coast’ design, I made the original blue, green and sand colour scheme for my youngest a few years ago and am making this version up using a range of dusky blues, greys and plums which I have called ‘Storm’.
They, various members of the knit and natter group, were going to knit in the community garden, but as it was distinctly wet and windy, that plan was aborted and they moved to one of the coffee shops. I haven't seen any pictures, but 11am to 12 noon is bad timing for my participation: it's just before one of my daughter's meds and when she's at her worst.
I’m occasionally driven to circular needles for something with a great many stitches, but I find trying to knit with them is like wrestling a small python.
I tend to work exclusively with dk cotton yarn - any other fibre abrades my fingertips too much. However since I also like riotously colourful intarsia, for which it is very suitable, I can do quite a lot.
Anyone do modular knitting? My current (self-designed) project features mitres squares in place of ribbing. The diamond shape is then repeated in horizontal zigzag stripes. Colours mainly greens and turquoises with black, purple and yellow.
I have a free modular knitting scarf made of triangles done on short rows. Years since I made it but people were impressed by it. Iris Schrier seems a familiar name but am not able to check right now. First family movie night in about three months is about to start. Hole I am sure the 13 yo grandson probably has seen more adult stuff than we think, we are careful what we screen. Can’t show tense stuff as son with ruined back gets tense and backpain starts.
I have a free modular knitting scarf made of triangles done on short rows. Years since I made it but people were impressed by it.
Just googled modular knitting....a lot of it is absolutely fabulous! How to you join the different segments?
That’s the joy of it - by slipping the first stitch and purling the last, you create an edge of very easily picked up stitches. Domino Knitting by Vivian Hoxbro is a short, simple introduction to the basic mitred square/triangle. But there are lots of others, introducing much more complicated shapes and designs.
The scarf I made had triangular sections. Knit across n number of stitches, turn and knit bqack. Next row the stitches are different by plus or minus one and so on. This is confusing to write but easier with it in front of yu to see. Iwill have poke around and see if I can find link to the free scarf to post here.
Uness you join groups in Ravelry, the time taken is in drooling over patterns, not discussion like SoF.
My Old Mum was an accomplished Knitter, and until comparatively recently I still had one or two pullovers she'd made in my Yoof.
Alas, the march of time, the southward progression of my Tummy, and the outward expansion of my Equator, meant that I could no longer comfortably wear them, so they were passed on to a charity shop. Hopefully, someone is still finding them as warm and comfortable as I did!
I've knitted a few modular items - the first being what the pattern called a 'capelet', in mitred squares - but which turned out to be very big (just as well, as I am rather plus-size). It took forever, and I got to hate it, but loved it once it was finished.
I once made a free-style modular, cardigan for my first grandchild, but it was not liked by his mother so I didn't repeat that experiment.
Entrelac is my favourite form of modular knitting at the moment, it is really easy, but looks quite complicated, and I love the reaction it gets!
I am contemplating making a modular jacket - for myself, so another huge project. I have had the yarn for a very long time, but have yet to pluck up the enthusiasm/courage to start it. I keep making stuff for the littlest grandchild instead.
I am also on Ravelry, as lilyofthevalley. I use it mostly to look for patterns, but also belong to a few groups. I post mostly on the Archers Listeners forum.
There is a Ship of Fools group, but it has never taken off. It was started in Dec 2007, and the last post made on it was June 2008.
That’s the joy of it - by slipping the first stitch and purling the last, you create an edge of very easily picked up stitches. Domino Knitting by Vivian Hoxbro is a short, simple introduction to the basic mitred square/triangle. But there are lots of others, introducing much more complicated shapes and designs.
Thank you, that sounds great. The Hoxbro book is a bit expensive for me, but I explored the Ravelry site, and it looks like they have a lot of patterns. There are also a couple of experienced knitters at my knit and natter group, so I am sure I could get some help from them too. Anyway this is a project for the future - but something to bear in mind...
I'm having issues signing on with this website - but hopefully they will send me an email soon. The scarf looks wonderful - and wonderfully basic too. Fingers crossed I hear from them soon
@Roseofsharon All good luck with the modular jacket. If I ever get proficient enough (my knitting is absolutely basic at the moment), I'd love to do something loose and swirly like that... Something cosy for watching television in winter.
@caroline444 - here is a simple example you could try out.
Cast on an odd number of stitches e.g. 27
Knit to the last stitch. Purl. This is a wrong side row.
Slip first stitch, knit to the centre 3 (so on a 27 st base, that’s 12 stitches altogether). Slip 1, knit 2 together, pull the slip st over. Knit to last stitch. Purl.
Slip 1. Knit to last stitch. Purl.
As previous right side row, except it will be 11 to the central decrease.
As previous wrong side row.
Keep on doing this until you have just 5 stitches, right side facing. Slip, k2together, slip st over.
I'm no knitter; the only thing I've ever knitted that was of any use was one of those Icelandic Lopi sweaters that were so "in" in the early 1980s. It was on circular needles, so all but the cuffs, neckline and hem was in plain stitches (I got my mum to do the complicated bits like arm-holes). There was a pattern, but it was quite easy to follow: you made a diamond pattern by alternating five stitches of one colour with one of another, then three and three, then five and one the opposite way round. It served me very well when I was a student in Aberdeen - it can be jolly cold there in the winter!
We celebrated Pentecost this morning with some rather decent music and all went well apart from our new deacon breaking the Holy Ghost. It was being represented by a bunch of red streamers attached to a very long, thin pole (a bit like a fishing-rod), and she was supposed to precede the choir in the procession, waving the streamer, but I think she got it caught on a rafter in the side-aisle and the streamers came off, so she ended up just waving them in her hand, which wasn't quite the effect the Dean had been after ...
HeavenlyAnnie, I'm another one who can't knit but can crochet. I find standard hooks difficult to hold these days, but I have a set of Clover Soft Touch hooks, which have flat handles and are much easier to hold.
I am currently crocheting a dog from Edward's Menagerie, but not in the wool they suggest, which is very expensive!
All this talk of modular knitting has made me wistful as I’ve had to give up knitting because of clicking fingers. However, I am now in possession of a peg loom and am looking forward to when I get some free time (probably after I’ve finished the dreaded constitution & associated documents) and can begin to experiment.
All good luck with your weaving! I've just googled peg looms. Are they specifically for carpets, or can you weave at a clothing weight too? (The carpets I saw looked lovely.)
HeavenlyAnnie, I'm another one who can't knit but can crochet. I find standard hooks difficult to hold these days, but I have a set of Clover Soft Touch hooks, which have flat handles and are much easier to hold.
I am currently crocheting a dog from Edward's Menagerie, but not in the wool they suggest, which is very expensive!
Yes, I use soft handled hooks unless I am re-enacting, when I have either bone ones or some rather nicely turned wooden ones. I’ve been crocheting a WW1 soldier’s long sock for 4 years now! The war will be ended by the time I finish it.
That book is fabulous but, as you say, their wool is appallingly expensive. I have a kit for one of their dogs that I got for Christmas, I must start it.
Lovely relaxing day today, church followed by a lazy afternoon watching The Imitation Game.
Nice day off here, country-wide. Pentecost Monday is always off. Another long weekend after Ascension Day Thursday, where many businesses are closed on Friday too. Helps bridge the holiday gap until July and August, and the summer break. Some places are even off on Corpus Christi.
Some pleasant and still very much appreciated rainfall this weekend - though organisers of seasonal outdoor events weren't exactly happy, from what I read.
Wishing everyone a good start of the week, whether knit-picking or not.
Rainy here too. I’m about to walk to the shops and then have some admin to do. I’ll do some reading this afternoon and then an end of module de-briefing meeting this evening.
My youngest starts work experience today and I always get anxious about everything out of the ordinary. We’ve done a swap with a fellow parent to get him a placement in a design company specialising in designing trade fair stands - he wants a career in computer graphics design so it should be good experience for him. His friend will be working at my husband’s tech start up.
I’m on a decluttering mission indoors ‘tho, with the ‘help’ of three big black Labs. My friend’s dog, Zaba is visiting for a week while they holiday in Montenegro.
All good luck with your weaving! I've just googled peg looms. Are they specifically for carpets, or can you weave at a clothing weight too? (The carpets I saw looked lovely.)
Thank you, it’s only 18” and is one of these, so if I get really produce price I could sew strips together to make something. But the start with it’ll be a wall hanging (or 2... or 3).
Excitement before 10, here on the edge of this sleepy country town... on my way to the dump household waste recycling centre with a trailer load of garage and garden clearance, I pulled out of my close to discover I’d got in front of a car chase . The car being chased followed me as I turned left onto a road with pedestrian islands which complicated things, but very quickly a police Range Rover pulled up in front of that car and an unmarked police car with flashing lights blocked it from behind while a police officer leapt out and opened the chased car’s driver door. I drove on so I probably will not know what that was all about unless it goes onto the local FB gossip info group.
@Boogie
Wow, all three of those dogs are drop dead gorgeous ♥ ♥ ♥. How lovely to have so many luscious canines in your life (albeit that Zaba is just visiting....)
@daisydaisy
Thank you - in fact the link wasn't working, but I saw some of the looms when I googled peg looms, and I can visualise yours as one of the smaller ones. Hopefully in future we will see the fruit of some of your labours!
And gosh, what an exciting morning!!!!
One of my local churches is the cathedral - and I've taken to going there on a regular basis. This morning I went to its offices & said I'd like to volunteer to do some cleaning. They said if I was accepted I would join their group referred to as 'the holy dusters', which I though was nice...
At Taizé one year I was in the group that had the job of hoovering the church. All their hoovers have been given delightful names like Peace and Serenity, and one great monster of a machine that goes by Misericordia.
@caroline444 said -
Wow, all three of those dogs are drop dead gorgeous ♥ ♥ ♥. How lovely to have so many luscious canines in your life (albeit that Zaba is just visiting....)
Thank you. Tatze is my pet dog, six years old. Zaba is my friend’s dog, the same age. They spend a lot of time together as we look after each other’s when we go on holiday, we also go long walks with the two dogs.
The middle dog is Spencer, my sixth Guide Dog puppy. He’s a Lab/GR cross (as most Guide Dogs are) and twelve months old. We are awaiting the call for him to go to Big School. He’s passed all his assessments and is on the list.
Comments
I assume they mean this.
Oh no, I never knew that! *Runs off to put Worldwide Knit in Public Day in diary for next year*......
We had a lovely jaunt down to Rothesay, got ourselves ensconced in the borrowed flat (which was beautiful, and had deer in the garden), and then headed into Saint John for dinner. To say that it was excellent wouldn't begin to do it justice: we couldn't fault it at all.
We began by sharing a cheese-and-pickles board, which was interesting without being silly; then D. had the best chicken fricassee he's ever tasted, and I had equally delicious duck. The waitress apologised for a substitution on the pudding menu, but as the replacement was crème brûlée, I think they must have known I was coming. D. had a v. good lemon tart, and the whole thing, with a half-litre of white wine and a glass of red and including a tip, came to $140 (about £82). It was worth every cent.
The wedding went off very nicely: it was really a perfect day for it (18° with just a sniff of a breeze and sunny). We enjoyed singing with the local choir (D's done a couple of choral workshops with them) and everything went off very nicely.
ION, D's just informed me that Stephen Cleobury, who's retiring from King's this summer, has got a knighthood in the Birthday Honours List. Good on him!
There have been big outings down here at some times for knitting in public. I have never gone as I knit when and where I want to. A small girl in the bus was fascinated once but her mum did not know the difference between knitting and crochet.
I was on a Central Coast train once knitting a sock on four tiny double pointed needles. The elderly lady opposite was so pleased to see it that she cried. She was German and like me, had three sons for whom she once used to knit. One had just asked her for more socks and she was overjoyed as none had been made for years. I showed her my lacy socks I was wearing and she was amazed and asked for details. What she did was all plain. All this in very basic English and my remembered German.
I don’t need a day to knit in public and socks are good as they are a small project to manage.
It would have been even better if they could have knit the design -- that appears to be counted cross-stitch.
Any chances of a pic of your lacy socks? They sound great. Plus I am most impressed that you can knit them (using 4 needles!) 0_0
My knitting is very basic, but I really enjoy it - as I enjoy my knit and natter group. I like the idea of celebrating it on a special day in public. I could set myself a challenge....like 'sit and knit in the library until at least one person comes up and talks to you.'
Double pointed needles are not really difficult. You are really only ever knitting with two needles at any one time. It just moves around and around. Some people use magic loop with a circular needle, but not for me for socks. I do use a circular needle for some jumpers, something which may be flat but has lots of stitches, hats and similar. No purl stitches in a hat knitted like that. Just knit around and around and around.
Do you belong to Ravelry? Thousands of patterns for all levels of ability and an advanced search function which works well most of the time. Free. Unfortunately it is easy to spend far too much time there.
How wonderful that you have a selection of lacy socks!
And yes, flickr has really gone downhill. I stumble along with it, but with a lot of eye-rolling, sighing and growling. I often come close to giving it up.
Thank you for pointing out that you are really only ever knitting with 2 needles when you do the socks. I have seen people use circular needles, and I can see that I might get to use them one day.
Just the other week a knitting friend introduced me to Revelry. It is amazing! What a wonderful resource... Regrettably I am already enmeshed with three or four other websites (like Ship of Fools...) and really can't squeeze in anything else.
I tend to work exclusively with dk cotton yarn - any other fibre abrades my fingertips too much. However since I also like riotously colourful intarsia, for which it is very suitable, I can do quite a lot.
Anyone do modular knitting? My current (self-designed) project features mitres squares in place of ribbing. The diamond shape is then repeated in horizontal zigzag stripes. Colours mainly greens and turquoises with black, purple and yellow.
*chuckle*
My next project is a blanket for my eldest before he goes to university. I’m using the Attic24 ‘Coast’ design, I made the original blue, green and sand colour scheme for my youngest a few years ago and am making this version up using a range of dusky blues, greys and plums which I have called ‘Storm’.
I have a free modular knitting scarf made of triangles done on short rows. Years since I made it but people were impressed by it. Iris Schrier seems a familiar name but am not able to check right now. First family movie night in about three months is about to start. Hole I am sure the 13 yo grandson probably has seen more adult stuff than we think, we are careful what we screen. Can’t show tense stuff as son with ruined back gets tense and backpain starts.
Just googled modular knitting....a lot of it is absolutely fabulous! How to you join the different segments?
That’s the joy of it - by slipping the first stitch and purling the last, you create an edge of very easily picked up stitches. Domino Knitting by Vivian Hoxbro is a short, simple introduction to the basic mitred square/triangle. But there are lots of others, introducing much more complicated shapes and designs.
Uness you join groups in Ravelry, the time taken is in drooling over patterns, not discussion like SoF.
Modular scarf pattern
Alas, the march of time, the southward progression of my Tummy, and the outward expansion of my Equator, meant that I could no longer comfortably wear them, so they were passed on to a charity shop. Hopefully, someone is still finding them as warm and comfortable as I did!
The Knitt Ing is a most useful imp to possess...
I once made a free-style modular, cardigan for my first grandchild, but it was not liked by his mother so I didn't repeat that experiment.
Entrelac is my favourite form of modular knitting at the moment, it is really easy, but looks quite complicated, and I love the reaction it gets!
I am contemplating making a modular jacket - for myself, so another huge project. I have had the yarn for a very long time, but have yet to pluck up the enthusiasm/courage to start it. I keep making stuff for the littlest grandchild instead.
I am also on Ravelry, as lilyofthevalley. I use it mostly to look for patterns, but also belong to a few groups. I post mostly on the Archers Listeners forum.
There is a Ship of Fools group, but it has never taken off. It was started in Dec 2007, and the last post made on it was June 2008.
Thank you, that sounds great. The Hoxbro book is a bit expensive for me, but I explored the Ravelry site, and it looks like they have a lot of patterns. There are also a couple of experienced knitters at my knit and natter group, so I am sure I could get some help from them too. Anyway this is a project for the future - but something to bear in mind...
I'm having issues signing on with this website - but hopefully they will send me an email soon. The scarf looks wonderful - and wonderfully basic too. Fingers crossed I hear from them soon
Click, click, click, click.... I'm getting that impression
Congratulations! You now have a mitred square.
We celebrated Pentecost this morning with some rather decent music and all went well apart from our new deacon breaking the Holy Ghost. It was being represented by a bunch of red streamers attached to a very long, thin pole (a bit like a fishing-rod), and she was supposed to precede the choir in the procession, waving the streamer, but I think she got it caught on a rafter in the side-aisle and the streamers came off, so she ended up just waving them in her hand, which wasn't quite the effect the Dean had been after ...
I am currently crocheting a dog from Edward's Menagerie, but not in the wool they suggest, which is very expensive!
Thank you so much! Will pluck up the courage to try and tackle it when I next meet up with my knit & natter buddies.
All good luck with your weaving! I've just googled peg looms. Are they specifically for carpets, or can you weave at a clothing weight too? (The carpets I saw looked lovely.)
That book is fabulous but, as you say, their wool is appallingly expensive. I have a kit for one of their dogs that I got for Christmas, I must start it.
Lovely relaxing day today, church followed by a lazy afternoon watching The Imitation Game.
Some pleasant and still very much appreciated rainfall this weekend - though organisers of seasonal outdoor events weren't exactly happy, from what I read.
Wishing everyone a good start of the week, whether knit-picking or not.
My youngest starts work experience today and I always get anxious about everything out of the ordinary. We’ve done a swap with a fellow parent to get him a placement in a design company specialising in designing trade fair stands - he wants a career in computer graphics design so it should be good experience for him. His friend will be working at my husband’s tech start up.
I’m on a decluttering mission indoors ‘tho, with the ‘help’ of three big black Labs. My friend’s dog, Zaba is visiting for a week while they holiday in Montenegro.
Excitement before 10, here on the edge of this sleepy country town... on my way to the dump household waste recycling centre with a trailer load of garage and garden clearance, I pulled out of my close to discover I’d got in front of a car chase
Wow, all three of those dogs are drop dead gorgeous ♥ ♥ ♥. How lovely to have so many luscious canines in your life (albeit that Zaba is just visiting....)
@daisydaisy
Thank you - in fact the link wasn't working, but I saw some of the looms when I googled peg looms, and I can visualise yours as one of the smaller ones. Hopefully in future we will see the fruit of some of your labours!
And gosh, what an exciting morning!!!!
One of my local churches is the cathedral - and I've taken to going there on a regular basis. This morning I went to its offices & said I'd like to volunteer to do some cleaning. They said if I was accepted I would join their group referred to as 'the holy dusters', which I though was nice...
Taize chants come in various languages, though a Hoover gently humming in Catalan, or Serbo-Croatian, or German, would be worth hearing.
Thank you. Tatze is my pet dog, six years old. Zaba is my friend’s dog, the same age. They spend a lot of time together as we look after each other’s when we go on holiday, we also go long walks with the two dogs.
The middle dog is Spencer, my sixth Guide Dog puppy. He’s a Lab/GR cross (as most Guide Dogs are) and twelve months old. We are awaiting the call for him to go to Big School. He’s passed all his assessments and is on the list.
His full story is here.