Back in Action!

It's hard to believe my last blog post was a whole six months ago!

My blogging break started off when I came home from France and was spending time with my family and friends again, and it continued because I got into the habit of not taking pictures of my knitting. I do enjoy documenting what I've knit though, and I would hope to be able to look back at projects and remember everything I've given to friends. It's also very nice to be able to read what I liked and disliked about certain projects long after I've forgotten what it was like to knit them.

So a lot of this blog is for my own benefit, but I'll try my best to make it interesting for you other readers as well!

Here's a look at what's on the needles at the moment:

Red Herring by Cookie A

This is the second of a pair of socks which have been sitting in my knitting bag for a little too long now. The beige wool is from Aldi and the red wool is a hand-dyed. I attempted to knit a lacy sock in the red wool, but it didn't show off the lace pattern at all so I decided to add in the beige and see what happened.

Before:

 After:

I'm very happy with how the two colours go together, and of course Cookie A's pattern is really pretty. Unlike Cookie, I continued the herringbone pattern all the way down the foot of the sock. It takes a lot more time, but it will be worth it for the lovely socks at the end!

Quick and Pretty Headband:

Headbands are everywhere these days! They've got the benefit of keeping your ears and forehead warm without the disadvantage of messing up your hair like a hat might. For a knitter, it takes very little wool and very little time to whip one up, and the versions in the shops seem to be easy to copy. This project is for a friend who gave me two balls of this wool, I think it's time I gave it back to her in the form of a pretty headband.

 Aidez:

I have been eyeing this cardigan up for ages now, and I'm so glad I finally started it! It's taking me a while to get through it (I'm slow at cables), but I can see it's going to be gorgeous when it's finished! Hopefully I'll get it done before the end of the winter so it can keep me nice and toasty.

This colour is very difficult to capture, the above picture is the closest I could get. It's a deep emerald green with flecks of yellow and blue. I have no idea why it comes out so grey below!

That's all I'm working on at the moment. The few projects I have finished will be online soon. I'm looking forward to regularly updating and hopefully being a bit more productive in my knitting in future!

Woldwide Knit in Public Day

Worldwide Knit in Public day was on Saturday, and I was delighted to find out that there was a public knitting group organised in Strasbourg. I'm a bit shy about going to these things on my own, so when a friend asked if I wanted to meet up on Saturday I suggested we go to the park where the knitting was happening. She then said she had learned a few stitches over Christmas and had already knit a garter stitch scarf, but gave up soon after that. So I brought her a pair of needles and she got to work!

Because I'm shy, we decided to sit on a bench at first and watch the group to suss out if they all knew each other or if they were welcoming newbies as well. We were working up the courage to go over when a girl approached us and asked in English if we'd like to join. Somebody had heard my friend and I speaking English as they passed and the group got a girl who studies English to ask us to join. It was so nice how they went out of their way like that to include us.

So we sat down and chatted for a few hours. It makes such a difference to have company while you knit. I don't have friends who knit so I usually do it on my own in front of a knitting podcast or an episode of White Collar. I maybe should have brought something simpler than my colourwork socks: I got distracted from the pattern a lot, and ended up making more mistakes while chatting than I ever did on my own!

I was a great day out and the ladies from the Strasknitting group are so friendly! I'm disappointed I only joined them a few days before I leave for good, but I'm so glad I found out how nice it is to be part of a knitting group. I'll be much less shy to join one in Dublin!

I forgot to bring my camera, but I took a few photos with my phone:

As I said, I won't be able to join them at their next meeting as my time in Strasbourg is coming to an end. Today I will be packing, tonight my dad and brother arrive and tomorrow we'll set off through the Black Forest region (and Paris on the way home).

Ribbit!

Sometimes we have to frog a project we're currently working on. A lot of the time it's a very hard thing to do - when it's a project you can't wait to finish or have invested a lot of time into. Other times it's not so hard.


Today, for the first time ever, I was excited to frog a project. From the very start I was unsure of what I wanted to do with the yarn. It was my first variegated sock yarn and I couldn't decide on a way to show off the yarn and the pattern at the same time. 

I picked a lacy pattern and got to work, only to find that the colours were hidden by the pattern and the pattern was hidden by the colours! I could tell it wasn't going to work shortly after starting, so I took some pictures and decided to sleep on it before frogging.

I knew this pattern wasn't right for the yarn, but I had no idea which pattern would be. Little did I know my answer would come to me that night. In my dreams I was knitting colourwork socks! I could not believe it, my subconscious had helped me out of my knitting dilemma. Colourwork socks would be perfect! Why not pair the red yarn up with another colour and knit a pattern which will both show off the colours of the yarn and break up any pooling which might have occurred?


I got to work straight away and remembered a pattern I had been wanting to knit for a while. And so I present to you the very beginnings of my new favourite socks: Red Herring by Cookie A

The Harry Potter House Cup

In my last post I mentioned the Harry Potter House Cup on Ravelry, but the post was already so long I couldn't really go into detail about why I signed up, what I'm making or how it's going so far.


I can't remember how I found out about the House Cup, but I know it was right before sign-ups for this term began. Each term is three months long, and every student must turn in at least one finished item per month. As I'm spending the summer at home while most of my friends will be abroad, I figured I'd have plenty of free time to contribute to my team's efforts.


May was my exam month so I didn't have a lot of time for knitting. I did manage to finish a pair of socks just in time to submit them and I'm delighted with how they turned out.

I could only spend half an hour knitting here and there during exams, so the first sock took me three weeks to finish. After my exams I had one week left to knit an entire sock, and to my surprise, I managed to finish it just in time.

For the next two months, I imagine I'll have a lot more free time to knit, and I'd like to turn in more than just one project per month. 

I'm back, and it's SUMMER!

It's been over a month since my last post! Here's what I've been up to (skip to the end for knitting!):

Exams

For the past month, my life was taken over by end-of-year exams. A lot of them were oral exams, which means you don't have time to sit and think about the answer because the teacher is right there waiting for you to say something! On top of that, they were all in French, a language I've just about got used to speaking after a year of living here. My last exam was on Friday, which means I am now on my summer holidays!

Beach

If you know Strasbourg, you'll know that it's an inland city on the border between France and Germany. It's not by the sea so I didn't expect my summer adventures to be on the shore. However, when I got here I found out that there's a beach by a lake. I even hear the sand is imported from the Mediterranean...

Cycling

A few months ago the back wheel of my bike was stolen, and I realised just how much longer it takes to walk everywhere! I took the opportunity to give my bike a little makeover:

I took it for its first big outing yesterday: a 30km cycle through the French countryside.

I took this photo while I was riding my bike. Wheeeeeee!

It was a lovely way to spend a beautiful day.

And of course... knitting!

During exam time I haven't been knitting as much as usual, but I did find a bit of time every day to keep it going. First of all, my Lala's Simple Shawl has taken a backseat. I still like it and I looking forward to finishing it, but for the moment I'm more excited about other projects.

I've been admiring cabled patterns forever, and as I plan to knit the Aidez cardigan soon, I thought I should learn how cables are done. I picked out some bulky yarn which I bought from a bargain bin and got started on a pair of Bella's Mittens. I don't have much interest in Twilight, but I do think the mittens are adorable! I overestimated how much wool I had, and had to frog and start over with a shorter wrist. I ran out of wool when I got about three-quarters of the way through the thumb, so the mittens are now in time-out while I try to figure out the best way to finish them.

Since finishing my boyfriend's socks I've been wanting to make a pair for myself. I had a bit of trouble with ladders on my DPNs and when I heard about magic looping I couldn't wait to try it out. I took a walk into town to see what kind of sock wool I could find, and I found some of my favourite colours ever. I spent about ten minutes looking at them, trying to decide which one I wanted. I settled on a beautiful greenish-turquoise, a colour called "eau vive", which is French for running water (the outdoor kind, not the kitchen sink kind!). With this wool I'm making myself a pair of Spring Forward socks.

These socks are for the Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup. For anyone who hasn't heard of it yet, it's a really fun way to motivate yourself to be creative with your knitting, crocheting and spinning. It's also a serious motivator to finish your projects on time, because if you don't hand in a project a month, you might not be allowed participate again! The socks have been going slowly due to exams, so now I have to finish a bit more than half a sock by the end of May. I think I'll make it; I have heaps of free time now that I'm on my summer holidays!

Knit and Crochet Blog Week: Highlights

When I decided to take part in this year's Knit and Crochet Blog Week, I really wanted to challenge myself to post every day of the week. I looked at the topics in advance and thought about what I'd write for each one, which is the kind of preparation I don't usually do. Unfortunately, Blog Week is happening just before my exams - exams which are entirely in French and in a strange French format which I'm really not used to. I have eight exams, a few hundred pages of revision to get through, and I'm also working a part-time job. So it's tough making time for Blog Week too.

However, I don't want to just abandon it, so I'm goin to give you a summary of what I would have written if I had had the time. 

TUESDAY - Wildcard Topic - Craft your perfect day

My perfect knitting day: I would wake up to the sun shining through my curtains. I would have a lazy breakfast with a pot of tea and would have no commitments all day to rush to. Except maybe meeting friends for a picnic or something, that would be a lovely commitment. I would finish a pair of socks in the morning and wear them straight away (they don't need to be blocked!). Then I would cast on a project I've been excited about for months and knit all day. Simple.

Once my exams are over I'm hoping I'll have plenty of time for a few perfect knitting days.

WEDNESDAY - Day Three - Your Knitting Hero

When I started knitting I had no idea there was such a huge online community of knitters. I had so much to learn. I can't remember how I came across Ravelry, but my goodness it's the best thing I've ever found on the internet! So my first knitting heroes are the founders of Ravelry, Jess and Casey, for making so much information available to us. I think without the huge database of patterns and all that information on different yarns, it would have taken me years to figure out all the stuff I've learned from the website.

My second set of knitting heroes would have to be The Knit Girllls, Leslie and Laura. They keep me company for an hour a week while I focus on my knitting. I have learned so many things from them - from interesting groups on Ravelry to various techniques (such as an Afterthought Heel). I have also become so much more interested in yarn because of them; the way they get so excited about certain yarns makes me want to try them out some day. And they spin. I had no idea that people spun before I watched The Knit Girllls and now I just want to make my own yarn too!

My knitting heroes are knitting heroes because of how easy they've made it for me to keep knitting. Thank you all!

THURSDAY - Day Four - A Knitter for All Seasons

I will most definitely be knitting this summer.

My three-week contract at work is nearly over, and while I thought it was a tester to see how I got on with a view to hiring me for the summer, it's becoming more and more apparent that they have their permanent staff and just hire poor suckers like me for three weeks when it gets busy.

Which means if I'm not re-hired, I'll be spending the summer back home in Ireland. I don't mind so much, I've only been home twice in the past year and it will be lovely to spend some time with my family and friends from home. And summer in Ireland is never too hot, so I'll be knitting comfortably all year round. I really really want an Aidez cardigan for the autumn, so I think that will be my big summer project.

My only problem with year-round knitting is that if you knit something warm and woollen in the spring, you can't wear it until it gets cold again. Which is why this time next year I think I'm going to try my hand at designing a simple motif (like the ethnic prints that are all over the high street), knitting it up in cotton and wearing it all summer long.

Knit and Crochet Blog Week : Day One - Colour Lovers

This week is the 3rd Annual Knit and Crochet Blog Week! This means that every day for an entire week, participating bloggers from all over the world will be blogging about the same topic. You an find the other participating blogs easily by searching the internet for the code of the day.  Today's topic is Colour Lovers and the code is 3KCBWDAY1; the rest of the week's topics and codes can be found here.

Some of the topics will be a challenge this week, so I'm glad to start off on one that's easy for me. I love colour. I especially love the spectacular colour palettes of certain yarn brands: the deep, rich, vibrant colours and the light, bright, fresh colours - I love them all. I could spend hours upon hours searching various online yarn stores deciding what my favourite colours are and imagining what I could make with them, but for some reason (probably the fact that I'm a cash-strapped student) I never actually buy.

What surprises me even more is that as much as I'm taken in by these colours and would love nothing more than to knit with them, when it comes to actually buying yarn for a particular project I lean towards more natural tones. I have the Aidez cardigan in my queue and plan to knit it for the autumn, but I feel like the beautiful textures will be seen so much more clearly if I knit it in beige. And anyway, Aran always looks good in naturals.


I want to buy more of those amazingly coloured yarns I spend all my time looking at, but I don't get to buy yarn often. My "stash" consists of enough Aldi yarn for three pairs of socks, and four skeins of some Bergere de France I picked up in the bargain bin. I only want to buy yarn if I'm ready to cast on for a specific project, which means I'll only buy a colour if it's perfect for a pattern I'm about to knit. The last thing I want to do to a beautiful yarn is to commit to it, then not know what to do with it and leave it sitting idly in the back of my wardrobe. Funnily enough, my unused stashed yarn is all beige or grey - this might be why I'm not so excited to knit with it!


I think this is one reason sock yarns come in more colours than any other type of yarn. It's not such a commitment to the colour if you only need one skein for a project. Also if it doesn't turn out great, the socks won't be on show as much as jumper for example (that means sweater to you Americans). It was with this logic that I took the plunge earlier today and bought my first variegated sock yarn. (If any non-knitting friends have stuck with me this far, a variegated yarn is one that changes from colour to colour as you knit.) I think a variegated yarn is a gamble: while the colours might look gorgeous on the skein, you never know exactly how they are going to look once they knit up.


I'm very cautious about picking the wrong yarn, but as soon as I saw a Three Irish Girls sock yarn in a colourway called "Maeve" I had to buy it: the yarn and my sister have the same name! It also seems to be a much more luxurious yarn than the Aldi stuff I'm used to, so I'm really looking forward to knitting her a pair of Maeve-coloured socks!


Find other Knit and Crochet Blog Week posts about Colour Lovers here.