DH's two favourite ladies model the Flower Basket Shawl

DH will be in passion overdrive when he sees this post!

His two favourite heart-throbs in one posting, hee hee.

One is Caitlin Fitzgerald, Pam Allen's daughter, whom you will doubtless recognise from many an Interweave publication and one is li'l ole me looking coy in my stunning new shawl.

Plenty of pics and specs to come in the next few days, but for now I'll leave this uncluttered for J to feast his eyes.

Falling in Love Lace Scarf

Thank you for your kind comments about the shopping bag and the lacy gloves.
My next FO is the Falling in Love Lace Scarf by Evelyn Clark at Fibertrends. I bought the pattern from Get Knitted
and thoroughly enjoyed making it. Although I occasionally hand to tink back a few stitches and the odd row, it was a lot easier to keep control of 41 stitches than the usual 250+ or 300 you usually have to tame when doing this designer's shawls. (Trust me on this one, I'm approaching the edging on a largish Flower Basket Shawl.)
The yarn is Jamieson's Shetland Spindrift in colour Cherry. Not all of the pictures show it, but Cherry is a good name, it's a nice rich pink and I was left with about one metre of the third ball after the picot edgings, so I was pleased my arithmetic worked out.

Bought the yarn in the Wool & Needlecraft Centre in Argyll Square, Oban, after checking in for the Mull ferry crossing.

Felt a bit funny doing a garter stitch-based lace, and I kept wondering why she'd gone for that, but the design pops out nicely plus it lies good and flat, it could be that.
You do a provisional cast-on at the centre then knit side one and go back and do the second side identically so that the hearts are falling downwards on each side.
This has been the nicest week of weather of the summer so far- must knit pure wool Shetland scarves more often. :-)

I forgot the freakin' rose!

In the first picture we have my version of the Falling in Love Lace scarf, done in Jamieson's Shetland Spindrift.

In the second, the publicity shot.

I must have subconsciously been copying the picture as it appears on the pattern.

Of course, I forgot the rose, which is okay as I may have been taking the imitation=flattery thing a bit far.

Crochet shopping bag

Here's something I finished off on holiday- a bag made from my haul of Sirdar Indigo cotton yarn I got at the SECC in 2005- I'm slowly but surely working my way through it.

This took 3 balls of the Dark Denim shade and one ball of Light Denim. I hadn't really planned on having the light colour up at the top again but the fact that I was on Mull and my stash was in Glasgow meant that I had to tweak my plans a bit.

It really wasn't a problem with this style of bag, but I really must start to make sure I have the right stitch count after each row. I think I am not stitching into the last stitch of each row on a consistent basis. It probably looks pretty much deliberate because of the way the handles pull the top in, but the pieces are parallelograms, not rectangles as originally planned. Edit- not parallelograms- trapeziums/ trapezia?

The handles are Rowan bamboo ones. The denim yarn is starting to take on that weathered look after a vigorous 60 degree wash.
Nice for swanning around the town shopping with. Happy crafting. x K

I left a generous opening unsewn at the side of the bag, so it had a nice wide mouth for all the essentials.

Close-up of the crochet fabric- I call these trebles, what do you call them?

Crochet shopping bag

Simply Lovely Lace Gloves

Sound a big hit for myself in the title, don't I?

Just because these are actually the Simply Lovely Lace Socks from Interweave Knits Spring 2006.

They started off life last summer as the socks in question. I knitted the "legs" of both, they languished in a basket for months, and then were re-discovered this spring when I decided that I would convert them into fingerless gloves.

I always wear pink lacy gloves with jeans and walking boots, don't you? I was making the most of a brief dry spell to take outdoor pictures.

Don't ask me how I adapted the pattern it was "do this, fudge that, make it happen".

The pattern is very nice, but rather sloooow because you're always knitting into the back of each plain stitch, which is probably why they never made the final cut as socks for me.

Here they are on the "distressed" picnic table of our holiday cottage. I'll tell you , the table wasn't the only one distressed at the grotty cottage, but I digress.

They were made from a dusky pink colour of Opal Uni which I bought from Get Knitted last spring. I feel a bit like Fagin from Oliver when wearing them, but they're nice gloves nonetheless. x K

Been fishin' !

Hi there, I've missed you!

Safely back from our island adventures now.
Had a nice holiday, although the accommodation was a let-down and to be honest the weather wasn't up to much either.

We did manage to get out and about every single day, such as on a boat trip to the Treshnish Isles where we spotted this fine specimen who had caught some yummy sand eels for tea. (I love the way they are always laid out in such an orderly fashion in their beaks.) There are loads of puffins on Lunga and we took dozens of photos of them so that at least some of them would be good.

Also knitted or crocheted every single day, so I've got a few things to show you once I'm organised.

Off to read the blogs now. Call back in a couple of days for more details and pix. K x