French Market Bag

From this to this! My take on the French Market Bag on Ravelry - knitted in lopi. It's come out rather more square than I thought it would, but I like it anyway! Now I just need to find something to do with it! But it's certainly eating into my stash (which is good...)

Getting to the sole of it

I love warm chunky knitted socks to slip on in the evenings and relax round the house in. But I wear holes in the heels. I have darned the socks twice. And there are more holes in the heels. So they sat in the basket for ages looking forlorn. And I had an idea... maybe I could use the sleeves of a jumper I felted by accident to make felt soles that I could sew on ....? Yep it works! So now have double thickness soles and hopefully a darnfree winter ...

Absorba to the rescue!

I bought this cotton almost two years ago now. I can remember it was an impulse buy at a fancy yarn store nearby me and felt guilty about buying it, all the way home. Then I started knitting it up. It was horrid. The pattern was probably only okay for an anorexic model, it made me look like a demented Michelin man. So I ripped it out, and knitted it into a lace pattern shawl. But it never got used, I mean who would use a chunky cotton shawl? So it sat in the spare room and made me feel bad. Then on day on Ravelry I saw that someone had used this same cotton (Araucania Patagonia) for Absorba the Great Bathmat from Mason-Dixon. Wow we thought, that would be cheery. And so it was. A quick knit on on 10mm pins and three strands at a time, and some left over for a washcloth and scrubby too. So now I have a soft and cheering bathmat. Me like.

Second summer instalment

The nephew gets introduced to the fine art of holding a hank ... ah childhood memories!! Other holiday pics are the sea pinks which clung to the rocks and edges all over, the amazing shapes of the Giant's Causeway, and the start of Absorba the Great Bathmat - think I have finally found something to do with that Araucania yarn. Yes it will be the most expensive bathmat ever but at least having ripped it out twice already I'll hopefully get some use out of it. Another hot summer day here and I'm bushed again, but hey two blogs in a row!

Summer!

Is here! A gorgeous couple of days to brighten us all up - and exhaust us in this heat too of course... So I thought it was about time I updated this blog. April was very busy workwise and on May I went to Donegal for a holiday but got ill so ended up recuperating at my sister's (and getting introduced to the wonders of facebook...) so have just come back to my flat and am trying to tidy up today. Nice 15 minute spurts of course, which means I can have wee rests and do things like the blog update and all the other online time eaters. I'll dip in and out with some pics too though. Kinnagoe Bay, Inishowen, Donegal / Gran's new socks! / Sunset at Giant's Causeway, Antrim / On the beach / And the glorious meringues at the Sandhead cafe in Dumfries & Galloway!