instant sun top!

Ever woken up to sun, glorious sun, and wished that you had a brand-new hand-knitted top to swank around in, without actually having to knit it?

Ta da! Just overdye an old one, and swank away! Well, swank away happily until you look at the photos and realise quite how much non-toned tummy is on view. Whoops. Just as well I knitted that extra round of lace edging the first time, no? It's last year's Soleil, overdyed in violet because, well, I just couldn't get my head around that mottled ducks-egg thing that the top had going on. Whereas violet is rock. Just to make sure that no-one mistakes me for a goth, I'm being sure to accessorise with rainbow belt and scholarly own. It's a queer-tastic purple vest top, not gothy purple lace, OK?

You are all, by the way, to be admiring HOW MUCH MY HAIR HAS GROWN in the year in between, OK? It's hard work, growing my wimpy hairs, I can tell you. A full time occupation.

And then I wandered out in the gorgeous spring sunshine to This is Knit's new shop in Blackrock, to drool and admire Lisa and Jacqui's gorgeous new premises. They recognised me as soon as I went in! Even though I've been in Northern exile for so long! That's knitting community for you. The shop is absolutely lovely, and so are the Lorna's Laces yarns. I have a job now, and I had to succumb, if only for the fun of using the ball winder:

Then down to the beach for a bit to gaze over Dublin Bay into eternity, while waiting for the train. I love my city. Lorna's Laces-enabling job or not, I can't wait to be back.

Wheeee!

The sun has got her hat on

By which I mean, of course, Hurrah!

FO: Knitty's Soleil

Pattern: Soleil, from last spring's Knitty

Yarn: ggh Molina, 100% cotton, colour 05, 4.5 balls used (ca. 225 grammes)

Needles: 4 mm Addi Turbos

Pattern modifications: One extra repeat of lace along the bottom; edging on arms and neckline picked up and knit rather than crocheted, because, erm, I haven't learned to crochet. Yet. Yet!

Time sucked: About a week and a half, with a week's break in between.

What colour would you call this, then?

I'm intrigued by the yarn, rather than in love: it's soft and shiny and light, and the colours are aubergine, sky blue, turquoise, cream and mid-blue, all plied together. I thought, somehow, that when it knit up, the colours would resolve themselves, but even in a garment, they're as indetermined as ever.

I think I like this: it is, as I intended, a plain-ish, no-fireworks garment that I could even wear to an office. The fit is fabulous around the waist, perhaps a little matronly around the shoulders: if I were to knit it again, I'd decrease for the last six rows under the arms rather than increasing, and make the straps thinner. (Also, I would stand up straighter while being photographed. Good grief.)

But let us be honest with ourselves, friends: I'm not going to knit it again. Ever again. Never mind the slight mercy of the lacey edging (Felinity, it was indeed fun, though very, very easy.) Repeat to yourself over and over again, Glitz: No more stocking stitch garments, no no NO.

Oops, I laced it again

German knitting magazines are odd, odd things. You might know about Rebecca, the German knitting magazine that Debbie Stoller describes in Stitch and Bitch as being full of attractive Aryans frolicking on the beach, a snide but reasonably accurate description. Rebecca tends to simple-ish, classic designs that feature ggh yarns only, as it is the in-house magazine of the ggh yarn house. Rebecca also, I think, has a US edition, and hence an English-language following.

But there are others that are not translated, more obscure and considerably more mad. I am particularly fond of Verena, which is put out by Burda. Unlike Rebecca, Verena is not hampered by being bound to use the yarns of any one manufacturer; but still, I suppose, like any knitting magazine, it is bound to market the new yarns that are put on the market. And lord, the German market is absolutely full of crazy novelty yarns, in ever more unlikely combinations of synthetic fibres. Thus, Verena is half-full of creations like the one on the left, above, that feature more novelty yarns and plastic than you would have thought possible in one jumper, cost a fortune, and are of so astonishing a hideousness that they probably regularly feature on You Knit What? Presumably, the yarn manufacturers figure that, unless the wizards of Verena whip up a design featuring their latest crazy shiny sticky string, no-one in their right minds would buy it.

But then again, they also feature wonderful eccentric bohemian knits, the like of which you don't see elsewhere. So take, for example, the delicious little snacky jacket to the right, which, the blurb charmingly says, is designed for "desert princesses". Look at the gorgeous intricate lace! The plain-ish yarn! I have been ogling it for weeks, and yesterday... I fell. I didn't just fall into knitting yet ANOTHER lace project for myself, no; I felll into, for the first time ever, buying the original yarn specified for the project, at full price, Schoeller and Stahl's Scooter.

And lo, I suppose that the yarn manufacturers have a point, for I certainly would never have dreamed of buying this rather odd yarn otherwise: 64% cotton, 27% viscose, 9% polyamide (the colour is true in the photo of the ball, but not in the photo of the lace). It feels and looks a bit like carpet pile, with a golden shiny polyamide thread running through it, and whoever thought of designing a lace pattern with it? But I'm enjoying knitting it up, and, erm, have achieved quite a lot since yesterday. Whoops.

Thus, my friends, a double sin: not only have I not started knitting scrumptious little baby dresses with the cotton, as I said I would, but neither have I finished sewing Soleil. There is a reason for it, though: it needs to be finished with a crochet edging picked up and knit along the armholes, and no matter how I google, I cannot find instructions for how to do that. Perhaps I will have to give in and ask the Livejournal knitting community for advice; or perhaps I'll figure it out on my own somehow after all.

die Sonne kommt wieder

Greetings! I have been away in Vienna, and although I meant to do a thorough scour of the yarn shops there, I got no further than peering through the window shutters of a small yarnery late at night. The prices were in keeping with Vienna, i.e.: not small, and as you may have gathered by now, cheapness is of the essence in my yarn purchasing. Perhaps this blog should be called MiserKnits instead. Sigh.

I didn't bring knitting with me, but have been lashing into Soleil since I came back. It'll be finished by the end of the week, I hope - I most devoutly hope. I had entirely forgotten how utterly dull stocking stitch is, and even though I'm only slogging up the back of the neck at the moment, every purl row is torture. Never again.

Isn't it funny how one's idea of what is a nice garment changes once one starts knitting? At least, that's what happened to me. When I started, I wanted to knit what I saw in the shops: simple, stretchy stocking-stitch and rib knits, in this season's shape. And then, I knocked out a couple of boringly-shaped stocking-stitch jumpers, and realised that I probably never, ever wanted to knit that much predictable fabric again. Now, I find myself looking at knitwear and admiring fussy little details like fairisle, lacework, fancy shoulder shaping, neat waist details - none of which are fashionable, all of which would be both fun to knit and very instructive. Soleil is fine, it'll be a sturdy flattering vest in my wardrobe, but have I learned anything from it? No. Until I get to the crochet edging, of course.