yarnstorm

Cupcakes on Sunday

I am all set up for my visit to NY in July now. I am going on a knitting and cupcake mission. As I wend my way, clutching my needles, between Purl and the Yarn Co and Knit New York, I'll be dropping in on a couple of cupcake places. So I've been emailing the lovely Rachel at cupcakestakethecake (excellent source of a good morning laugh) who tells me I should visit the Sugar Sweet Sunshine Bakery on Lexington. As someone who is dedicated enough to scoff inches of Magnolia Bakery frosting in temperatures of 36C, I pride myself on my professionalism in all kinds of tastings.

The wine trade has taught the importance of training one's palate, so we are dedicated to bun-making (sorry, no cupcakes here, only in NYC) in this house. Today, I took my Mum to the airport and when I came back there was a whirlwind in the kitchen. In the cloud of flour and icing sugar was Phoebe (aged 9) busily producing these lovelies. All by herself. So when I am too old to travel to NY, I'll be able to rely on Phoebe for a sugar-rush.

Good joke material

Beady-eyed readers may have noticed something in this photo which would be the basis of lots of playground jokes. (This is some of the yarn I plan to use to make one of those fantastic Felted Rose Bags in Vogue Knitting Winter 2004/5. I'm going to use Rowan Big Wool - but have yet to buy the colour for the flowers - can't decide on pink or red.)

For a few pictures of some finished ones look at fuzzynoodleknits photo album. I love the way that one pattern can inspire so many different finished versions.

ANYWAY, what I didn't know was that you could buy knitting needles made by Durex - like those in the picture with the original label. The possibilities for bad jokes are endless. (Click on thumbnail picture for detail).

Kureyon scarf no 4

I've been knitting this great scarf in Noro Kureyon from a pattern in the second Vogue Scarf book. It's so easy and yet so fascinating to watch the yarns change colour (it's knitted with two balls, changing over every two rows) and merge and re-emerge. This is scarf no 4 - the whole family is wrapped up in them at the moment.

Knitting, at last

Just to show that I do knit - here's the back of the lovely burgundy coloured cardigan in Kid Classic - with a detail of the bell edging.

Beaded lady

Knitting/yarn pictures in the pipeline, but to brighten up the page here's a pic of some beading I did earlier. Actually, I didn't like it too much and decided it would look better on the phrenological head than on me. There are buttons from eBay, Swarovski crystal beads and sterling silver wire. Sounds great, but I look odd with red buttons round my neck - like a sort of post-modern Frankenstein monster made by a Z-list installation artist.

Incredible but true

Just after I wrote that I could have done with some extra fingers when knitting socks, I read in Through the Looking-Glass of the sheep who knits with 14 pairs of knitting needles (Ch 5 Wool and Water).

'She was now working with fourteen pairs of needles at once, and Alice couldn't help looking at her in great astonishment.

"How can she knit with so many?" the puzzled child thought to herself. "She gets more and more like a porcupine every minute!"'

I wouldn't mind looking like a porcupine if I could knit with that many needles. (And the sheep doesn't even have fingers...).

There's a great Tenniel illustration of this - when I have worked out how to scan etc etc I'll put in on the blog.

On my needles II

I knitted my first sock last summer and haven't stopped since. At first I felt I needed a few extra fingers in order to manage all the dpns, but then I found that the number I had was sufficient. But, goodness me, the stitches are small on those thin needles and I am tall and have very large feet, so my socks take a while longer to knit than those for dainty fairy feet. Fortunately, Alice and Phoebe like wearing handmade socks and their feet are smaller than mine (and destined to stay that way it appears - lucky them), so my production level speeds up when knitting for them.

I really like the self-striping yarns. They satisfy some primeval stripy instinct in me.

These are for me - the brightest colours I could find. I'm using Opal Brazil from www.yarn-shop.co.uk/opal-yarn They have a great range of sock yarn.

Three cheers for eBay

I'm a very recent convert to eBay (never say never again) and have just moved out of a serious initial buying phase when I realised that lots of stuff doesn't have to be bought just because it's there and you like it. Duh. But these were a little bit special and could not be passed up. They are vintage AND Bakelite. I can't decide to whether to knit a cardigan to match or use them to make some sort of textile 'work of art' as my wonderfully optimistic son, Thomas, suggested I could. Bless him.

On my needles

A rather fetching number called Emmeline from Rowan Magazine 28 in Kid Silk of a delightfully quaffable burgundy colour (shade 825). With fabbydoolidoozy buttons

from Tender Buttons in New York.

Tasteful needle arrangements

Phoebe, wonderful daughter that she is, spent ages sorting out all my vintage knitting needles and came up with these great arrangements. And the joy is that they don't need watering.

*click to enlarge