Frogging Results

The Celandine vest is now completed, with contrast trim around the neckline and armbands. I really like the way it turned out. I snapped it here before it was washed and blocked, and I shall probably wear it to work tomorrow:

And the textured baby jacket has now become a textured baby cardigan with a twist instead of miles of knitting:

Frogging Along

There's been lots of frogging at Chez Melody this week. Not only did I run out of grey yarn to finish my Celandine vest with only one armhole band to complete and had to frog the neckline trim and the one completed armband, but I also decided that I didn't want to knit seemingly miles of textured fabric to produce one small baby jacket.

I had some black country Style DK in my stash which is destined to become an Action Man hoodie for youngest son Danny, so on the advice from the members at the Crafty Threads 'n' Yarns forum I knitted the neckline and armbands in the contrast colour on the vest. It's looking pretty good with the contrast trim, and it will now be completed instead of languishing with a tidgy bit to finish and no more yarn!

I frogged the textured baby jacket in favour of a little cardigan with cabled twists. It might be knitted now instead of staying firmly shut away in the cupboard.

I've also been doing some very important stuff for me this week, but it's not knitting related. Maybe I'll tell you about that in a couple of weeks or so *wink*

Knit, Knit, Knit Like the Wind

I’m knitting like the wind at the moment ~ I have a smidge of yarn left to finish off my Louisa Harding ‘Celandine’ vest that I decided to knit in Sirdar Country Style DK instead of Kimono DK as I’m using yarn from stash.
I have to complete the shoulder and neck shaping on the second side of the neck and knit up around the neck and armholes. Will I have enough yarn to finish??

And it's really cold here today ~ brrrrrr!!

Another Baby Jacket

Yet another one of my friends is expecting a baby (in mid-February), and so out came the knitting needles again to knit the expected newborn something to wear whilst they are teeny and the weather is chilly.

I asked my friend whether she would prefer lemon or white, as she doesn't know the newborn's gender as yet. She replied that she'd like lemon, but added that she'd also like mint. As I had some very pale mint baby yarn in my baby yarn stash I cast on straight away for a little baby jacket with a collar, in a lovely textured stitch pattern which I think is suitable for either a boy or a girl:




It's lovely to knit, except at 42 rows to 10cm using double knitting yarn, there's a heck of a lot of knitting to do in such a tiny garment :-o

When I went to visit my knitting friend Wendy on Wednesday, she showed me how to crochet a square blanket. Here is my progress so far:

Progress Pics

Just a few pics to show you my knitting progress this week:

The Ocean sock, almost up to the toe on the first sock. I'm lovin' this Sockamonth Challenge, although some people have finished their first pair already!!



And my new project that I cast on yesterday for the ‘Arsenic and Old Lace' knitalong on the crafty threads 'n' yarns forum. A lacy sweater in dark red Sirdar Mohair that I dug out of my capacious stash. I'm knitting this to the tune of this Sirdar Blur mohair pattern:



In all a good week's knitting methinks, since I was back at work on Wednesday, and there were new children in the setting after the Christmas break

Oh dear, oh dear! What a plumbing disaster we had yesterday!

When John was getting boys out of the shower before bedtime, I heard a shout "Deb, I need you" The shower just wouldn't turn off and there was water gushing out of the shower head. Hot water at that. We had to turn off the water at the stopcock to stop the shower, but it meant that we had no running water at all. It was a nightmare! We couldn't flush toilets, we couldn't wash our hands, we couldn't do any dishes, nothing. Nicht. Nada. Nowt. I had to ring an emergency plumber this morning to come out to the problem, which took a whole 15 minutes to fix. How people manage without running water is beyond me, and even more so clean water. So let's not forget those people who don't even have clean, parasite-free water in which to bathe and to drink, let alone to use their bloody dishwashers and washing machines.

Okay, on with knitterly stuff. My sock progress for the Sockamonth Challenge was severely hindered last night due to my stopcock duties *roll*, and my progress thus far is this:



I'm about two thirds of the way down the cuff. I'm knitting a sock for my seven year old son on DPNs (I've given up with the bloomin' two circulars method for now) in a lovely yarn Four Seasons Hot Socks. Matthew chose the colours because they reminded him of the ocean, so they will officially be known as the ‘Ocean Socks', and rather aptly too, I feel, after last night's fiasco with water *rolls eyes again*

And progress has been made on the milk chocolate merino cardigan. After washing and blocking, and then steam pressing, the front and back of the cardigan look like this, you can just about see the sleeves blocking in the same photo:



It actually looks like I picked up the right number of stitches on the front bands now, instead of looking like I picked up too few and the cardigan fronts looking runkled up. That's because I knitted the cardigan to the tension I had after washing and steam pressing, rather than before the blocking treatment. Sneaky huh?