It's finished! A beautiful coat for my beautiful big sister, who celebrated her birthday last week. A labour of love, as a friend aptly pointed out.
Knitted in the gorgeous Debbie Bliss Luxury Tweed Chunky yarn, I am so pleased I started knitting this in May, for completion in September. The pattern was so complicated! I was doing fine (back knitted up quickly, 6.5mm needles, my kind of knitting!) until I had to decrease for the armholes, when I just completely lost the lace pattern and the will to live at certain points. It was only through sheer willpower and the help of my friend Paula from the Harrow Knitters that I completed this at all!
I finished it off with two gorgeous vintage purple pear mother-of-pearl buttons.
Anyway, I hope my sister likes it; I thought it was perfect for walking the dog on a blustery autumnal day.
Fantastic morning this morning,cheering on the Tour of Britain, which in it's 7th stage from Bury St Edmunds to Sandringham, came through Lavenham.
Sadly we didn't get much of a glimse at the cyclists as they were soooo fast!!
I have been very productive today (of sorts!) Dominic woke early again (6am) so I made the most of the time before school to make a pumpkin and carrot soup (courtesy of half a homegrown pumkpin from Mum), clean the kitchen & hoover.
Mum and Dad popped over to supervise my sloe picking! Having been the very grateful recipient of homemade sloe gin from Mum and Dad for many a Christmas, I was keen to make my own for Christmas gifts this year. The parents were slightly concerned that what I had seen on one of my many countryside walks were not sloes, so came along to check, just to make sure I didn't poison any close friends!
Anyway, we came home with a bumper crop, Dominic even helped, and ate some along the way, though he was keener on the blackberries!!
Watch this space to see how the sloe gin progresses. I need to work out how much gin I need to buy now, although Dad has a more laissez faire attitude "You can never have too much gin, buy about 4 bottles.....!!"
Cafe Knit are delighted to now stock Jarol Pure British Wool Aran yarn! One of the first 100% pure British yarns to be commercially produced in the UK for many years (British fleeces, spun in Yorkshire) - it is utterly gorgeous! It still smells of sheep!!
It comes in 6 lovely colourways - all natural, and it would make gorgeous winter jumpers and accessories (hats, scarves etc). It is featured in this months The Knitter magazine too (issue 36), a stunning sweater design called 'Trail' by Kyoko Nakayoshi.
Well, it's been ages since I've blogged, but life has been so hectic recently! The day after the end of term we went off camping in Cornwall for 10 days or so, came home and then less than 2 days later moved home and business from Harrow to the gorgeous village of Lavenham in Suffolk.
The fun doesn't stop there, as the house we have bought has a shop attached, which is being turned into Cafe Knit! There is a lot of work to do, but we have already demolished two internal walls, so we can now begin in earnest with the shop refitting.
Here is the shop as it stands today......
The shop front is lovely, and I had a meeting with my signwriter today, which is all very exciting. It's beyond my wildest dreams to take the logo my sister in law designed for the website three years ago, to a 'real' shop front!!!. And the shop space itself is much bigger than I remembered, especially now we have taken down two partition walls. Hopefully plenty of space for a spacious cafe and enough room to display all our scrummy yarns.....
I do hope if you are visiting, or live in Suffolk, you will stop by when we are open. As well as a bite to eat and drink and browsing through all the fab things we have to offer, we will be running various classes too.
My sister kindly posted me an article by Sarah Stacey taken from 'You' Magazine (which comes with the Mail on Sunday) 15th May edition, entitled 'Cast on .....and cast away stress'
It confirms what we knitters have always known: knitting is a form of meditation, therapeutic, and a way to forget all about the problems of the day.
But it also mentioned the calming effects it can have for women with anorexia, the help it gives them in clearing their minds of eating disorder preoccupations. It shouldn't surprise me, but I guess I had just never thought about it in that context. It's a subject close to my heart as my 21 year old niece has an eating disorder, and our family is desperately worried about her. I am going to speak to my sister and pack up a knitting parcel straight away!
We have just discovered this fantastic new product for removing all the pilling and bobbles from your handknits!
Sweater Stone is a natural pumice which has the unique ability to remove pilling from knits with each sharp edge of a broken cell. It actually cuts the filament that holds the pill to the garment while the cell breaks off, removing pilling and restoring the nap on fabrics.
Sweater Stone is made in the USA in sheltered workshops for the disabled and costs just £7.80
