Habadashery P**n

I could spend a whole day in a good dressmaking shop, handling the fabrics, drooling at buttons, salivating at trimmings, throbb- okay, I'll stop, but you know what I mean.

Well, almost as good is looking at MacCulloch & Wallis' web site. The photography is stunning!

One of their silk and velvet roses in the bridal section;



The hat blocks are so beautiful I'd like one just to look at and touch.



Go look at the bridal section and click on the flowers! Look at the buttons, and closures! Magnetic closures, leather trimmings, gasp. And the wool fabrics, so beautiful, wonderful colours, but very pricey as they are made in England.

As Brenda Dayne moaned in her blog a couple of weeks back, the UK has lost most of it's dressmaking and haberdashery outlets years ago. But, we do still have John Lewis', where you can buy fabric and notions. However there are only 25 stores in England and Scotland, (I've just been to their website and counted, more than I thought actually). But, there are none in the Southwest or Wales and you have to visit their Oxford street store in London for the greatest choice of fabrics. Some larger towns still have a fabric shop, where you will have a limited choice of buttons, including fish-eye plastic, where would we be without those, plain zips, a bit of Vilene and some velcro.

But MacCulloch's, I'm in heaven. When I get back to England that is one place on my list to visit.

I think I've done a bad thing, I was busy looking at the pictures and saving the images - JUST SO THAT I COULD SHOW YOU - but all of a sudden my browser wouldn't display any more images on their site. I guess it can tell when people are copying? Oh dear, I'm embarrassed now....

Socks and gin

I'm on a quick visit to the UK to see my old Dad and Mum and came away from their house minus my holdall. It contained the cursed socks and a litre of gin. Nuff said.

The Curse of the Sock Knitter

These have a curse on them. I completed this sock, kitchenered, didn't like the 'ears' although I slipped the end stitches over the next one in, the toe still had definite corners to it. I fancied the sock wasn't as snug as I liked them so decided to frog it and try a toe up version 4 stitches smaller. I found a few patterns with gussets which I like and need as I have a high instep so off I jolly well went.

I think it took eight attempts at the figure of 8 cast on before I a)managed it at all and b) was happy with my increasing. For some reason the increases didn't look nearly as nice and symmetrical as my decreases did. Once I got going I knit the sock up to the heel and once completed didn't like that either. It seemed too shallow. Frogged again.

I went back to knitting downwards, got most of the leg done then - I always leave a reasonable tail to mark the beginning of the rounds, one particular tail was too long so I grabbed the scissors to cut it off and cut the working yarn instead. Frog.

I got as far as turning the heel but kept looking at my gusset decreases which didn't match well enough for me. Frog. Then on Knitter's Review there was a suggestion that for ssk slipping the first stitch knitwise and the second purlwise works well - and it does!

So for the umpteenth time started again, this time to avoid the 'ears' turned the sock inside out to finish. Now I have to use a crib sheet to kitchener, it saves me time. I tried to reverse the instructions in my head, dead loss. So I re-typed the instructions substituting 'back' for 'front' and 'purl' for 'knit'. When I'd finished half the toe was okay but I must have lost track as the second half had purl bumps. I tinked back and tried again. Same result. Shit.

By then I was ready to chop it up with the scissors. I tinked back, decreased several times in the last two rows, sewed it up, said 'that will do'. Off course, it wouldn't. So after leaving it for 24 hours, I've frogged, cast on the original number of stitches as decided I preferred ever so slightly loose to ever so slightly over stretched. I'm now on the home run. On separate needles I am going to do a toe, turn it inside out and practice reverse kitchener until I get it bloody right.

It's only 02.21 ...

... I was reading an old post on Maia Spins and there was a link to Web sites as graphs
where you pop in the address of your blog and get this, Well, you won't get that picture exactly, you can get your own. On the site there are a few links which I followed as it is 02.22 now in the morning and that's how I waste my time and I got this. I can see a slight problem, just a tiny one. Over here in Euro territory, the euro symbol goes after the numbers. Do you think I should tell him? Nah.

Rain

Rain

Today, back to this.

Violets

Violets

Yesterday was sunny, dry, and to good to miss a spin on the bike, and the spring flowers had really begun to show themselves, violets everywhere.

B4 Bag

I've nearly finished the B4 Bag from Blooming Knitiot. It's so pretty. It's a comprehensive pattern with several pictures of other bags, their finished sizes and how different yarns behaved after felting. Trish sent an accompanying email with other tips and ideas from previous knitters of the bags, all very useful.



I'm using hand spun and trying to achieve as even a fabric as I can by using 2 strands of some yarns, or mixing thinner and thicker and trying get a pleasing colour mix. For the base I used 1 strand of blue, plied alpaca with one strand of merino single. They sort of cancelled one another out so I didn't repeat that blend. The dark band is two strands of merino, it is firmer, but one strand was too flimsy, I'm hoping the felting with even up the fabric, not accentuate the difference.



I just have the last 'bump' row to finish then the cord handles. Luckily I have a magic French Knitting toy and I just have to crank a handle to get yards of I-cord very quickly. Then there is the dreaded felting. I don't have much luck with felting.


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