Northing ventured, nothing gained...

...especially when it comes to hats, apparently!




Pattern: Druidess Beret, by Anna Bright. Knitted out of half a ball of Bendigo Woollen Mills Rustic 8ply (Midnight Tweed), on 4.5mm circular/dpns.

Colour commentary: Hurrah, I knitted a beret that doesn't look look stupid on me! As previously mentioned, I had reservations about starting this one. It was obviously a gorgeous pattern, but I don't have a history of looking good in berets. Really, this looks to me more like a tam than a beret, and perhaps this is why it doesn't suffer from beret-on-Anna's-head syndrome. Either way, I'm happy with it! And I finished it just in time for the cold snap that has suddenly hit Melbourne.




This is a really well written pattern, and given how beautiful the end result is, I'm amazed that more people on Ravelry haven't made it. That said, it was rather time consuming for a hat, though it would probably go more quickly if the cabling was worked without a cable needle (I have, ahem, not mastered that technique yet - or rather I am yet to find a way that I am comfortable with). At first I wasn't entirely convinced that the finished product was worth the time that it took me, but I think I'm convinced now.

The only changes I made was to omit the bobble from the top of the centre (for no real reason other than laziness, to be honest), and to work the bobbles in the pattern a little differently than prescribed - the method I used made them bigger, and a little more defined.

I also loved the yarn - BWM yarn is awesome, and every time I use it I can't help but feel that I should use it more often. It's so great for the price (and yes, observant readers, you are correct - this is the same yarn I used for my sleevesless pullover last post).

In other news, thanks to everyone who said nice things about the pattern in the last post - I've been thrilled with all of the positive feedback! In other project news, my Kypria raglan shrug is coming along well, if a little idiosyncratically. And now that this hat is off the needles, I can finally start putting some more work into The Boy's (now much needed - see previous comment about the cold snap) scarf. He gets a scarf. I have something new to knit on the train. Everyone wins.

And now I need to go and feed the cats. Five more days of house-sitting to go - I'm not sure if I'll miss them or just be relieved that they're no longer wrecking havoc on my possessions. These guys are constantly treading the line between cute and infuritating, and sometimes I really can't tell what side they're walking on.



(looks cute, but is pure mischief and evil, I swear. Then again, he is a cat....)

Potentially nonsensical...

Okay - there is a very real chance that this post will not make a great deal of sense, because approximately five minutes ago, I was asleep. Ahh, the wonder that is exam period. Mind you, why I'm bothering to nap at 11:42pm instead of just going to bed is anybody's guess...

At any rate, I'm still busy, but definitely alive and kicking. Without the kicking part though. And I am posting for a reason - it isn't procrastination alone that's fuelling me. Because behold, I finished my second Terra:

And this would be: Terra, by Jacqueline Landry. Size XS (32"), knitted with several inches of negative ease, on 6mm needles. Used 3 balls of Bendigo Woollen Mills Rustic 12ply (in colour "Red Currant"). No significant mods to speak of.

The part where I blather: I love this pattern, and I honestly don't know why more people haven't made it. It's easy, ridiculously fast, and the end product is awesome. The pattern suggests you pick a size with several inches of positive ease, and for my first Terra, that was what I did. The fit was good (and indeed I still love this jumper dearly and wear it several times a week), but because of the loose gauge, it stretched a little over time. It got me wondering about what the next size down would look like, so I figured that I'd find out.

It's always a little bit nerve racking knitting garments with negative ease, because they always look far too small before they're seamed and blocked. But this, as you can see, came out just fine in the end. It's rather close fitting at the moment, but I'm counting on it stretching a little like the last one did, so it should ease up a bit. I'm not complaining either way.


I'm very enamoured with the colour. Admittedly it does have a bit of a Little Red Riding Hood vibe to it, but red is really nice to wear in winter, and I can't quite bring myself to feel that the hood is anything less than awesome. It's lovely and warm too - I wore it out and about yesterday, and was perfectly toasty despite winter having well and truly set in. If we're being nit picky, some of seaming really could have been better - especially around the sleeves. And the armholes are a fraction too tight in this size. But I'm really having to scrape the bottom of the barrel, complaint wise. I'm really happy with how this turned out, and I plan to wear it quite thoroughly to death over the next while. Now I just need to convince myself not to order the yarn to make another. Given the fact that this is so quick to make, costs under $30AUS to make, and yields such a good result, I'm probably in severe danger on this front...

I have things to keep me occupied though. The yarn for my Sylvi finally arrived, so I'm swatching away busily on that:

That's rather a lot of yarn - I'll be busy indeed. And, you know, with exams. Those as well...

Proof that I'm still here!

Wow - that was a comparatively long break! I have been doing things, I swear. It's just that things have been taking a bit longer than usual. There have been a few social woes (who doesn't love an ex-husband spamming their phone 14 times a day? And at 2am no less, but this isn't the time and place to complain about that), and I'm working nearly full-time at my job at the moment, and that has meant cutting back on knitting/blogging time. And I wasn't always in the mood either. While I wasn't directly affected by the bush-fires that have been doing their best to demolish my state over the last week, I know people who lost homes, friends, and family members, and it's hard to sit still and knit when you're worrying/reading the headlines in disbelief...

But, all that said, I have been knitting away. Behold, I have two finished objects to prove it!




Number One: Terra by Jacquelyn Landry, in Bendigo Woollen Mills Rustic 12ply (Green Tweed), knitted on 6mm needles.

There aren't really any halfway decent photos of this one, due to a number of factors (specially a 5am bedtime, followed by a 9am call summoning me unexpectedly into work, followed by a work day that lasted until 9pm). So you'll have to live with this one! At least you get a taste of why my blog is titled as it is - and that's only half of one wall!

This was a fantastically quick jumper, and I was happy with how it turned out. If I did it over again I'd probably make the body just a little less baggy, and the sleeves quite a bit less baggy, but that's not to say that I'm unhappy with how it turned out. It'll be fantastic for when winter rolls around. I love the colour - it's somewhere in between dark green and teal, and the yarn was lovely and quite inexpensive. The pattern was good too - there were a few ambiguities around the hood/shoulder grafting, but applying common sense I managed to puzzle my way through and I'm sure that most others could too. I love the moss stitch and the large, pointy hood.



I'm almost tempted to make another one of these, actually.
(my, my Blogger - why are you being so cranky tonight when I try to post pictures!?!)



Number Two: The Cream of Spinach Scarf (Ravelry link here), in Noro Silk Garden (Colour 244), knitted on 5.5mm needles.

Not that much to say about this one really. I love it of course, but things knitted in Noro tend to look good because they're knitted in Noro, not because of anything that you did! That said, the pattern was great - it's a two row repeat, and one of those rows is just purling, so I didn't need to concentrate on it at all (indeed, I managed to watch a great many episodes of Skins while knitting it), but it looks lovely when blocked out. I think a version in a plain yarn would look beautiful too.

This yarn had been kicking around my room for ages. I bought it because I simply couldn't walk past the colours, but I wasn't really sure what to do with it, because I idealised it so much that no project seemed good enough. Then I had a reality check and decided to make a scarf, since at least that way I'd get to actually see the colours, and it's something that I'll get plenty of wear out of.

I was a little worried about the length - I hate stingily short scarves and I only had three balls of yarn. But I knitted at a fairly loose gauge, so this came out plenty long enough. I didn't measure it (my sewing tape measure wasn't even long enough), but if I hold one end in my upstretched arm, the other end still pools on the floor, and I'm not too far shy of six feet tall. So not a stingy scarf at all ;)

And now it's back to project limbo. I hate limbo. I'm currently swatching for some potential projects I have in mind, but I think I really need to raid my Ravelry queue as well. What a horrible problem to have...

Insomnia and knitting

Well, still here, and still mostly sane, even though wedding is now 10 days away (it's a little scary to think of it in terms of days instead of weeks/months/>year. It's all going more or less to plan, though I'm wishing that everyone would stop trying to plan things to within an inch of their lives. I'm not so big on that kind of formal rigidity at social gatherings; I like people to be able to wander around and do what they like. Oh well, I'm sure people will do that anyway, whether they've been told otherwise or not (or all the people I know will anyway).

Anyway Anna, put a sock in it. Wedding gas-bagging is for other blog, not this one.

Decided to make a Lelah top (http://knittingforboozehags.com/freebirds/lelah-top) with my Bendigo Woollen Mills cotton yarn; it seems a pretty straightforward pattern, and some of the versions on Ravelry look so awesome. The light purple is a little bit girly by my standards, but maybe that's not a bad thing for a change (one can't live in jeans and baggy t-shirt all the time... or at least not without being mistaken for a guy from a distance when you're as tall as I am...).

Anyway, top is coming along swimmingly, albeit a little slowly since I'm knitting in a much smaller gauge. Still, I've had a bit of insomnia (probably due to wedding) the last few nights, so that's helping it along a bit. No photos yet, because my digital camera is out of batteries and I can't find new ones. So there...

Now, off to be a good girl and write my essay, even though I'm so screwed with it that it really is quite hilarious...

I survived!

Hurray, the big nasty pieces of assessment are over and done with.


Now it's just one more smaller essay to do, and I'm free...


Except I have a sneaking suspicion that freedom will involve remembering the fact that I'm getting married in two weeks from today... Yet another thing that requires me being organised. And in some ways this requires a worse kind of organised, because everyone is always asking me questions about stuff. Nobody asks me law questions, because they know I'll just bore them to death if they do...

Anyway, when I was literally running out the door to make the train and hand my essay in on time (late submission penalties and harsh and generally bitey), I nearly tripped over a parcel on my doorstep:

Yay! My Bendigo Woollen Mills yarn got here (which surprised me because I'm pretty sure I asked them to send it to my family's PO box, but that doesn't mean I wasn't happy to see it... It's an 8-ply 100% cotton yarn that I'm going to make something summery with, have yet to decide on what. They sent me a colour card as well, which is pretty and highly touchable. I'm liking the look of their alpaca yarn for when winter rolls around again...