Shellseeker cycling hoodie or hoody - in progress!

I have made some more progress with my sweater, I am knitting Shellseeker by the talented Heidi Kirrmaier. I am using Drops Extra Fine Merino. I love this yarn, I used it for my French stripey throw and promised myself a sweater for me in it. Grey plus 8 colours, a ninth one has been rejected as being too bright. It's a superwash double knit yarn, so no hint of lanolin or itchy wool-itis, and it comes in lots of gorgeous natural shades and it is relatively affordable!

Shellseeker is a clever top down in the round construction with neat shaping...

..as you can see below, which cleverly incorporates the kangaroo pocket. Decreasing in the centre and increasing at the sides so the sticth number doesn't actually change but shaping happens! Now that pocket was a bit of a challenge, I had had flu badly and been in bed for ten whole days with no hope of knitting, and however hard I tried I could not fathom out the pocket logic. I googled and found others had the same problem. The solution...

...is to stop trying to imagine it and just follow the instructions exactly, and then it works. Even post flu befuddled brains can do it. I was so annoyed with myself as I undid it once when I had done it correctly...duh! Follow the instructions exactly as written and it works.

I am so proud of myself as, about a zillion years after everybody else, I also taught myself Magic Loop. I thought it was some extremely complicated clever technique for super advanced knitters requiring multiple classes to learn. It is extremely clever but super easy, knit anything in the round on one size circular needles. Google and watch a You Tube video for 2 minutes and anyone is an expert! I have just picked up the sleeve stitches from the holder in the pic above to knit magic loop. Now just to work out how you knit two socks at once.

The only problem with all these luscious stripes are the ends......I have sewn them all in except for the second sleeve I am just finishing off. 2 ends per colour stripe for the body and each sleeve Far wiser to use just two yarns as the pattern advises so the yarn can be carried up neatly! 156 ends, never mind a few grey ones too.....I have endititis.

French Stripey Throw - DONE!

As promised I'm back.

I finished my French Strip Throw. To be truthful I finished it back in June, and we have had a long hot summer (well for England we've had a lovely summer) and in all that good weather I never got around to photographing my dense, warm, cosy and soft French Stripey Throw! So here it is.

The story started a year ago when I splashed out on some gorgeous Garnstudio Drops Extra Fine Merino in my favourite colours, a light double knit pure merino wool. I justified the outlay as it was my birthday money. I then stashed it like a squirrel. Nothing unusual there for most knitters and hookers, but I do not store, I buy for a project and use it. I may not finish whatever it is but I always buy for a specific project and not in advance of starting, and certainly not without knowing what it is for and how much I need.

I knew I was making a throw and that was it, but the design cogitated in my head, with extensive "research" on Ravelry, aka how-to-make-an-evening-fly-past-and-achieve-nothing!! I finished my Rainbow Ripple and started and finished Cath Kidston inspired Granny and also mum's Christmas present Vintage Granny, the blanket wa vintage colours not that my mum is vintage!

Anyway, a bit more detail on how my French Stripe Throw was finally born, back in January. It seems ages ago when it rained and rained and rained for months. Here is my only update a couple of weeks later. Since then we have moved house and I've started a new full time shift-work job that is very physical. I am so ready each evening for a selfish half an hour or so of crocheting with my feet up.

As you can see in the pictures, we are getting around to doing something with our little estate garden. The vintage gazebo came from mum's garden in Cumbria 15 years ago, moved to Minchinhampton where it resided with a clematis crawling all over for 15 years, and I was determined it was coming to Bristol as there was nothing in the garden, it had to go into storage! A couple of weeks ago when I had Sunday off and it was a lovely day, the two of us dug the turf and bedded in the wood edging and bamboo strip so the grass can be mown up to the edge, and pegged down some weed matting. It's scary how much this landscaping lark costs. A huge crane lorry arrived on Friday morning and nimbly lifted a bag of slate chippings over the back wall. Then we had to wheelbarrow it round, as you can see I didn't get very far on my day off on Friday and got waylaid by photographing my blanket! it was finished yesterday though.

Anyway, back to the important things. As I explained previously, I had 9 colours and I decided on a very loose 'colour pattern' of 5 rows solid and then a variegated similar size stripe of different colours and then another solid stripe and so on and on and on. As it gets bigger you have to lug the whole blanket with you, great in winter but it gets a bit warm in summer. However, there was no joining-together-marathon either. There were a lot of ends and the ends were "dealt with" very religiously every 20 or so rows, I would lose the will to finish if I had all the ends hanging over me, literally.

The size was determined by the amount of yarn I had, early on I sent off for another 12 balls, so 40x50g balls in total approx. This pattern is yarn hungry and quite dense, I kicked myself for picking a dense design with the posh yarn. I just kept going until I reckoned I would be getting short on the border.

The border I worked by keeping the pattern the same (dc ch) and picking up down the two long edges, working a double crochet in each row and then a chain to work into on the following round with a 2 ch sp and 2 dc worked into the corners. 

 I did have a few issues with the wavy edges, and so I worked 2 decrease rounds in border rounds 2 and 5, clearly visible on the pistachio round, where I crocheted two stitches together every 10 stitches.

I didn't have the same amount of each yarn so tried to spread the colours evenly throughout, some had run out by the border.

I was a little frustrated that I had chosen a pattern that ate yarn, so it ended up a throw size for the sofa, and goes well with our soft furnishings in the living room, a cushion snuck outside to pose!! It is gorgeous yarn, but being 100% wool I will worry about it more than the Stylecraft blankets that can be abused. I have no reason to believe that the Drops yarn won't wear well, I only worry because I spent so much more on it than usual.

French Stripes Blanket finished 14th June 2013, it took me six months as I started on Boxing Day

FINISHED SIZE: 160cm x 135cm including the border that ended up as 9cm

YARN: Drops Extra Fine Merino (Light DK weight 50g balls)
#15 Light greyish green 2 balls
#19 Light grey blue       6 balls
#20 Dark blue              4 balls
#21 Purple                   4 balls
#13 Denim blue            6 balls
#14 Steel blue              6 balls
#22 Medium purple      6 balls
#26 Pistachio               6 balls
#01 Off white               2 balls

HOOK: 4mm

PATTERN: Beach Stripe Surf Blanket from Kristen's Cozy Things blog
Inspiration came from the talented Cathy at Clicky Needles which led me to Kristen's blog. Oh how time is wasted artistically inspired blog hopping!

HOOKY HAPPY INDEX: 8/10

French Stripe Throw The Beginning

Update 1

Update 2

Update 3

French Stripe Throw - the beginning

A New Year and a new project. This one I have been anticipating for some time as I bought the yarn with birthday money back in September. Choosing the yarn and then deciding what to make with it has kept my brain occupied much of the time I have spent working on my Vintage Solid Granny Throw that was finished in time for Christmas, phew!

Since rediscovering crochet and knitting in the last couple of years I have used Stylecraft Special DK for almost everything, especially crochet throws. I have loved working with it and although I am very satisfied with the look and feel, I have had a hankering to use "posh" yarn, as so many others do and somehow their projects look so special. I would love to try something like Debbie Bliss Cashmerino or Rowan Cashsoft but at over £5 for a 50g ball there is no way I could justify even hankering. However, I had seen Drops yarn, and knew their yarn was far more reasonable. When the autumn sale was announced I pounced. I purchased Drops Merino Extra Fine in 9 colours from the fantastically helpful Wool Shed. They scoured their stock, waited for a delivery to come in, and sent exactly what I needed in 2 parcels optomised for postage, 28 balls in total. I went with a mixture of blues and heathery tones reminding me of French lavender fields and the sea. 4 balls each of 5 colours and 2 balls each of 4 others. The washable yarn is so soft and 100% merino wool, a light double knit weight. It is good value at £3.10 for a 50g ball, but I managed to secure the 25% off sale price. So it is over twice the price of acrylic but not 5 times the price!

This is what I am making, stripes, lots of stripes, inspired by Clicky Needles' Beach Stripe Surf Blanket

The idea is just to keep on going as long as the yarn lasts, the pattern is 1dc 1 ch, then the next row you work the double crochet into the one chain space and then a chain, so it all interlocks and gives a lovely dense yet flexible fabric which is soft and very warm.

Garnstudio Drops Merino Extra Fine L to R: 15 Lt greyish green:14 steel blue:01 off white:22 med purple:21 purple:13 denim blue:20 dk blue:19: lt grey blue:26 pistachio

The photos are washed out, although it hasn't rained that much today we have had enough of dank, miserable and wet weather around here the past few weeks, it's hard to get decent photos even in the conservatory!

I will be back on Tuesday to restart the One a Day crochet-a-long (cal) for the New Year, this is my project. Hopefully the weather will cooperate for some much nicer photos.

I will leave you with some inspiration, Kristen's original Beach Stripe Surf Blanket from her lovely Cozy Things Blog.

Edited to add, here is my French Stripey Throw finished!