Head Over Heels All Stars

New yarns in Head over Heels All Stars have arrived from Stylecraft. All 6 shades have been  chosen by Stylecraft Blogstars and inspired by the artist David Hockney. Earlier this year knitters and crocheter's voted in their thousands for their favourite combinations of colours to add to the yarn range. There's a post about the competition on the Stylecraft blog. I was amazed and thrilled to find out my combination was one of the winners.

Influenced by this picture on the cover of the book by Chris Stephens about the artist I chose muted shades of blue, green and a splash of pink. The picture is called 'Pool with two figures'.

Six shades from the special dk range went into my yarn combination.

Here are some details about the yarn:
75% super wash wool
25% nylon
100g ball weight
400m/437yrds
needle size 2.25mm
machine washable at 30 degrees

This is how the final 'Pool' yarn looks close up. The wool blend is durable for socks but light enough for making knitted or crochet shawls.

Below is the shawl I designed specially for Head Over Heels All Stars 'Pool'. The pattern is available from Stylecraft bricks and mortar stockists and is free with the yarn purchases.

The 6 new All Star colour combinations and designers are from top left 

Saltaire by The Twisted Yarn,  Ossie by Cherry Heart, Woldgate by Josie Kitten, 

bottom row from the left:

Pool by (yours truly) Hand Knitted Things, Splash by Zooty Owl, Red Pots by Attic 24.

Bracken, heather, moss, thistle

Bracken, Heather, Moss and Thistle are names in a yarn range called Tweedy which I've been working with to make these Simple Mittens.

The yarn is DK weight, in a mix of cotton and premium acrylic. Recommend needle size is 4mm (US 6) and comes in balls 100g / 260m length. The rich colours of blue, green, pink and purple are accented by the natural cotton thread.

I was given this sample yarn by Stylecraft, enjoyed working with it and love the colours in the range. All of the plant varieties are found on and around the croft in varying amounts some more welcome than others...

Bracken

Bracken is a plant which was growing in abundance on the croft and we've been working to control the spread of it. Happy to say I enjoyed working with this yarn colour combination. The rich brown and golden colours are very much representative of bracken as it starts to die back at this time of year. There's a definite autumnal feel to the yarn colours.

Heather

Heather is in full flower just now in August here in Scotland causing the hills to have a soft glow of purple and pink. The Tweedy yarn colours are muted and perfectly reflect the pinks and mauve's of this abundant plant.

Moss

There's no shortage of mosses on the croft due to the high rainfall and wet peaty ground we have here. The yellowy greens through to the darker olive in this yarn are a match for the mosses. Haven't seen any blue moss though. But the blues in this palette do compliment the greens.

Thistle

The thistle has long been associated with Scotland and it's history. However, along with bracken, the thistle is a plant we have been attempting to control in parts of the croft where it was taking over.  The strong bold pink in this yarn is a very good match for the thistle flower and goes well with the vibrant green. A combination I like and will look forward to wearing these mittens to brightening up a dull winters day.

A lovely yarn to work with, interesting names and bold colours...

Retro 70's Look

Continuing the theme of knitted mittens on this blog, another pair came off the needles last week. The Bunty Mitts by Ella Austin have a retro feel to the design. It was the bold flower and leaf pattern that caught my eye. Very reminiscent of the 1970's wall paper and fabrics I remember from my childhood. They also look very cheerful for these cold, dull, winter days we're having here in NW Scotland at the moment.

The pattern is well written with a chart for the colour work. I needed to watch the tension as the yarn is carried across more than five stitches in places. Also needed a fair amount of concentration. I lost the plot a few times, pulling back the stitches more than once, but it was worth the effort re-knitting. I particularly like the strip effect on the thumbs with the smaller flower detail. My Bunty Mitts project details can be found on Ravelry here.

Here's the information on the yarn I used: Yarn Stories Fine Merino 4ply 50g balls in French Navy, Cream, Burnt Sienna. 

Stylecraft Special DK Blog Tour

If you follow Let's Knit Magazine you may remember the Stylecraft Special DK Colour Competition from earlier in the year. Readers were asked to suggest a new colour for the yarn range (which already included sixty shades). A shortlist of ten colours were made and a winner chosen by public vote.

The Winner
The overall winner was Duck Egg, however, Stylecraft liked all the shortlisted colours and has put together limited edition 50g packs to be showcased at the Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace 7th -11th October 2015. 

As part of the promotion Stylecraft asked a number of bloggers to try out sample packs of the yarn and to come up with creative ideas. (See the links at the end of this post to view all the participants in the Blog Tour and for the chance to enter a yarn Giveaway).

What did I do with my samples? 
I'd recently designed a hat pattern called Pathfinder using a Fair Isle style motif. The pattern uses four colours but I wondered if I could instead use three colours to showcase the Stylecraft yarn. There were endless lovely combinations. After some time grouping different colours together I came up with the following three combinations to make three hats. I used 8 out of the 10 new colours from the range.

Duck Egg being one of my favourites, I had to choose this. Another favourite was Pistachio,  this was used in two of the hats, as a contrast colour and once as an accent colour.

I thoroughly enjoyed working with this yarn and the vibrant new colours. 

Click here for details of Pathfinder on Ravelry.

Here's a full list with links to the participants:
Jane Crowfoot 
Josie Kitten 
Emma Varnam
Crafternoon Treats 
The Twisted Yarn 
The Patchwork Heart
Le Monde de Sucrette 
Hand Knitted Things
Cherry Heart
The 8th Gem 
 
Hope you enjoy browsing the creative projects!

 

 

A Yorkshire Yarn

Having a relaxing time down in Yorkshire, drinking tea and knitting. Not only drinking 'Yorkshire' tea but knitting with yarn spun in Yorkshire too. The people at Yarn Stories have sent me some samples to try out from their mill in Huddersfield.  This small town was once at the centre of the Yorkshire woollen industry before the decline in the mid 20th century. However, there's a strong continuing tradition in the town for textiles and a resurgence of woollen products. Here's what Yarn Stories say,

"In a Yorkshire mill, steeped in history and tradition, a new brand has been created. Yarn Stories takes a unique approach to spinning, creating the highest quality yarns from superior fibres.

Our yarns have been shared with talented designers drawn from all over the world in a truly collaborative relationship. In turn, the designers have created collections of patterns unlike any other – designs that promote fashionable hand knit and crochet to a discerning audience."

Yarn Stories is currently offering a free shade card and free digital pattern until 1st July 2015. The shade cards have samples of 4ply, DK & Aran weights, in merino and fine merino with baby alpaca. Patterns feature international designers including, Carol Feller and Tanis Gray .

My yarn samples in 'Duck Egg' and 'Burnt Sienna' are fine merino 4ply. I've been working with a lot of Shetland and Blue Faced Leicester yarn recently which is very soft. But this merino is really fine and soft, it's also in a good range of colours. 

I chose to knit a pair of fingerless gloves with a simple Fair Isle motif called Junko by Katya Frankel. The pattern can also be found on Ravelry.  I knit these without printing out the instructions, just using the digital PDF version on my tablet. The pattern is very well written, nicely presented and easy to follow, also there are instructions for a matching hat. 

The finished gloves are a perfect fit and feel very comfortable. They'll be travelling back north with me, I'll probably need them, it'll be summer up in Scotland!

Socks Yarns & Travel

It was good to meet people behind the names of some favourite yarn companies at the Edinburgh Yarn Festival. I also acquired a few skeins of their 4ply/fingering weight yarn to sustain my current enthusiasm for sock knitting. They are as follows:

John Dunn-Ballam - Easyknits - Gobstoppers - Hanzo Tokyo - Hand Dyed - 75% superwash Merino, 25% Nylon

Lyndsey Roberts - The Border Tart - Blue Moon - Hand Dyed Natural Indigo - 75% Superwash BFL, 35% Nylon

Yvonne McSwinney - Dublin Dye - Swing Sock - Water Sprite 75% Merino 25% Nylon

Recently I completed a pair of the Basic Ribbed Socks by Kate Atherley. I enjoyed the simple straightforward design so much I cast on another pair of socks using this pattern in the Easyknits Hanzo Tokyo. The yarn is producing some bold broad stripes in contrasting colours of charcoal, grey, burgundy and gold. A great travel knitting project, not too much thinking and small enough to carry around.

 

Travelling Yarns Collaboration

Way back in the summer I met with Catherine Sclater of Travelling Yarns. We discussed the possibility of a knitting/yarn/pattern collaboration. Catherine has been working with the new Uist Wool Spinning Mill and has developed her own artisan hand dyed yarn. She is using fleece from a breed of sheep called Zwartbles and it has a rich dark brown/black colour. Catherine has named this yarn Black Beauly, a reference to the area where the fleece was sourced. Some of the dark yarn is spun with white Cheviot fibre which takes up the dye. The result is a lovely rich two tone colour effect, this hand dyed yarn she has named Machair.

The image shows sample skeins of the Machair hand dyed with one skein of Black Beauly. My brief was to design a hat pattern using one skein of the dark yarn and one of the hand dyed. Also there was to be a Fair Isle influence to bring out the contrast between the two yarns. 

I came up with, 'Stellar', a beanie style hat, suitable for men or women, with a Fair Isle style design made up of intersecting triangles and a solid colour crown with an optional tassel. I made the first sample using the yellow colour element forming the pattern and the darker contrast on the crown. This is shown in Catherine's Autumn Yellow hand dyed. Stellar hat pattern is now available via Ravelry.

 

Modelled here (reluctantly) by Mr Hand Knitted. He likes the hat but not being photographed.

The second hat sample was knitted with the darker colour forming the pattern element and the colour on the crown for contrast, shown here in Catherine's hand dyed Teal.

Catherine will be exhibiting her Black Beauly and Machair yarn, 'Stellar' hat knitting kits and a vast range of other knitting yarns at the Highland Wool and Textile Fair, Bishop's Palace at Eden Court, Inverness, on 18th October 10am - 4pm.