Little Joshua's Gifts

Little Joshua arrived two weeks ago and we went over to give his parents, our good friends, his pressies:


Booties from my own pattern:

An Umbilical Cord Hat:

And a little bear, complete with matching scarf:

Joshua may be too little for them at the moment, but he'll soon grow into them.

Rainbow Bear

Another little bear, this one in Koigu:

Hes's multi-coloured and speckled! Can anyone give me some advice: do you think he needs a face? Or would it look too fussy?

Close-up of the colours:

Here's the tie I made DH a couple of weeks ago:

Yes, there's a colour join (blue to grey - I ran out of the blue, but I don't think it matters). I still have to stitch in a sliver of fabric along the neck-band, so I'll show you that another time. It's basically a slightly graduated moss stitch tube with the ends sewn up, and a stockinette neck-band. I'm quite pleased with it, and DH seems to like it, but if he doesn't like the feel of angora I'll just put it on Etsy.

I thought just I'd just show you some legwarmers I made about a year ago. I've been meaning to send them to my Sister in Edinburgh, and I'm making a pair for myself now. They look very long, but they're not when they're on, as you scrunch them up.

Finally, some peonies Alex gave me when she came for lunch last week. Aren't they beautiful? The petals look like paper.

I've got Monday Knit Night at Stash tomorrow and my own group on Tuesday!

Little Bear

Little Bear is finished!

He was very quick to knit up (I finished him earlier in the week), and I knew what to expect after having done the bunny previously.

They are both Lovable Toys by Marion Edmonds from Last Minute Hand-Knitted Gifts. On both occasions I used Blue Sky Alpacas in Sportweight and the only modification I have made is to knit the entire thing in the round. I simply can't understand why anyone would want to seam each limb, when you can just use Magic Loop and knit the entire animal in the round. Granted, when I was first told about Magic Loop I got my knickers in a twist, panicked and promised I would never try it. However, I perservered and have been using the technique ever since.

Little Bear will make a great present for someone.

Now I know it looks like it's snowed here in Brook Green, but look closer...


It's just the blossom. This happens every March and it wows me every time. I'm guessing this is apple blossom because of the colour (possibly plum) but I'll never know because for some mysterious reason the trees in our street never fruit.

The pink cherry blossom hasn't appeared yet but it's in bud, and when that falls, we get a pink carpet lining the street (I'll show you when the time comes).

Weekend Progress

Curlicue's finally finished:

I really enjoyed it, and as my first experience of lace, it wasn't too difficult. However, it took a long time to knit up and I'm definitely having a break from lace for now! Here it is being blocked. It looks a bit wonky, but take it from me, that's just the camera angle. The colour is pure oatmeal:

As soon as I'd got that blocked, I whipped up a Ripples Beret in navy-blue (my own design) for my friend Jo. It also looks much better on that off!:

And I got started on a bear (from Lovable Toys in Last Minute Hand-knitted Gifts) to match the blanket, both of which are potentially for a friend of my friend Alex, but if she doesn't like it, I'll make her a different blanket.

I'll leave you with some Spring daffodils: