Giveaway!!!!!!!!!

Hi Everyone,

I and my blog are celebrating our one-year anniversary! I can't believe it's only been a year, it seems like I've been doing this for years and I can't imagine life without blogging now!

I started this blog in August 2008 as a way of venting about my knitting projects, showing any (limited) success I had, and trying to meet fellow knitters. One of my favourite things is hearing from non-knitting friends about things that they've read or seen on the blog.

Over time, my skills have definitely grown, and so the blog has grown with me. I now have free patterns available that I designed, and am pleased to count as friends, those who visit me in cyber space. The blog (and comments I got from readers) also gave me the idea to start up a knitting group where I live, as I realised how popular the craft had become. Hammersmith Stitch N' Bitch is now also thriving, with new members coming along every week!

Anyway, to celebrate, I am giving away a small token from my stash. This helps me too; like most knitters' stashes, mine is getting too big to handle! So what's up for grabs, I hear you ask? Well, see below:

Three balls of Debbie Bliss Rilato Aran (100% Merino Wool, extra fine superwash, 80m/50g, wash at 30 degrees, recommended needle size 5mm):

1 ball stone-blue, colour 21203, dye-lot 78

1 ball forest-green, colour 21209, dye-lot 79

1 ball teal-blue, colour 21211, dye-lot 86*.

I bought the yarn to make some Fetchings for some friends, but didn't get around to making them, and probably never will (my to-do list is growing!). I made a pair for myself some time ago, which I love. They keep the hands toasty while allowing the fingers to work! I wore them all last winter.

Each ball is enough to make a pair of Fetchings, that's right, a whole pair! So you could get three pairs in total out of these balls. Of course, you don't have to make fingerless gloves; you can make whatever you like, incorporate them into a small blanket pattern perhaps.

**Edited 05/10/09**

Sorry, I should have said, leave a comment before 11th October.

People in the US and Canada are not excluded from the competition. That wouldn't be fair now, would it. The giveaway is open to everyone.

Here's what to do: leave me a comment (making sure I'm able to find your email address) about something you like about Rowanberry, or something you saw or read in one of my posts, or anything you'd like me to blog about or see more of on the blog before 11th September, and I'll put the numbers in to the Random Number Generator, and come up with a winner. I'll then ship the yarn to you, covering all postage and packing expenses. If you have a blog I'd really appreciate you mentioning Rowanberry (everyone could do with more site traffic).

*This yarn comes from a pet-free and smoke-free home.

Here's to another few years of Rowanberry!

*** Edited 11/10/09 at 19.51 ***

Thank you so much for your lovely comments. Comments are now closed.

California, here we come...

Sorry it's been a long time coming, but here's a whistle-stop tour of our holiday, starting in LA and taking in Arizona, the Grand Canyon, the Hoover Dam, Yosemite and finishing in a favourite stop of ours, Santa Barbara.

The Getty Centre in LA, where we spent a whole day:

The architecture is really inspiring, and shows hints of the Classical past:

A beautiful Holy Family by Carlo Dolci, in fact they have a very good art collection:

Sculptures on the balconies that wrap around the building:

An old gas station at the Farmers Market in LA:

Firs in the grounds of the Hollyhock House by Frank Lloyd Wright:

The Griffin Observatory:

Sedona, where we were based for 5 days, and my favourite part. Just look at the colour of the rocks; every day they were a different colour, and the intensity of the red increased and decreased throughout the day:

The Four Vortexes:

The breathtaking Grand Canyon:

Part of an early 20th Century Hopi Mural inside the Desert View Stone Watchtower designed by Mary Colter:

A Squirrel posing:

The Hopi House, built by Native American women and now housing their crafts:

The Route 66 town of Williams:

We had a stopover in Vegas. This is inside the Wynn: It's not easy to see, but there are giant flower balls hanging from the "trees" (you're never quite sure what's real in Vegas, everything seems fake, like the grass outside the Wynn Encore where we were staying, which was plastic!):

On to Yosemite, for the second half of the trip. This is the staggering Half Dome:

From the Alpine summit down to the meadows in the valleys:

I thought the shadows in this rock face resembled a bird:

A Sterling Jay. We saw deer, lots of tiny yellow-bellied squirrels and these birds, but sadly no bears:

"El Capitan", another imposing mountain. We actually saw rock climbers on this rock-face:

From lush meadows to towering sequioas:

These trees are sooo huge that you can drive through them. This is now frowned upon, as it obviously severly damages the tree, but at the turn of the Century this is what they did:

"The Bachelor and the Three Graces". They're too tall to take in vertically!:

The last night's meal, shrimp cocktail at our favourite, Brophy's on the water in Santa Barbara, a great way to end:

Update

So sorry for not posting before now. I've been really busy. I promise to get the holiday photos up before the end of the weekend.

In knitting news I've finished some gifts for a friend's baby that came early, managed to finish 3 of the 4 blanket squares I promised (and then managed to lose when I left Knit Night last night) and a cardigan, the bulk of which I finished on the plane to the States (it's a 10-hour flight you know!).

Photos to come soon, I promise.

Off On Hol's

I'm off on holiday for two weeks, so I'm afraid there won't be any posts until I get back. The cardigan is however, finished (except for the pockets which I will do when I get back); photo's to come.

As I wanted to carry on with the cardigan, the only other thing I've managed to complete is this blanket square for the MacMillan Comfort Blanket campaign (please note photo is pre-blocked). Sue at our Sticth N' Bitch suggested we take part as a group. I just can't see how I'm going to be able to fit in the other three squares I promised though.

I have cast on for the Noro short-sleeved cardigan and will smuggle this on to the plane. I also plan to get going on a secret pressie for a friend's impending arrival, though I don't want to do too much knitting when we're away (there'll be plenty to see out the window as we drive through Arizona and California).

When I get back I'll be doing a little give-away to celebrate the blog's first anniversary. I can't believe it's only been a year, it feels like I've been doing it for ages...

Cardigan Update and Rowanberries

After last weekend's four days of no knitting (yes, British Airways refused to let me on the plane with my "weapons"), I was desparate to get back to the needles.

I made up for it at Tuesday's SNB and last night finished the back of the cardigan. No sneak-peak I'm afraid, as the recipient may check the blog! It's certainly long enough, though quite narrow; hopefully that will all change with the restorative powers of blocking. Now, onto the first front!

This week I happened to notice a Rowan tree brimming with berries near my office. Isn't this a strange time of year for berries? Usually they appear in Autumn; I know last year I photographed the Rowanberries in my street when it was dark at 5pm.

I also spotted this beautiful Buddleia on my way to work.

Have you ever looked up close? The centres of the tiny flowers are orange.. who knew?

Must get back to the needles!

This Week's Stitch N' Bitch

Last night we had a great time at the pub and meet three new people - Rachel, Jayne and Liz! I even remembered the camera this time.

What's this? Could it be, no, it can't be a chilli... Too small to sample I fear, but this is progress!

Knitterly Istanbul

In the Islamic Arts Museum I unintentionally found a crude example of yarn dyeing in a yurt (black goat-skin hut from the Anatolian province of Turkey) and also managed to get told off for taking photos!:

I stumbled across ome crazy (and HUGE) felted hats in a shop:

And some not-so-huge ones:

Doesn't this remind you of a Moderne Log Cabin Blanket?

Anyone recognise this???

I immediately thought of the wonderful Kaffe when I saw this, and sure enough when I got home and checked my Pattern Library, there it was: the Caucasian Stripe:

I think my beloved Kaffe may have got quite a few of his motifs from his travels to Turkey. Here's another I saw everywhere: