Cameo

I caught the Cameo fever too

Dyed some black and red Barka Cinege yarn...

Knitted a few picos and stripe larger than the pattern

Blocked it within an inch of its life...

Then asked my boy to take some pictures...

Golden Wheat

The girls at facebook called for a knitalong, the subject was the Golden Wheat cardigan. Other sweaters knitted from thick yarns played too, we are flexible with the rules like that (just look at the nonrules of the stashdiet group).

Of course, if I think about it, I can count this as a stashdiet knit as well, since I bought the yarn about a year ago, in one of those crazy cheap sales of Ice Yarns, after which 4 package in two colorways found its way to my place. The rather simple pattern was perfect for the uneven thickness of the yarn.

And, of course the name of the pattern, and the color went just as well toogether, being just like ripe wheat. (I know thats kinda crazy thinking, but that is how I am).

I used 15 of the 16 balls(800 grams), and now I have to figure out what to dp aith the one leftover ball.If I would knit this again, I would leave it a bit longer. Used 5 mm needles for the neck, and 5.5 for the rest of the body. The recomended was like about 7 mm, but as I mentioned earlier I am not only a loose knitter, but like my knitted fabric denser than most others.

As for the pattern... I checked how many stitches she starts with, deducted 10 because I wanted a collar that stands up better, then after the garter stitch collar checked how she divided for the body and sleeves, and went after my head from there. I left the knit side of the stockinett for right side, and made the two stitch at the raglan line a narrow cable. After I increased until I thought it would be OK, added a number of stitches underarm to míke it just right. Decreased and increased as my usual for waist shaping, and knitted a rather wide garter stitch edge for the sleeves (just as my usual... its kinda becoming my trademark, eh?)

And the photos also as usual...shot by Christopher Laurent Deli.

Because...

Someone said I don't knit/wear purple...

Sure, I do... a LOT.

New year, new...

The "new year good luck sweater" tradition was introduced by my friend, Angela. Since I long observe the "the first day(s) of the day, do what you want to do a lot during the coming day" tradition, and knitting IS one of those things I actually WANT to do a lot of, I joined the tradition and the third year ina  row, I've started a new garment the first thing after midnight. Also, this is the second time -out of the three- that the sweater I am starting is red one, and chinese people say red brings god luck, I see a new point of thr tradition unfurling...

My knitting frinds on facebook organized a cardigan Knit Along. The original goal is teh Golden Wheat, but any cardigan is accepted. After a long search, discussion and deliberation, i returned to one of my absolute favorite patterns, to Rosamund's cardigan.

I've already knitted this many times over, this time it is a symmetric, long sleeved version.

An other facebook knitting group I joined is aimed at stashdiet.Everybody can put up her own rules. I long ago gave up on feeling guilty about my stash, or considering seriously downsizing it, so my rule is not to promise anything, but I will adhere to that very closely. I will try to use more than I bring home, however. On the other hand, about this time last year I took out six sweater's worth of yarn, and it didn't even show in the boxes, so the chance that even if I knit exclusively from my existing stash having any visible effect is pretty slim.

I bought this yarn about two years ago on a sale. (And yes, I already knitted the same pattern from its white version). It has 80% wool, and it is very light, a whole long sleeved sweater was knitted out of 400 gramms.
In addition it could be knit up on -for me unusually big- 4.5 mm needles, so it also works up really fast.

Photos as usual done by Christopher Laurent Deli, and one does not argue with the camera-guy, even if he says lie down the bench, however silly it sounds.... especially if he is one's own son. 

Minecraft hat

"Mama, knit me a Minecraft hat" said my only child, and who am I to say no to such a request?  A quick ravelry search came up with this pattern, to which said child replied..."sure, mama, but I want it with grey base and..." that was when I shsush-ed him and took down wome boxes containing parts of my sock yarn collections...the greys the greens and the blacks. and told my son "here sweetheart, choose yourself".

The green he picked up is a bit too dark, so the face of the creeper figure only shows up in strong daylight, and the hat went under the Xmas tree with needles attached. I finished on the 25th though.

He loves it though, and it also fullfills the stashdiet requrements...

Spektrum

2013 wasn't the best year of my life. I can't say it was all bad, as it did had some wonderful moments, even wonderful days here and there. Even though, the bad outweighed the good, I will try not to dwell on that too much. Lets just stay the good side of the Spektrum..
One of the good things was that I spent a considerable amount of time and energy on translating patterns from Drops to Hungarian.

photo: Pfoto team

The moment I opened the pattern for the Spektrum shawl (which back then didn't even had a name) I knew I wanted it. The original pattern calls for two colors of fabel, but I had a few balls of Drops Delight in my stash, just the perfect thing. All I needed a couple of balsl for the beige part. I was thinking I should get some alpaca, or alpaca silk, but I had to wait quite a few months to actually get them.

photo: Pfoto team

But finally they were here, and in love with this shawl, I am. As usual, I did make it somewhat bigger, added maybe 10 stripes or so. Otherwise I went by the pattern, which is very easy, and for a Drops pattern, well written.

I used slightly more than 2 balls of Delight, and about 3 balls of Alpaca mix. and 3.25 Addi needles.