This and That

The beginning of the Garden Shawl creeps nearer. I have decided on the Sage colour. I briefly toyed with the idea of the Ocean handpainted colourway, but my experiences with the Margaret Stove handpainted Hyacinth for the first Mystery Shawl made me think again. Don't get me wrong - this is beautiful yarn and the hyacinth is a beautiful colourway but I really don't think it added anything to the lace and, in some ways, I feel it detracted somewhat. The shawl in the link is shown in Wedgewood and I don't think that detracts but the colour changes are not so great as in the Ocean colour. I have taken advice from my knitbud (who in turn took advice from Dorothy at Fiddlesticks) and it's the Sage for me. The knitbud (hereinafter referred to as KB) has chosen the Shell colour. All the colours can be seen on the Fiddlesticks colour page. There are other colours but Dorothy stocks most of them. Now that she has teamed up with Marsha at the NeedleArts Bookshop to offer online ordering, there will be no stopping me. I just love both of these sites.

Having had the decision from KB, I set about ordering the yarn. Obviously, I'd rather order in the UK, and, after extensive research, I have discovered that the cheapest place to get Margaret Stove merino is KCG trading. There is no online ordering, so you need to telephone or order by post. The website is, ahem, rudimentary - there are no pictures, the prices quoted are slightly out of date, it doesn't make you want to reach for the plastic (which is probably just as well), but it is the cheapest place and so I think I can live with the drawbacks. I ordered this morning and will keep you posted as to when the yarn arrives.

A little bit of housekeeping: Tari left a comment and said she'd like to see a picture of the Hasselblad camera I knitted. Me too, my dear. I knitted it years (and years and years) ago from a pattern in "Amateur Photographer" and I gave it away and never got a picture of it. (Even though the recipient was, guess what?, a photographer!) However, it looked very similar to the third picture on this page.

Francoise left a comment saying how she'd like to see a gallery of FOs. Again, so would I. It's really just a case of working out where, and how (and finding the time to do it, between all the other things I have to do/want to do.)

Corinne, if you are reading this, please email me (address in the sidebar, there) as I have no way of getting in touch with you!

Sorry this is a no-picture post - there will be jam tomorrow, I promise.