Home Again

Here I am, back again, having had a lovely time with Mother in Italy. There wasn't much evidence of any knitting (though I did see some one crocheting on the train) and there is only one tiny yarn shop in Sorrento, which didn't have a very exciting range of yarns:



I may have mentioned that I won a prize in the Yarn Smackdown competition and the book arrived while I was away.



It's about hats, which is a good thing but it's about crochet hats, which is not such a good thing. I know the basics of crochet but have never really taken to it - whenever I have tried to make a doily, it's turned out like a hat; when I try to make a hat, it turns out flat. I'm hoping this book will spur me on to greater effort with the crochet hook.

To that end I have made "Lively" and I don't think it's turned out too badly - #1 son, pictured here, has "commandeered" it:



Here's a view of the top:



The central section, where you "close the hole" in the middle, is a little "plouffy" (technical term) but all in all, I'm very pleased with it. It was quick and easy but used a ton of yarn.

My only real criticism of the book is that it doesn't tell us which yarns were used but advises us to use "worsted weight" or "sports weight" - which isn't a big help for me. I would have preferred to know the yardage of the yarns used, thus allowing me to make a reasonable stab at substituting yarn. However, I suppose it's just a hat - it's bound to fit somebody, somewhere.

I've also been working on the sock yarn blanket, though it's a little hot to have the whole thing on your lap at the moment. I've reached 206 squares and here's #1 daughter hiding under the thing:



and again:



Many thanks again to those kind readers who have sent me yarn to add to the growing pile.

I've also been working on the green "tablecloth", but there's no picture of that. It suffers from the usual downfall of all lace knitting - it looks like a crumpled handkerchief until blocked.

I have also been wrestling with getting the "garden" here in the rural backwater into some semblance of order and have made a bed and planted various vegetables. There's not much to see at the moment but perhaps when there is, you will be treated to a picture.

No recent picture of the back field - the nettles are so high I can't get anywhere near it but if my plans for a flame gun come to fruition, there's no telling if there will be a back field left.