Projects in queue

I finally broke down and bought a Kim Hargreaves kit. Personally, I wish that she'd just sell her patterns, or publish a book of 'em, instead of selling them only with the yarn. I can understand her reasons why, but... *sighs* I'm just wishing, that's all. I bought the Blithe in cotton 4ply, with that lovely yellow colour. In retrospect, I think Blithe would look nice in Rowan's cashsoft - their 4ply version, in a stronger colour.





That's my colour for Blithe. The other colours in the 4ply were too dark, too soft, or just too bland. I think I've choosen the best colour for me.













As it is, I'm doing the Loll cardighan, but in Coffee, instead of Driftwood as shown in the photo. With my complexion, biscuit, tan or 'blonde wooden' colours don't fit the yellow undertones. For the amount of money that Rowan charges for the yarn, I wish the colours were a bit more saturated. Like, if they had a luscious aubergine (instead of the purple touched with the grey tint that they have now), I'd have done Loll in that colour.

Loll has been a challenging knit so far. The fringes took an age to get my head around (cast on and cast off 6 sts), the slip stitch reverse stocking stitch is cunning, but I'd advise you to make your own charts for this pattern and do a swatch. Normally, I'm good with specified tension, but for Calmer I had to go up half a needle size (from 5mm to 5.5mm) to get gauge. I'm doing decreases and increases carefully to keep the ribbing pattern - but I haven't seen a Loll that's failed to impress or thrill its wearer.

Watch out!