SECC Creative Stitches and Hobbycraft


I went to the SECC Creative Stitches and Hobbycraft event today - the boy dropped me off at 10am - I was all spent up by 12! From New Lanark World Heritage Site's stall - a penny a gram for this aran wool in utterly sumptious colours! 2211 grams later ... I think it is still oiled but I'm not sure. Do you wash the yarn before or after knitting it?

I got even more excited when I thought of all the lovely Noro jumper patterns that I haven't been able to knit cos I just can't afford to spend £100 on the yarn. At £21 [I got more weight than the skeins said - score!] I can make 2 jumpers out of this! Yay!

'Weren't you supposed to be knitting from your stash?' I hear you ask. Yes, yes - but my excuse is this - I can't go to Woolfest. Also - at £21 for 2211 grams it would have been criminal not to have bought this yarn. Two Noro jumpers would have cost me over £200 pounds in yarn.

On the way home we had to stop at Toys R' Us to get another part for the Xbox controller [I broke it trying to get the batteries out for the camera.] I decided to stay in the car since 2 hours of crazed bargain-hunting hobbyists had taken it's toll and Toys R' Us is generally not a relaxing shopping experience.

Spotted in the car, all my yarn spread over my lap, sniffing one skein deeply trying to work out whether it was oil, or sheep that I could smell. This was Ibrox Toys R' Us you understand ... perhaps not the best place to let one's guard down and indulge in knittery habits.



Swift and ballwinder hard at work - my swift has developed a squeak though. A bit of Olive Oil helped a bit, but only if I can keep up a certain speed - tired arms but determined to finish.


Ta-daa! Lovely colours - the one next to the sunset yellow is a very dark brown - I think they look fantastically retro together.


In Borders at the weekend to get some more survival guides for Tokyo - the restaurants one in particular is fantastic for someone with food issues - the language course really helps, so that pronunciation will be no problem. Well... I guess I should wait until we're back to gauge that. The trip has been booked on Expedia. Very scary to spend that amount of cash and get nought but an email for all our months of saving.

Central Park hoodie continues. The second sleeve is almost at the cap shaping - since I already posted the last sleeve at this stage I'm not going to bother this time. And that's me - except I have Monday off so I expect I'll be knitting and gaming for most of the day.

Comments

  1. Twelfthknit10 March, 2007 19:04

    Go! Knitsister!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Flavaknits10 March, 2007 20:55

    WOW! You put me to shame - I only bought a measly 300grams - still there is still tomorrow, and I really like the Aran in Blueberry at only a £10!

    ReplyDelete
  3. tigerlilith11 March, 2007 16:21

    wow - nice colours! i love the red & chocolate brown - lucky you...
    you can knit with it as is & wash it afterwards, but it's a good idea to knit a gauge swatch & wash that before doing any sweater knitting as oiled yarn will usually "bloom" quite a bit after washing & might throw off your gauge otherwise. have fun!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Kathleen11 March, 2007 20:52

    What a great haul you got. Well impressed by the fact you've got it balled up already by the way. x K

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous12 March, 2007 18:13

    Oh - soooo jealous!! Both of your Japan trip (wanna go!) and all that amazing yarn at such an amazing price.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous15 March, 2007 20:46

    Excellent score Elaine ! I think I saw you from the back on Saturday but you were so weighed down by yarn you didn't hear me calling :0)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A bit of culture...

Image
Well we're back in rainy Glasgow, and I think I'm sufficiently recovered from jetlag enough to be able to operate a PC, string a sentence together and complete my Japan blogging. Just in case you thought we'd spent our entire time playing in yarn shops, arcades and eating - a bit of culture was also had. These pics are from the Meiji shrine and surrounding Yoyogi Park. The top pic is a big pond full of koi karp, terrapins and massive dragonflies. We had our lunch there - it was very peaceful and relaxing. The above picture was the dwarfing entrance to the shrine. We walked around the gardens and had lunch but we never visited the shrine itself. [It was a Saturday so fairly busy and really humid hot, so we were looking for a bit of peace from the crowds.] This was me walking in the park - I used my umbrella to shade myself from the sun, but on this occasion it was up despite being in the shade ... due to the massive spiders that lurked. This was just at the entrance to the ...
Read more

Central Park Hoodie

Image
I can't believe it's Friday already. I've been trying to blog this since Monday, but Blogger and a cold have combined forces to make sure that it didn't happen until today. Thanks for comments and emails re; oiled yarn. Sorry I didn't hear you at the SECC Heather - I may have been a little delirious after having bought all that yarn! See this is why I do the SECC alone - I'm utterly unsociable when there are crafty delights all around begging to be purchased. Cheers Heather - I would love to get any help that anyone can give me on yarn goodies to be had in Tokyo, and also to see steeking 'live'. I have finally finished the back, 2 sides and 2 sleeves for Central Park Hoodie. Blocking was required in order to seam the shoulders and join front and back pieces for the hood. Now you all saw that I did a tension square right? It fit perfectly with the specified tension with no effort on my part. And I remained all calm and zen-like whilst knitting it - tryin...
Read more

Central Park and Apple Meringue

Image
Central Park Hoodie ... the sleeves are blocking ... ... the hood is finished... [not cast off, rather left for grafting later once the ribbing is finished] ... everything I can seam and weave in at this stage has been done ... ...only picking up the stitches along the edge of the right & left fronts and the hood and knitting rib for a few inches to go ... Can you see my problem? Click and enlarge if not ... oh yes. The picking up stitches knitty skill is sadly lacking here. I've been able to wing it with socks, but clearly winging it is just not going to cut it any longer. So I must frog *sigh* You have no idea how long it took me to pick up the exact 150 stitches needed. Frog and consult the knitting tomes in my craft room for help in this area cos I suck at it! I'm not quite ready to frog, and so I have put Central Park Hoodie down and continued with Earnshaw and Xboxing until I can face it. In the meanwhile - Apple Meringue with ginger and brandy. There was not enough m...
Read more