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I've just treated myself to some new yarn - Madeline Tosh Vintage in Antler and Tart*. It may be eye-wateringly expensive, but my goodness it is gorgeous!
Vibrantly rich in colour
with a lovely plied twist
and perfect for a pair of lovely mitts to keep my hard-working fingers toasty and warm on those cold and frosty mornings that are just around the corner!
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* I bought mine from Loop
Walks in the woods are definitely best at this time of year and Toby & I collected lots of different leaves on our walk last weekend. It got me thinking about hedgehogs and hibernation and made me want to come back home and get cracking on a little batch of autumny hedgehog pincushions with leaves on them.
I had lots of fun last year with shrinkle sheets and leaf shapes but couldn't find the sketches I made back then so I've made some new templates which you're welcome to use too.
Just trace them onto a shrinkle sheet (my favourite are the frosted ones - which make it easy to trace an image underneath), colour in with coloured pencils, punch a hole and bake them in the oven to shrink them into tiny little leaves. I use mine as pin toppers for the hedgehogs but they'd work as jewellery, keyrings or phone tags too.
It's tidy up time in my garden. The last of our potatoes, tomatoes, carrots and squash are gathered in for another year with just the parsnips left to be pulled after Christmas, as apparently they grow sweeter after a couple of frosts. I'm left with a bowl of green tomatoes which will probably get turned into chutney.
Around the rest of the garden greens are turning to reds - I do love autumn leaves.
There's even a spot of green and red knitting going on inside. I'm really enjoying playing around with new ideas for a batch of nordic animals which will be ready to find new homes in time for Christmas.
Next week it's forecast to be turning colder and I'm looking forward to getting our fire stoked up and curling up with my wool. Hope you have a snuggly weekend!
Today marks the start of National Wool Week - a celebration of all things woolly. So, if you needed an excuse to add to your woolly stash, then this week you have the perfect one (not that I know many knitters who need an excuse). I've treated myself to some pure, undyed organic gorgeousness in named breed colours from Garthenor in Wales
Of course if you're not a knitter you could always celebrate by supporting the lovely creatures that produce our wonderful wool. Saving Rare Breeds are aiming to raise awareness of declining rare breeds and their wonderful work deserves lots of support. You can even sponsor your very own sheep, I've chosen Noah No-Ears to be my special friend for this year but they are all equally lovely.
Thanks again for all of the kind comments on my anniversary giveaway post, I really appreciate them. The good old random number generator has been set in motion again and has turned up number 426
which is a comment from Peggy Sue:
Posted by: peggysue | October 02, 2010 at 03:23 AM
I'm waiting to hear back which animal she's chosen but when she's emailed and I've finished adding names to the mailing list I'll sort out a sale of those remaining.
We've had a busy week here with both of the children celebrating their birthdays. Amy had her 11th birthday party last weekend - a crazy affair with 4 friends coming for a disco, pizza, film and sleepover.
Luckily the boys went to stay elsewhere and so Amy and her friends could go really wild! Needless to say sleep did not feature very prominently as they eventually settled down at 2am and woke at 7.30, but a lot of fun was had.
Toby's birthday is coming up this weekend and we'll be having a quiet bouncy castle party with balloons, bubbles and lots of french fancies (Toby's favourite cake!) - much more my kind of party!
How sweet of you to do a giveaway. I haven't a snowball's chance in July of winning, but do wish to be kept on the list for a chance to purchase in the future. Thank you!