Little Cotton Rabbits

snippets from the last week

 

watching a small spider create a work of art

 

 

(and yes, that is actually sunshine sparkling off the strands of web) - summer has arrived here at last.

 

delighting in the beauty of flowers beginning to open

 

 

 

smiling at Toby having fun in the sun

 

and laughing at the collection of toys that have to go everywhere with him - it takes him a couple of trips to move them all each time!

 

And in between looking after home and family I've been sitting in the shade at the end of the garden and trying to finish off the pattern for the little pouch that I promised all of you lovely people back in April!

 

It's still in progress but hopefully will be done soon!

 

It's been mostly a happy, relaxing week now that summer has arrived properly. Hope you can say the same for your week too.

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The misty is still growing, one square at a time

 

and I'm starting to think that it will look good draped over the sofabed that we bought last year to help us deal with having Toby awake so much at night. I'm glad that we have it because now H and I can take it in turns to get a decent sleep upstairs while the other is 'sleeping' here with Toby, but as a piece of furniture it sure is ugly!

 

Now I'm just trying to decide whether to have the throw draped over the back or to make it large enough to cover the whole flipping thing!

 

I shall keep one-a-daying until I decide.

Well, the school summer holidays are nearly upon us and I'm feeling both unprepared and unenthusiastic. The prospect of keeping Toby entertained for so long is an unsettling one, especially if we don't get some dry weather soon. So I'm making like an ostrich with her head in the sand and spending the last few quiet days hiding away in a peaceful corner with my knitting.

I hope to pop in here as often as possible but I do expect to fall behind with my blog reading. So, here's wishing you a good few weeks and hope to see you soon x

protecting my cuppa

Lately I have been on a bit of a quest to find a new tea cup to use in the garden. A search brought on by something that happened a few weeks back when I was sitting at the end of the garden and noticed occassional ripples in my tea. When I looked closely I found that there were little pellets of caterpillar pooh plopping down from the grapevine overhead! For all I know this may be a delicacy in some corner of the world but I prefer my cuppa sans pooh thank you.

During my search I came across this little mug with it's handy lid and it's the perfect solution to a cup of tea full of caterpillar pooh, wind-blown leaves or other garden bits and pieces. I love it!

 

 

 

In fact I love it so much that I was prompted to make it a special coaster of it's own. And since I am having some friends over for some chat and afternoon tea later in the month, I then thought it might be nice to make a set of coasters to pop our cups on and afterwards for them to take home with them.

 

I used the first 7 rounds of Attic 24's crochet bag pattern, topped off with 1 row of single crochet (with no increases) worked in Rowan fine milk cotton (sadly just discontinued) with a 2.75mm hook.

 

 

I hope my friends like them, but if not there will be plenty of cake to enjoy. It's a shame you can't join us x

variations on a theme

Sometimes the urge to knit something is like an itch and you just have to scratch it. After really enjoying making my first pair of welted fingerless gloves I am now planning pairs in green, blue and red.

 

Afterall, you can't really be properly dressed in winter without mittens to match your favourite scarf can you?

And I do have 3 favourite scarves :)

And I have found the perfect colours to make matching mittens, with Quince & Co. Lark in split pea, bird's egg and winesap,

And the Quince & Co. yarn is so smooshy and lovely to knit with,

So, all in all I do feel completely justified in making more mittens (though H may not agree, he thinks that I have too many already)

 

 

It would have been a shame not to use this pattern again, it really is very appealing, not least because it knits up so quickly and takes only 1 skein per pair. And perhaps if I keep knitting winter woollies the sun might stay out for a bit, it does seem to have a rather perverse nature this year!

....................

 

Moss stitch scarves from my improvised 'pattern' (notes here), green and red are in Rowan Big Wool and the blue is Misti Alpacas hand paint chunky.

Midsummers day mittens

The fact that I'm just finishing off my second pair of mittens this month must be a measure of what a rubbish summer we're having so far. My hands really feel the cold, so popping on a pair of mittens for pottering around the garden in the late evening has been necessary of late and somehow the butterfly mittens that I finished last week are a little too pretty to wear for picking snails off of my cabbages, so I thought I'd make a more utilitarian pair.

 

Luckily these mittens are really snuggly and they knitted up really quickly. I only started them on friday evening and this morning I'm just sewing on the finishing touch buttons.

 

The pattern is Welted Fingerless Gloves from Churchmouse Yarns and Teas and I've knitted it with 3.75mm needles and Cascade 220 wool in 'pear' (full details on ravelry).  I originally choose this yarn as one of the colours for the misty afghan but it somehow didn't fit and I'm glad now because I think this is my new favourite colour and I'm pondering what else to make in it.

Despite the fact that I'm very pleased with my new mittens, I really hope that I'll not need them this week - it would be really nice to actually have a summer before the autumn comes around!