Shawl & Socks

I do wonder where on earth the day goes which to me, seems to be very quick and before you know it the Autumn weather is here.  It is getting dark now about 18:45 and the sunrise is around 06:50 plus it is rather chilly in the morning and evening.

I have been showing off my completed projects to my colleagues at work and recently had an order for 2 pairs of socks.  Elisabeth's son and daughter in law are going to New Zealand in November and she said she would like to gift them a pair of hand knit socks to take with them so I said I would make 2 pairs.

 This first pair is a size UK 8-9 and they are knitted using Novita Venla which is a 75% wool and 25% nylon mix.  It is machine washable and the colour is called Harmaa (No.499).  

I would describe it as a stone grey and I have knitted it as a plain sock which is what Elisabeth wanted for her son.  

The yarn is 100g ball with 420 meters so I have quite a bit left over still.  

The 2nd pair that I am knitting are going to be in a gorgeous lilac colour and I am having a go at designing again so I cannot show them on here yet.  

I have knitted one sock and started the other one yesterday morning.

I seem to have a lot of design ideas going on in my head at the moment and I am so anxious to get them all knitted but it is just impossible.  

Today (Saturday) I decided to get up and get on with doing all of my chores i.e. hoovering, dusting, cleaning the bathroom, ironing, sorting out the freezer and cleaning the cooker.  Well, it is now 1pm and that is all done and am quite pleased with myself.  

After all of that my next plan is to write this blogpost and then watch some podcasts and do some more knitting.  

My next project that I have finished is a shawl that I have knitted before but using a different yarn.  

This shawl is a pattern called LaLa's Simple Shawl by Laura Linneman.  She is one of the Knit Girllls on Youtube.com.

It is a free pattern on Ravelry and the yarn that I used was Sweet Georgia Yarns 'Party of Five' Tough Love Sock Mini Skeins.

The colour way is called Hanami and I just kept on with the pattern until I used up the mini skeins which weight 30g each.  

This yarn was £35 to buy and it was a gift from my partner a couple of years ago and so I wanted to make sure I made something that I would wear.  It is very soft and a joy to knit with but be warned....the darker colour runs when you wash it.  

I let my shawl soak for about 5 minutes in hand warm water and the dark colour ran, I whipped it out of the bowl pretty quickly because I didn't want it to bleed into the other colours.  Thank god it didn't.

I do have a crochet blanket on the go which is using up scraps of sock yarn and I am crocheting a Christmas tree skirt for my grand children using a Cygnet Yarn in red which is lovely and soft.  I tend to do that in bed for a while because I cannot crochet for long periods of time due to fatigue in my hand and arm. 

Oh well, I am off now to watch Ali's from Little Drops of Wonderful Podcast.  She is doing Vlogtober which I thoroughly enjoyed last years one.  

Happy crafting and be back soon.