christmas jumper finished?

time to decorate the tree?

I have now finished Best Boy's Christmas jumper...or have I? I have sewn in the dozens of ends and carefully sewn up the seams, given Rudolph his red nose and given the reindeer each an eye but still feel like there is something missing. Bearing in mind that Best Boy will be wearing it Christmas day I feel it is lacking on the sparkle front. So...I wonder...should I decorate the tree? Should I glitz it up a bit like this one? (thanks to fresh-thoughts.co.uk) OK...maybe not quite like that but after my sparkly yarn find in Hobbycraft last week and the green and silver colours I coveted  - I'm thinking...does the tree need something extra, like green, red and silver sparkly baubles? Does it need some sequinned tinsel? A gold star at the top? I think it does...do you?

Talking about finishing items, I don't know about other knitters but I really used to hate the making-up part of knitting and would rush through it. This resulted in items that looked poorly made, despite the quality of the knitted material or the beauty of the yarn used. It also resulted in a lot of unfinished projects as I couldn't be bothered with the sewing part of it all.  Nowadays, I have come to the conclusion that the making-up of an item is an important part of the whole process, almost as important as the knitting part itself, and I now take my time to do it as carefully and neatly as possible. This has resulted in my finished items looking home made rather than poorly made. I can't say I enjoy the making-up part any more than I used to but I no longer hate it and I value it for the difference it makes to the finished item. There are lots of free knitting resources with instructions on finishing an item, (knitty.com or knit simple for example), available on the web - so... no more excuses for poorly finished or unfinished garments.

what's on your needles?

christmas jumper

On mine is a Christmas jumper for Best Boy. It's a bit of a trial run really as I couldn't find a design I liked so cobbled together my own take on the Christmas Nordic jumper. It is knitted in DK Acrylic on 4mm needles so is a quick easy knit. I half made a different design before I frogged it. I was planning to make a fairisle jumper with snowmen, snowflake, Christmas tree and holly motifs and it just didn't work. On paper it looked good but once I started knitting it looked clunky and ill thought out. I think smaller needles and 4 ply rather than DK yarn. Maybe I'll try it again for next year. I'm quite pleased with this little one though - and it only cost a little over £10 to make.

red metallic

And...look what I found in my local Hobbycraft , red metallic thread...how pretty...I just had to buy it! They also had green and silver but I couldn't justify buying it, especially as I don't really have any plans for the red - apart from using it for Rudolph's red nose on Best Boy's Christmas jumper.

red background

I'm also in the process of swatching motifs for a Christmas stocking for Best Boy. He's going to be 19 months this Christmas, just old enough to start getting excited about it all.  I can't wait to see his little face when we've decorated the tree and on Christmas day when Santa's been. Like most kids I expect he'll prefer the boxes and wrapping paper to the stuff inside! Anyway, this is my first go at knitting a sock/stocking, I have knitted in the round before a long time ago but I used a circular needle rather than double pointed needles.

blue background

little hearts or big hearts?

What do you think of the colours? I prefer the little hearts to the big hearts and may fill in the white gaps with some upside down hearts as don't really like the way the red shows through the white.

In the meantime, the grannies sit forgotten in their basket and the scary sewing machine still lurks in its corner - well, it is Christmas (nearly) so Christmas knitting  takes priority. The grannies can wait.

scary sewing machine

scary sewing machine

My sewing machine scares me. It glares balefully from its table in the corner of the craft (junk) room. Most of the time it is hidden behind other stuff, friendlier stuff, like my nice soft wool and my knitting patterns with their easy to understand instructions. The scary sewing machine has sharp needles and movable levers and bobbins with some kind of spring. Before you can even think of starting to sew the thread needs to be wound round the machine in some kind of complicated manoeuvre.

my first ever grannies

I consider myself to be kind of a creative crafty person. I love knitting with my beautiful, friendly, soft yarns and have become quite an accomplished knitter and designer within my little world. I have also recently taught myself to crochet, with the help of  you tube and this book as
have been hooked by the beautiful, colourful granny blankets that I've seen on other craft blogs.


As I can knit and now crochet I naively (stupidly) thought I would be able to use a sewing machine to make stuff. Also, my mum always had her machine on the go when I was growing up, churning out new stuff weekly, including once a broderie anglaise circle skirt I begged her to make when I was about 13. This consisted of what seemed to be hundreds of broderie triangles each of which needed edging, seaming and pressing before being sewn together and took my mum weeks to make - I tried it on, hated the way it made me look 'fat'and never wore it again...I don't think my mum has ever made me anything else and can't blame her really.

So there it sits, in its lonely corner - unused, gathering dust, glaring balefully from its table. Mr Periknits has mentioned the eBay word on more than one occasion. I have pretended not to hear and dream of the day that the scary sewing machine and I will spring to life and create some beautiful stuff. This is my plan for 2015...after all, it can't be that hard, can it...?