#bedinburghyarnfest

Things I learnt from my Festival At Home

Don't get me wrong, whilst I thoroughly enjoyed my #bedinburghyarnfest day I'll be the first to admit that the day didn't go entirely in accordance with my nice neat plan.

  • It didn't start well, when immobile DH insisted on coming on the grocery shop with me. I had planned on a quick, military style operation to get the necessary snacks. Shepherding a bear with a sore head(knee) around a crowded Waitrose full of intolerant and grumpy people slowed me down somewhat.

And my quick browse in Ravelry threatened to derail proceedings. Chronic indecision struck and not only could I not decide on a sweater pattern I also couldn't find a single pair of 4mm needle tips in the house. Faced with the choice of pulling the needles out of an existing project (don't judge - we've all done it) or settling down with an existing project I opted for the latter.

I made good progress on my colourwork hot water bottle cosy but then had to search for something easier for rugby watching. My stash search produced 3 skeins of Blacker Yarns Cornish Tin 2 which would have been perfect but on closer inspection one of the skeins had an almighty tangle in it. I decided that untangling it wasn't in the spirit of the day so it went back into the stash.

I did manage to locate a beautiful yarn cake - bought at EYF last year from The Wool Kitchen. A ready to knit gradient yarn from the Urban hints range. This has been cast on into a nice simple shawl. For now I'm just working simple stocking stitch and I'll decide on a border later on.

For next  time my learning points would be to

  • Wind yarn ahead of time
  • Plan a new cast on properly and amass the necessary materials - don't try to do it on the fly
  • Buy more snack - and don't forget the cake!

 

 

The secret of a good festival at home: A list of course

Like anything else, the secret to a successful knitting day at home is all in the planning. After much thought and deliberation ( and my 2nd cup of coffee) I hearby present my agenda for the day.

8.00am to 10.00am: Market shopping and domestic chores. Particular attention being given to the buying of snacks which are easy for a 10 and 11 year old to prepare and eat (as they will be in charge of feeding themselves and immobile DH).

10.00 to 10:30am: Home to unload shopping and make offspring aware of location of all of Saif snacks. Mental note to check kick off times for Six Nations rugby.

10.30am to 11:00am: Ravelry surfing to find pattern for DK weight sweater for me. This time slot is strictly limited to avoid falling down a black hole.

11:00am to 12noon : Cast on for new colourwork hot water bottle cosy. Have a slice of cake.

12noon to 13:00: Lunch and reading a good book (must pop into library whilst in town)

13:00 to 14:00: Cast on for DK weight sweater. Have another slice of cake.  

14:00 to 15:00: Check downstairs that no one is injured, bleeding or starving and work on colourwork project again.

15:00 to 16:00: Try to finish stripy sock in progress and set up for afterthought heel.

16:00 to 17:00: Stash rootle. Find a fab skein of yarn for an impulsive and frivolous cast on. Have a cheeky glass of Prosecco.

17:00 to 18:00: work on frivolous and impulsive cast on.

18:00 to 19:00: Join family for dinner (take Prosecco with me) and catch up with rugby chat.

19:00 to 21:00: Find good Netflix family film. Settle down with Mitered Square sock yarn blanket.

21:00 to 22:00: Small peeps and immobile DH to bed. Settle back on sofa. Bring remainder of cake out of hiding and finish it - being careful to cancel crumbs.

22:00: and so to bed.

If I'm cunning I may be able to repeat this on Sunday too - fingers crossed.