Remember my felted moccasins, a present to 15yo billy before Christmas?
They're also my first felting disaster. Well, not quite. I knitted Chris, who is always in search of the perfect knitted, water & wind proof hat, a felted hat a few years ago. First few washes, it shrank well, but was a tad too large, third wash it shrank a lot and became a carpet hat, that I had difficulty wearing.
Billy thought the un-felted moccasins were funny, and then Chris started trying to felt them down. Various wash cycles, from 40 degrees fast colours to top temperature whites. They shrank, and slightly felted, but didn't have that super stiff carpet look about them (and were too large). He tried again yesterday, and when I pulled them out of the pillow case, rather than felting further, they had started disintegrating! Yarn was J&S aran. Chris thinks that Billy was excited, in a 15yo way, about these moccasins, so it looks like I'll be looking around for some more aran wool to knit another pair. Sigh. Libertys here I come.
I spent all day yesterday quietly knitting on the Diamond Patch socks, and this is the progress so far (well, I've now finished the toe too)
They look great, but this is how far I've got after countless Saturdays working on them! Really fiddly, 2.25mm dpns (even the short ones) and small mitred squares aren't speedy! And I can only work on them on weekends, during daylight hours! These are going into the UFO pile. I won't frog them yet, but leave them for a few weeks and see if I want to come back to them or not. Love the yarn, love the colour, hate the small mitres.
I've now re-knitted the Maya that I'd used for the top down raglan. So, top down raglan, to a couple of inches past the armhole edge =
2 x 
+ 1 x
(about 9 inches of the back - just another 4 inches until the armholes, yippee!)
Another view of the cashmer scarf, unpinned. I could have blocked it narrower and longer, but as is, it's about 30" long, enough for a shorter scarf that tucks in nicely.
Lots of simple knitting done yesterday, because we watched a whole four episodes of 24, third series! Billy's got into it too, so we've been trying to coordinate viewing between two homes! There's a lot of 15yo Southfield boys who've been having a 24 fest this weekend!
Today is a close friend's daughter's 15th birthday. I've got a bag full of shoulder warmers, scarves and socks to give to the family, and Jemima was adamant that I post them to her school, addressed to her, so that she can get first choice, before mum and big sister! Obviously my knitting has some street cred with 15yos at the moment, sight unseen! With that in mind, I've cast on more ribbed fingerless mitts, hope to make a couple of pairs to include in the parcel. These are officially my commuter knitting (until I decide on a Sockapaloozer sock) for next week. Hopefully a quick FO soon.
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