Today, I bring you a little experiment in colour juxtaposition. Here is my Soumak Shawl Wrap, worn with two sweaters, which are identical except for the colour.
The above photos were taken with me standing in the shade. Here they are again with me standing in the bright sunshine:
Please note two things: First, there IS bright sunshine today, on a Bank Holiday weekend, in England! Never fear, dear readers, tomorrow we are expecting blustery winds, thunder, and hail! We can rest easy that life goes on as expected. Second, note that I am squinting. I am, after all, standing in the bright sunshine.
I had expected that the shawl would look warm against the orange sweater, and cool against the beige sweater. Instead, I think that it looks warm in the sunshine and cool in the shade, regardless of the sweater colour. See how the blues stand out in the shade, while the yellows stand out in the sun?
Why am I publishing this not very enlightening post? Well, obviously, I have something important I should be doing today. Something other than knitting, or blogging about knitting, or driving my husband crazy asking him to take multiple photos of me, while I change sweaters back and forth and try not to squint in the sun. (Like, perhaps, finishing a very important paper that I need to write…) But you see, I am a master of procrastination. Thus, this post.
Speaking of which, this is me, without a doubt:
Here’s hoping your procrastination techniques get some practice today!
I am now back in England and we had a beautiful hour or two of sun this afternoon (!) in which to take some photos of my new mitts. These are the mitts which I was knitting last week while in South Africa communing with elephants.
This is the pattern Wedgewood Mitts, designed by me. I designed them to play around with a lovely shipment of Kate Davies’ new yarn, Buachaille. The original pair, made for Leah, was in a very pretty mid-blue with white edging. Just before leaving for Johannesburg, I tossed a skein of this lovely spring green, called Yaffle, and the remaining white from the first pair of mitts, into my suitcase.
I made a few small modifications from my original pattern. Here is what I did:
Cast on an extra 4 stitches (48)
Worked an extra two rows of corrugated ribbing
Decreased 4 stitches after ribbing
Worked an extra 2 rows before starting gusset
Worked three rows less before adding white edging
Basically, this added 4 stitches just to the cuff, to make the cuff a tiny bit more roomy. I also made the cuff portion of the mitt slightly longer, while making the finger portion of the mitt slightly shorter.
I am very happy with how they worked out, and am especially charmed with the combination of this spring green and the white (Yaffle and Ptarmigan in Buachaille-speak). Obviously, I am not the only one to think so. I had finished the first mitt and cast on for the second when I noticed that Kate Davies had designed a new hat for release at the Edinburgh Yarn Festival this weekend:
I absolutely love this design, which was inspired by a collection of Hornsea pottery designed by John Clappison in the 1960s; go read Kate’s post here. Sadly, I cannot be at the festivities in Edinburgh this weekend, but I did try to alleviate my misery by ordering a kit to make this hat! Just think how pretty it will look with the mitts.
I am in South Africa for two weeks teaching, and I took advantage of my free weekend to travel out to a game reserve. Yes, that is me knitting while standing next to an elephant. I am standing in front of the restaurant at the game reserve, which is located next to a large watering hole where the elephants come to drink every day. Thank you to Roy, the lovely man who took the photo; when I told him and his wife that I wanted a photo of me knitting with the elephants for my blog, they said “What a lovely idea!” instead of “Sorry, lady, but you are crazy! You need help!”
Above is a photo taken the day before where I am sitting on the back porch of my room while an elephant wanders in the bush just below me. This was a very cool and surreal experience.
I went on a game drive one evening. It was great fun. Here is a list of the animals which we saw while on the drive: vervet monkeys, hippos, red hartebeest, wildebeest, warthogs, zebras, white rhinos, giraffes, ostriches, impala, blestbok, kudu, jackals, waterbok, springbok, nyala, and eland. I didn’t take many photos, and am also having some difficulties with bandwidth here, so I will only show you a few. I am not sure, but I think the beautiful animal below is an impala.
We came across a family of giraffes, including a three week old baby:
We were in an all-terrain open vehicle, and driving through the bush – really off-road. This last week there has been torrential rain here, so there was mud everywhere. At one point, our vehicle got stuck in the mud, and we had to all get out and stand in the bush, while trying to get the vehicle loose from the mud. We gathered tree branches and vegetable matter to stick under the wheels, but it took a good 20 minutes to get it loose, and in the meantime we were all sure that we would get eaten by hippos! We drove through the game reserve for three hours and came so close to the animals it was astonishing (and a bit scary). The rhinos were the hit – at one point we were about 8 feet away (too close in my opinion). Here is a photo of me in the vehicle with rhinos just beyond me. (Thank you, Ian, for taking the photo!)
Here is a not very good photo of zebras, but it gives you a good idea of the kind of countryside we were driving through. It is pretty astonishing to be driving along and come across a herd of zebras. There were about twenty or so zebras in this group, including quite a few young ones.
The amazing thing is that we were still quite close to Johannesburg; this was an 80 minute drive from my hotel in Jo’burg, but really felt far removed. It is a whole different world from the city. I am told that it doesn’t come close to the kind of experience you would have in the Kruger, but for a weekend break, it was pretty cool! On the Saturday, I sat down in the restaurant for lunch, and looked up to see an elephant outside the window. Here is the photo I took from my seat while eating lunch:
People here are very friendly. My driver, Sipho, is a great companion on the road and we shared many stories. He brought his wife along on the return trip, and we all got to enjoy the elephants and good conversation. I was traveling by myself, but found people to sit with, and chat with, and eat with. I shared a lovely dinner with two Australians, one from Brisbane and one from Sydney, who were here attending a conference. (Thanks, Ian and Lisa. And thanks also for the wine!) Today, I sat in the sun for a while sharing drinks and chatting with two lovely South African families, Nicol and her husband and young son, and Roy with his wife, who prove that 74 is the new 50! I was knitting all morning while sitting and chatting with them, so perhaps they weren’t put off by my request for photos of me knitting with elephants. And, of course, I felt compelled to knit while leaning against the sign saying “Danger Elephants” in front of said elephants!
Recently, I have been seeing lots of pom pom hats. Each time I think “Poms poms may be cute, but they are not for me.” I don’t remember wearing them the last time they were in vogue, and I was younger and cuter then. But I suppose my contrary nature got the better of me, because I saw a photo on Ravelry of an un-modelled hat with pom pom, made from The Uncommon Thread Lush Worsted (one of my favorite yarns) in Cobble (one of my favorite shades) with a beautiful, soft, fluffy (and very large) alpaca pom pom. Within minutes, I had ordered the yarn and pom pom. How does that happen?
Regular readers of this blog will know that my first attempt at this hat was a disaster, not because of any problem with the yarn or pattern but because I wasn’t paying attention. (A little bit of stupidity was likely in play as well.) The pattern, designed by Wooly Wormhead, and called Skelter, is completely lovely. The stitch pattern is beautiful, and I love the way the decreases work into the crown:
Of course, you can’t see this beauty if you have a pom pom attached, but more on that in a moment. The problem with the first hat was caused by not doing a gauge swatch and not using a tape measure. With the second attempt, I kept the needle size the same (US6) but increased to the largest size (my head is big, but my gauge is also slightly under, so the result fits my 21″ head perfectly without being snug). I knit 2″ of brim and then 5 pattern repeats before starting the decreases. The completed hat used 66 grams of yarn (only 51 in the “teeny tiny hat” – my abortive first attempt). If you use this yarn, please note that it can stretch quite a bit when it is washed; I was very careful to push it all back into the size I wanted before drying flat. It is a gorgeous yarn, however, and lovely to knit with. I knit this fabulous sweater with it a few years ago.
The brim of this pattern has a notch at the back; it turns out that it is perfectly placed for ponytail wearers:
Here is a funny but true tale. Shortly after I ordered the supplies for this hat, I was passing though the Duty Free shop at Heathrow International Airport in London. I saw the below hat, and just had to take a photo for you. I draw your attention not so much to the hat, but rather to the price tag:
It’s a little hard to see, but the gist is: “Suggested price: £357, Our price £297.50, You save £59.50” This cracked me up! The GBP has taken a pounding in the last few weeks, but even at today’s less than stellar rates, this translates into dollars as “Suggested price $497, Our price $414, You save $83”. I can hardly type this without giggling! For my hat, I bought one skein of an extremely luxe hand-dyed yarn for £24 (of which I used .65 of a skein) and one pom pom for £8. I happen to think mine is prettier too, but that is a matter of taste.
So now, the real question: Pom pom?
Or no pom pom?
Pom pom?
Or no pom pom?
I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the pom pom is actually starting to grow on me!
