Earrings and Stash

Yesterday, at last, I found myself in Putney in a certain shop (clue - air conditioned and full of something we all love). No prizes for guessing I was in Stash Yarns and everything that everyone has said about it is oh, so true! I was impressed by the yarn on the needles all ready to knit so that one could try knitting with the different yarns before buying and the sheer array of yarn that I'd never been able to see and touch before. I met Natalie (Michelle's in the US at the moment) and got to meet Nickerjac again. I had a good look and feel of the Handmaiden yarn (or should I say the bit that was left as it had, apparently, been flying off the shelves like hot cakes!) I loved the texture of the Mission Falls Cotton and the colours of the Koigu were amazing. It was with a great effort of will that I stopped myself from buying the Koigu yarn for the delectable new Koigu Oriental Jacket which I've fallen hopelessly and madly in love with. Nickerjac and I, however, have agreed that it's probably better both from the points of view of getting just the right colour palette and for saving one from bankruptcy to buy a bit at a time and gradually acquire the yarn to make it with.

So, what did I buy? Well, I was relatively restrained and bought only two skeins of yarn. Admittedly one was a 200g skein of Handmaiden Silk Spun which is enough to make the Silk Vee the pattern of which comes with it. The other skein is Feza Premier and isn't for me so doesn't count! I also bought the Mason-Dixon Knitting book which has been on my wish list for some time.


I have a few bits of news! I've bought my own domain and am in the process of setting up my very own e-Shop so that I can sell some of my handmade jewellery. I've become quite addicted to making it you see and there's a limit to how much I can wear myself and how much I can actually afford to give away. A couple of potential opportunities have also come up knitting-wise but I can't say too much about that at the moment.

The last few days have seen me experimenting with earrings. Firstly, I made these silver feather earrings.


Then, I made a couple of single earrings (below) which I'm going to cannibalise as they were only experiments. Actually, the one on the left I'm rather proud of and I'm going to save the bottom bit and just discard the top bead as it's a bit too long and dangly, I think. The bit I'm chuffed about is the wire work at the bottom which was my very first attempt at this sort of thing which I've taught myself from instructions in a magazine.


I've finished the back and the left front of the Rapunzel cardi but I doubt if it will be ready in time for Tuesday to give to the new baby (or rather the new baby's mum) as work is very busy at the moment and I seem to be spending a lot of my spare time making jewellery!