Knitterly distractions

I’m glad I took my kids with me to the polls yesterday, so they could see what happens and understand the process. I feel passionately that they understand that it’s important to vote – and that it’s up to them to decide how to vote. My son is into maths just now, so he understands how close the result was, and how important it is therefore that we have our say.

But since this is a blog about knitting and not politics, I’m distracting myself by getting my summer knitting planning underway.

Do you do this too? Planning for a season is something I find helpful, not just for a specific trip or outing. We’ll be in and out a bit over the summer hols and there’s the summer KAL happening soon on the Ravelry board. I’ve been thinking ahead to what I want to work on – and when – so that it’s easy for me to know which project to reach for. Here’s my plan:

I just love how light and airy Colour Trail is knit in lace – perfect for summer!

Affinity KAL with Purlescence

A while ago Sarah from Purlescence and I talked about the possibility of our linking up on a knit-a-long (KAL) using one of the patterns from the Knit Play Colour book. Purlescence have a great group of followers who have keenly participated in their KALs in the past. Since Purlescence have several of the yarns which I used in the book, it looked like it would be fun to do a KAL together.

Colour? Texture? How will you create an affinity for your yarns?

Knit Play Colour love at Yarndale!

Wow.

No, really. That’s the word that comes to mind to describe an amazing, woolly time in Skipton at Yarndale last weekend. Now that I’ve had time to catch my breath, not only from the long drive back but also from launching the book yesterday, it’s been lovely to look back at the photos and re-live the weekend all over again.

No, I’m not really knitting on the motorway! We were stopped for an hour due to an accident. The engine was OFF!

It was a very early start from Twickenham on the Friday morning and we were making good time until we came to a closure due to an accident. Is it only us knitters who welcome the opportunity to come to a full stop on the motorway? The rest of the weekend was so busy, this is probably the most knitting I accomplished over three days!

My traveling companion, Alli, and I made good time to Yarndale once we were moving again, and even managed to beat Victoria and the Eden Cottage Yarns team to the venue for set up! Pretty soon though, we were lugging boxes and boxes of yarn into the ginormous quadruple stand and making it ready for Saturday’s opening:

This is just a small portion of the stand filled with Victoria’s yummy yarns!

Victoria was launching her collection at Yarndale – Drift (more on that in another post as it deserves it’s own!) – but was kind enough to offer me a little corner of her stand where I set up for the launch of Knit Play Colour. Victoria has also arranged for samples from the book to be knit in her own yarns, and they were wonderful! It was hard not to get carried away showing them off and helping people choose yarns and colours to make their own projects.

My own little corner of the Eden Cottage Yarns stand

Aren’t those little yarnlings delicious? Perfect for a stripe-y version of Yarn Tamer or Resonate…

And look how AMAZING the Shadowlines wrap came out in Eden Cottage Yarns’ Whitfell Chunky! This is what happens when you play:

You’ll need 8-10 skeins of ECY Whitfell Chunky to knit this indulgent wrap

The rest of Yarndale was a bit of a blur, to be honest! I spent so much time chatting with many of you and I can’t tell you overwhelming it is to finally have the book out there in the world and see your response to it. Thank you to everyone who stopped by, tried on the garments, picked up a book and gave me good wishes. Thank you!

One of the few things I managed to get a picture of – these gorgeous yarn bowls!

And for those of you who thought it might be torture being on a stand all weekend with all that lovely yarn? Well, you were right. There was no way I could resist this:

My Yarndale splurge – time for something for ME! It’s such a “Louise colour” isn’t it?

I figure after knitting all of those accessories that surely I can take a break with knitting a garment? I’m looking forward to the kids’ half-term, when I’ll be knitting this.

If you were there, I hope you enjoyed Yarndale as much as I did. Look out for more yarnie confessions on Instagram, as I get myself organised again!

PS if you pre-ordered Knit Play Colour, all the pre-orders have now been shipped. Yay!