Grinding the stumps away

These two chaps finally turned up to grind away at the tree stumps. There was a huge eucalyptus just on the edge of the patio, and four further conifer trees, all of which dominated the garden and were completely out of scale. These came down late October last year.

Our fences were put up yesterday and today, and there is a small section, which will need to be made and fitted next week. Now I will be able to start sorting out the garden and the planting. Hopefully kind friends will find bits and pieces of herbaceous and perennial plants and bring them or post them on to me!

Now you can see the Pattern, Shadow Knitting

If you look at the pot holders from a low angle, you can see the pattern! I now have two new pot holders for the kitchen. The ones they are replacing are at least 15 years old. They are bar beer mats/towels. When I moved in with David he had no oven mitts, and I found that the beer towels were just the right size. With the flames from the gas cooker, the smaller square potholders are just the ticket!

Now you can't see it: Shadow Knitting

They usually say it is best to knit a swatch to check tension before starting on a big project. I thought a swatch would also be a good idea, as this was the first time I had tried this technique, and I wanted to see what the effect was with my own eyes. The pot holders seemed to be more interesting than just a swatch, so armed with light and dark double knit cotton, I started. Soon the pattern irked, so I decided to add a pattern to prevent the boredom!

Cup Cakes

Just take a look at these: eye candy or what!

Veronica made these and sent me a picture. They are just so pretty and with yellow cases too for lemon flavoured cakes for her mother on mother's day.

There is no end to this girl's talent. She made hand made cosmetics for me and is now making a wool rug!

Knitting too many things at the same time

Having looked through Vivian Hoxbro's book on Shadow Knitting, I just had to try it. I'd bought some double knitting weight cotton in contrasting colours to try out a swatch to master the technique. A big swatch can be a pan holder, so I started on the POT HOLDER in the book, and by the 6th row I was bored. To add interest I decided to put in a chequer board pattern rather than the four stripes. Having finished the first, using the kitchen scales, there is sufficient yarn to knit a second. No knitting is wasted though and the techniques both for the two tone effects and the very neat edge stitches will no doubt be useful in the future. In addition I shall have two new pot holders. On balance lace knitting wins over shadow knitting especially as today "Knitting Lace Triangles" by Evelyn Clark arrived today from Get Knitted. I'm already thinking of the design for my holiday tucker in Hemp for Morocco.

With the Swallow Tail tucker still on the needles I had to buy more 3.5mm needles for the Shadow Knitting at knitting club on Tuesday at Web of Wool. This gave me the chance to try out Schoeller & Stahl Circular Needles. How they glide. They will be perfect for knitting up the yarns which don't quite like the equally lovely Brittany pins.

Before leaving on Tuesday I realised that I also would like some reddish socks and settled on a lovely Regia yarn by Kaffe Fassett Shade 4258. I've persuaded myself that it always useful to have some socks on the go, for when lace knitting is a little too taxing, and pot holders too boring!