Retro Knitting

Having inherited this fabulous book from my mum,

I opened it up for the first time today, and found this collection of handwritten patterns - love the idea of inheriting something that has been tried, tested and annotated, like getting a secondhand book with a stranger's name and notes in, so personal and somehow "connected". Plus, if you look closely, you can see the book is one year older than me! It also contained this very stylish 80s lovely. 

It has some amazing photography: I especially like this motorcycle chick, modelling a sweater!

And this is very glamorous - but a cable knit bikini? Hardly practical!

I think I'll be sticking to hats for the moment ...

[http://www.thisbutterflymind.blogspot.com/]

A weekend of making

It's been a hectic old summer, especially workwise, but this weekend I finally made some time for making.

I finished The Boy's bobble hat,

knocked up a very stylish (if I say so myself) knitting bag from an old skirt to prevent the cat from running around the house with my half-finished knitting in her mouth,

and baked this fantastic pistachio cake with cream cheese frosting, mmmmm:

Having swapped a creative marketing job for a responsible middle management job about two years ago, I really find these weekend things very satisfying.  I think it helps me bridge the gap between the "work me" and the "real me", which feel pretty separate these days. Now, to find a way to bring those two closer together ...

Knitting delight

Last weekend, inspired by the ever-increasing bevy of knitting mammas among my friends - see Helen's lovely 'Hand-me-down Handicraft' piece on A Matriarchal Cornucopia  - and fired up by my failure to take to crochet, I decided to learn to knit.

Perhaps rashly, and not a little swayed by the helpfulness of the lady at Teasels Yarncrafts, I invested in some 7mm needles and a chunky yarn (ideally for hiding beginner's mistakes, apparently!) and set to work.

I'm doing ok - I tackled casting on and knit stitch via the wonderful videojug How To tutorials and, so far, my scarf is growing nicely.

I admit to a little bit of a wonky start where I gained stitches at an amazing / alarming rate, and a few holes where I hadn't quite got the tension thing nailed, but I am powering on and may do a little judicious embellishment with ribbons, buttons and the like, to hide the mistakes! Or I'll just claim the whole thing is an artisanale design ...(sorry, family joke!)

I am thoroughly enjoying myself - the rhythm and low-level concentration required is very relaxing.

It also seems quite zeitgeisty: having posted my inital efforts on Facebook, lots of friends came out of the woodwork to confess their own first steps into granny-dom. Some kind of credit crunch make-do-and-mend movement, or are we just turning into our mothers? (Not necessarily such a bad thing!)