Welcome to August’s journal entry! The school summer holidays are almost over and we are getting ready for my eldest son to return to school.
The holidays have still had a much more relaxed feel to them while I still recover from surgery. I was allowed to drive again and things are much closer to normal, but there is still some more healing to do.
On The Needles & Hooks this month
This month started off with a new blanket for my eldest. He loves Minecraft and playing Minecraft in real life with his friends. We haven’t ventured into letting him play online with them yet. So I wanted to make them a Nether Portal blanket that he can hang up on his door frame. Now when he and his friends are playing Minecraft they have a Nether Portal prop to play with. For those of you who know any Minecraft loving kids you can find the recipe for free here.
I have been making some excellent progress on the Pagan Sky jumper by Zanete Knits. The Drops Soft Tweed yarn feels soft and warm and I am excited to finish it. I braved trying it on once – it fit – and I got my hair very tangled up in the jumper and yarn ends. I need to figure out how to do that more gracefully! The sleeves are left to complete and I aim to finish those next month. I have also learnt two new techniques making this so far – a folded neck and tubular cast off!
Whilst knitting the pattern I also noticed something about the instructions. It has always been a frustration for me when I write my own colourwork patterns that I write black squares represent the contrast colour – yet I so often use white yarn as the contrast. It feels backwards and confusing. I always kept it this way because if people print the pattern I wanted to help them save ink by using black for fewer squares. In the Pagan Sky instructions the colourwork charts use a pink square for the main colour and a white square for the contrast colour. As a compromise I am going to trial using this too. I don’t want to use up lots of pink ink – though greyscale is an option – but this colour combination seems more intuitive when knitting.
Last month I mentioned two new upcoming designs – a rose inspired cowl, and a lace baby blanket. The baby blanket is going to take me a little longer to write up, however the Delicate Rose Cowl was finalised and published this month, and it uses the new chart colouring I am trialling mentioned above. Grab your copy now on Ravelry or Gumroad. Although this wasn’t the aesthetic I intended I love it anyway. Roses are a beautiful flower that bring a quiet elegance to gardens – especially mine which has two young children running in it – and the motifs capture that nicely.
The final project I started this month is a crochet gift blanket made of squares. Initially I wanted to do the same square across the entire blanket, but I asked AI to show me what that would look like and I changed my mind. So I am now alternating blocks between two different patterns. I am not sure how big to make the blanket yet.
At Home & Travelling
With the majority of my healing done, we have ventured out this month further afield for holiday.
Our first adventure was a bit of a test run to Great Yarmouth seafront one day, Lowestoft beach the next day, and then a day at Africa Alive. I was very glad of the lazy day on the beach in between!
We also had a surprisingly eventful solar eclipse! We made pin hole cameras during the day, and then as us and the neighbours were coming out of our homes the water main burst under our driveway! It was a bit of an ordeal getting it repaired, but for the solar eclipse it was a lot of fun and excitement for the kids who enjoyed running and splashing in the new water park 😂
(I appear to have moved the photos from both of those entries to my computer which I will be able to upload next week).
To end the school holidays we braved a last minute holiday across the country. First we travelled to Oxford and spent the day at the Museum of Natural History, Pitts River Museum, and the Covered Marketplace. I think this was the first time any of us had been to Oxford so this was extra special to do as a family.
One wish about travelling to museums is that I could spend more time looking at the exhibits and learning about them. Young children just want to keep moving what seems as fast as possible!
After Oxford we continued our travels to Herefordshire, spending time at Goodrich Castle, Clearwater Caves, Wye Valley Butterfly Zoo, Bristol Zoo, and National Museum Cardiff.
There were so many things I loved about Herefordshire. Goodrich Castle was very interesting and both my boys loved it, but the highlight for me was the artwork at the National Museum Cardiff – particularly the JMW Turner paintings, but also Monet, Van Gogh, and a Rodin statue.
Looking Ahead
Moving into September there is likely to be a lot less crafting amongst the school runs and a new part-time job as Clerk for a neighbouring village. I am also reminded how over-ambitious I was for August’s goals!
My knitting and crochet goals for September are to:
- write up the baby blanket pattern mentioned in Julys’ post
- finish the Pagan Sky jumper
- crochet more of the gift blanket
- chart out the second rose inspired cowl
What are your goals for September?
Take care and happy crafting,
Love Sam xox
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