It's official, Ryan Gosling loves knitting.

So, in a recent interview (click here), Mr Gosling admitted that "If I had to design my perfect day, that [knitting] would be it."   *SWOON*

Purple Snood

©TheYarningDarling 2012

Another knitted Christmas gift!

My sister-in-law loves scarves.  She also loves purple.  So, it made sense to combine the two to make her a scarf!  I decided to make her a snood, or infinity scarf, with cables.  I wanted to break them up with a rib, but wanted to do something a bit different, so I flicked through my book of stitiches and found the brioche rib.  Seemed easy enough and I liked that it added a bit of thickness so that the scarf would be all snug and warm.

I started it in November on the plane to see my boy and originally made the edges in a seed stitch.

©TheYarningDarling 2012

This all started out fine, but for some reason, the brioche rib unravelled on the plane, luckily I managed to save it.  Whilst in LA, it happened again, but this time it was HUGE!  Silly me didn't take any tools with me, not even a crochet hook!  I had to improvise and with a safety pin I patched the area up; it didn't look great but it did the job and looked alright from the right side.

©TheYarningDarling 2012

Three balls of yarn in and one to go, it happened again!! ARRGGGHHH! I'm a bit of a perfectionist and having three fairly big mistakes annoyed me.  Like, seriously annoyed me.  The only solution was to start all over again.  It's funny how satisfying it can be to unwind 20+ hours of work :/

©TheYarningDarling 2012

Thankfully, it all went well the second time round - albeit a few minor mistakes!  And my sister-in-law loved it :)

For those who want to know, I used the Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran yarn on 5mm needles.

Vintage-style Tea Cosy

©TheYarningDarling 2013

So this was tea cosy number two - made for my boyfriend's sister as her Christmas present.  Well, I'd actually bought her a lovely Cath Kidston teapot and made the tea cosy to match it :)

I used exactly the same pattern as the one made for my 'twin' in a previous post.  For this one, I replaced the pompom on top with a rose.  Now, I'd love to write down some kind of pattern, but I'm afraid I made it up on the spot and didn't write down a pattern :(  All I can say is that it's a stockinette stitch so that it did that curly thing!  Oh, and the leaves were crocheted.

I was pretty sad when I had to give it away, I loved it so much!  But I'm a coffee drinker so if I had a 6 cup teapot it would just sit and gather dust!

Theft of Intellectual Property

Update: I contacted the UK admin for DaWanda and they agreed with me that it was a copyright violation.  They have since deleted the listing and sent the seller and message reminding them of the T&C's for selling.  So pleased :D


Sorry to have to write a serious post, but I've discovered that someone has been selling my free Giraffe pattern on a German based website Dawanda.com.  http://de.dawanda.com/product/37617009-Amigurumi-Giraffe-Haekelanleitung

This person has never contacted me regarding selling my pattern for their own personal profit and has tried to apply a copyright to the picture they've even stolen from my blog.

Due to this, I've had to put a stern message on my pattern :(

I'd be so grateful if you could let me know if you discover this pattern anywhere else, and if you could ask the seller to delete the pattern immediately.

Thank you.

Tea Cosy

Hey guys! I know it's been a while - I've been busy like a little bee knitting away in all of my free time making various gifts for people.  I did, however, make one gift that wasn't a Christmas one and so I can blog about it!

When I first started knitting, my twin (in the ironic sense, she's tall, white and blonde; I'm short, brown and have curly hair), asked me to make her a tea cosy as her teapot was feeling cold and was feeling a bit sad about it.  I promised her I would once my knitting skills were up to scratch. About a month ago I decided now was the time to try.

I found a pattern on Ravelry by Patons for a classic pleated tea cosy with a pom pom on top which looked cute.  My friend's favourite colours were turquoise and cherry red.  I held the colours together and didn't think they quite matched so I went for a deep turquoise and mint green.  I'm pretty pleased with the result, especially as it's my first one using more than one colour :)

Well, that's about it for now!

UPDATE: My twin received the cosy and now her teapot is all warm and snug, yay!

Quick Update

:O I've just realised it's be a whole month since my last post!

Anyways, I've been beavering away on a project...a knitted Christmas gift...yep, I'm being super organised this year!  Sorry I can't put a full picture up of my WIP, it has to be a surprise, but here's a sneak peak ;)

My next few projects will also be gifts so my blog will be devoid of pictures for a while, but expect an inundation of posts from me come Christmas Day!

Take care everyone :)

Another Baby Cardigan!

Guess I'm at that age where mostly everyone I know is either getting married or having babies. Some friends of mine are expecting a little bundle of joy in October and had a baby shower last weekend - so I did what I do best and made the little bubba something from yarn!

I was talking to another friend (the mum of the little girl I made the last cardigan for) and she said a baby cardigan for them would be perfect especially as it'll be a winter baby.

I decided that I wanted to knit a seed (moss) stitch cardigan with ribbed edges and a hood.  So, you know, not really that specific at all.  I spent quite a few hours looking for patterns all over the place but to no avail.  But alas, whilst browsing Ravelry I came across a raglan baby cardigan in seed stitch, ribbed edges and a hood.  I couldn't believe my luck! I purchased that pattern in a heartbeat!  

There I was, all excited that I was going to make this amazing cardigan and started reading through the pattern and saw...Circular needles...what?!...knitting in the round with double pointed needles (DPN's)...whaaatttt?!  I've only ever knitted on single points :/

I saw this as a challenge and I couldn't avoid these things forever, especially if I am to become the knitting extraordinaire that I want to be.  I went out a bought me some bamboo circulars and DPN's and got to work. Again, I used Rowan All-Seasons Cotton as it's easier to take care of especially where babies are concerned.  I cast on, then got into my head that I was knitting the body in the round with the circulars and got into a major panic.  How could I join 30 stitches across a 80cm circular?!  I decided to email the lovely lady who designed the pattern and she cleared things up for me instantly.  Eventually it would be 108 stitches long; the circular is used just to hold all the stitches and not to knit in the round.  Phew!

Then came the sleeves, DPN's and knitting in the round.  Whenever I've seen pictures of socks being knitted and seen all those DPN's, I'd get scared.  Plain scared.  It looked so complicated! Thank goodness for YouTube.  Is it bad that that it taught me how to knit in the round?!  Well, I am glad to say it was no where nearly as scary as it looks, and actually pretty enjoyed it!

Anyways, two weeks later, ta da! I finished the cardigan on the morning of the baby shower so I cut that one really fine!  The parents-to-be loved it.  I can't wait to see the little one wearing it when he/she is born :)