Wibbo's Words

Washcloths

A knitted washcloth is a quick and easy-to-make gift. Wrap it in pretty paper with a lovely bar of soap. I have a couple of free washcloth patterns ready to download in my Ravelry Store.

Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy is an easy washcloth to knit - it's a garter stitch square knitted from corner-to-corner using simple increases and decreases to form the shape. Knit this pattern in two or more colours or use a self-striping yarn. A pure cotton or a cotton/synthetic blend yarn works best for a washcloth.

Leaf Lace Washcloth has a simple lace pattern surrounded by garter stitch borders. The lace pattern has written instructions or there's a chart if you prefer to work from one. Yarn choices as above.

Random Precision

My new design, released today, is called Random Precision and the pattern is available from my Ravelry Store. A quick preview:

Random Precision contains two patterns; a small cowl (green) knitted in sock yarn and a large cowl (purple) knitting in DK weight. As ever, both  patterns have been tech edited and test knitted. There's a £1.00 off promotion running from tomorrow, November 15, until November 21 using the Coupon Code FLOYD.

This and that, Friday style

Knitting: new design samples for mitten patterns.

Baking: no-knead wholemeal bread; recipe and method from The Quince Tree. I've been making three loaves at a time and freezing them; I haven't eaten bought bread at home for a couple of months.

Eating: 'tis the weather for making and eating homemade soup. A stewpack of veg for £1 makes a fair amount of soup.

Drinking: New York Breakfast and Ginger Spice teas from T2.

Music: mainly Daily Mixes  and my own playlists on Spotify.

Listening

I listen to a lot of audiobooks; they're perfect listening while I work.  I have an Audible subscription and also download audiobooks from Brighton & Hove Libraries free BorrowBox service. There's list of this year's books (including physical books, e-books and audiobooks) on Pinterest.

This audiobook is my best non-fiction listen so far this year; it's an incredible story that sounds like a good spy novel but it's all true. 

 

In the pipeline...

I'm working on some new designs for fingerless mittens. I've swatched for this design several times already and I'm finally happy with how the stitch pattern, needle size and yarn work together.

The yarn is Drops Baby Merino; a lovely soft sport weight yarn. I'm surprised how good the stitch definition is. More soon!

And another....

I hate the amount/style of betting adverts on the radio (I mainly listen to Planet Rock). The adverts are shouty and style betting as 'exciting', 'unmissable fun' and 'smart'. There's nothing smart about betting; it's how to get yourself in debt and the only people who get rich are bookmakers.

This tiny Victorian moneybox is my reminder never to bet; it's made from china and has a slot across the top which is chipped in several places. It belonged to my grandma who gave it to me when I left home in the Sixties to go to art school. She told me not to be tempted by betting on anything; her mum used to raid the moneybox when she'd run out of money to bet on horse racing, using a knife to slide out the coins, hence the chips.

Did she win bets and make her fortune? As you might expect, the answer is no.

A little rant

Long time no see!

I've decided to resurrect my blogging schedule after dallying with social media far too much lately. These days, Instagram is so full of adverts and pushy posts from people trying to sell their wares that it's become much less pleasurable to scroll through. I don't do Facebook and even Pinterest is getting to be much the same as Instagram - it's buy, buy, buy all the time.  I find that Twitter is still enjoyable as long as I don't read much in the way of comments.

I choose to pay for this blog so there are no adverts here. And there never will be.

I will, however, still show photos of my new designs and provide Ravelry links, but that's about it!

Spirality

Now available as a Ravelry download here. 20% discount until midnight GMT on May 14 using coupon code SPIRAL.

Happy knitting!