Happy Birthday Mum!

It was Mum’s birthday this week and I recently succeeded in getting her back into knitting (I think sending her my first published pattern in the Knitter may have played a part – there was also a tempting sweater pattern in the same issue!)

As it were her who taught me to knit in the first place, aged about 5, I thought an apt present might be to sew a knitting needle roll in which to keep that fast growing collection of Knit Pro interchangable needles.

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I found this sweet sewing tutorial over at Today We Made and adapted it to include an extra pocket for cables, stitch holders and the little purse I made to hold knitting notions.

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This was also my first attempt at making a hand sewn button loop (I saw they were a challenge on the Great British Sewing Bee and thought I’d have a go.) It was hard! But I’m quite pleased with this for a first attempt.

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Now I just need to sew a second one for myself!

Headphone cosies!

After losing my second pair of earphones this year, I decided it was about time I did something to make me look after them a bit better. I’d seen a couple of peeps working on crocheting and knitting around the cord, but i felt like it would take an age, and I wanted to go for more of a retro feel.

I went with macramé in the end, working square knots for the long cord that attaches to the jack, and then spiral knots for each side going up to the ears.  I also decided to make an extra cord joining the two earphones up, as I have a habit of hanging them around my neck if I go into a shop, or need to speak to someone, and before I know it they’ve fallen down and are dragging along the floor.  As I said, I’m not very good at looking after headphones, which is why I don’t allow myself to use any that cost too much money!

This took about 5-6 hours to complete, it’s a bit of fun, and it gave me nostalgia to making friendship bracelets back at school! I love how they’ve turned out, plus, the thin cables are now quite protected in their snug cosies.  I should add this yarn is super posh – Wollmeise 80% merino, 20% nylon blend, and feels like it’s worthy of it’s £22 price tag.   I was gifted a small leftover ball by Ellen Gill, and it proved the best thing in my stash for showing up stitch definition and looking awesome macraméd over the earphones.  I have yet to knit anything with it, I think I have enough left for a swatch!

 

Join the Tea Cosy Craze!

As some of you are aware, I also regularly write for a blog for Cosy Tea. Once a week I feature free knitting patterns for tea cosies which I have found online or patterns that are sent to me.

'Button Up Your Cup' - Simply Notable

Since I started writing for Cosy Tea back in October, I have gathered quite a few free knitting patterns for Tea cosies and mug cosies. The pattern page is starting to pack out a bit now and is looking good, so I thought I’d share a few here and direct you over there to take a look!

Garden Party Tea Cosy - Loani Prior

You can find links to these gorgeous knitting patterns, and stacks more free ones over at Cosy Tea’s Blog. Don’t forget to check out the tea too!

Grannies Traditional Teacosy - Keren Smith

Thank you to Loani Prior, Keren Smith and Simply Notable for use of photos 🙂