Just a quick post to let everyone know our xmas opening times. We are open until about 2pm on Christmas Eve and then closed until Friday and Saturday. We will be open from 10-4 on both those days. Then we close over New Year and open again on Wednesday 2nd at 9.30.

Any web orders will be dealt with and posted  on the days we are open.

Have a great Christmas!

Today is my last day in the shop before Christmas. Earlier in the week it was quite busy but I think now even the most optimistic have realised that actually there is not time to knit that person a jumper and in fact a pair of socks may be pushing it. 

Personally I have to admit defeat there is one item not completed, well actually it is barely started but the recipient does have a birthday early in the New Year so maybe!

I am really pleased with the mitts I have knitted for Jess and my daughter says they stay on. I used the mitten pattern in The Knitters Book of Handy Patterns  by Ann Budd and although initially it looked really complicated when you got going it was easy to follow although I must admit I used the tension measurements on the ball band instead of knitting a tension square.  I used  some 4 ply sock wool that I had left over and the amount of wool used was tiny.

Now I think I had better concentrate on feeding the family and get on with some cooking etc.  as they all come at the weekend and our house will be full!

I hope everyone reading this has everything they wish for themselves, whether it is a frantic time visiting family and friends or a quiet time to relax.

A Very Merry Christmas andd a Happy and Healthy New Year.

Well, I am really pleased with myself. I only have 1 glove of christmas knitting left to do, fantastic! I have also done a couple of extra bits that weren’t on my list and I am so chuffed that for the first time in a few years I won’t be panic knitting on Christmas Eve. The Webmaster will be VERY pleased about that.

I do have some sewing to finish but it isn’t vital present sewing, just decorations. I’m making some ho-ho-ho bunting and a christmas tree skirt. Both are well started so I’m sure they will be finished by the weekend. I also have to make an outfit for my daughter’s nativity. She has to be a king as they don’t have enough boys in her pre-school which I thought was great as her brother has a king outfit already. But no, she must be a Princess King so I am revamping the outfit to make it more girly. I bought some gaudy gold net so I must get cracking on that for next week. Luckily my son is a ’scruffy shepherd’ in his nativity and just has to wear the traditional tea towel and a grown-ups t-shirt. Easy.

By the way, any members of Malvern Knit and Natter who haven’t heard about the venue for the 18th please get in touch for details. This Tuesday (11th) will be the last meeting at the Mount Pleasant until 8th January 2008.

We came 2nd in the Malvern Christmas Window Competition! Many thanks to everyone who has popped into the shop to say how great it looks. Unfortunately my photography skills don’t show how it looks in real life but hopefully you can get the gist! Pat, Mary and I won a voucher for the Anupam ( a great local indian restaurant) which we shall enjoy in January after the hectic christmas period.

Recent visitors to the shop may have seen us crocheting snowflakes. We entered the Christmas Window Competition and as the theme was ‘Winter Wonderland’ we decided to fill the window with a snowstorm. We started crocheting snowflakes as and when we had a spare few minutes and we had accumulated a small pile of them when we realised that actually to fill the window we would need around 200. So the heat was on and for the past 10 days we had a target of 20 a day between us which was more gruelling than it sounds!

So you could recreate this in your own home with our free snowflake pattern! It’s in the free patterns section. We used Sirdar Blur for ours.

We are also running a competition to guess the number of snowflakes in the window. We didn’t count them before we hung them so we won’t know the answer until after Christmas when we change the window. We are giving away a Kaffe Fassett sock kit to the person who guesses correctly or nearest. There are 3 ways to enter. Every customer who makes a purchase in the shop gets to make one guess, every website order gets one guess and anyone who leaves a comment on the blog can have one guess. Good luck!! All guesses must be in by Saturday 22nd December and the winner will be announced early January.

Here is our latest window, coinciding with a turn for colder weather, it is mainly scarves. Everything in the window is knitted with Mission Falls 1824 wool or cotton. Both are interchangeable and absolutely beautiful to knit with.

The shawl on the left is from the East & West book which will be on the website next week. It’s covered in cables and bobbles and has lovely twisted tassels all around. Thanks to Janet for knitting it for us!

The bag was knitted by Mary and is in the Recollection book. She has lined it with pretty fabric and it has great touches like the cute buttons on the ends of the straps.

The sripey cardi which you can just see on the right is from Wee Knits 3 and is knitted in the cotton by me! Even though the sizing only goes up to 2 years old in the Wee Knits books, they are quite generous and with a bit of extra length it does fit my almost 4 year old.

The scarves are dotted in all the other books and we all had a hand in those. each of them seems to have a great scarf pattern! Please as always e-mail or ring the shop for more info if there is anything in the window which takes your fancy!

The website now has some goodies for Christmas. We have lots of Lantern Moon accessories, new kits and some great knitting needles.

I think I am a bit behind this year again!  Still got two scarves , a doll’s blanket and a throw to go not to mention a few sewing projects.  I am a great believer in the saying ‘ that if it wasn’t for the last minute nothing would get done.’

I have been knitting fingureless gloves from the RYC Accessories Book.  It is a good way of trying out some yarns.  Sublime Merino DK has great stitch definition and is lovely knit.  Rowan Tapestry is very pretty and has made a really snuggly pair of gloves.  Will try Rowan’s Felted Tweed next.

A few Saturdays ago when I was working in the shop, the Webmaster let the kids watch Dr. Who and the Daleks and they LOVED it. They each picked out their favourite daleks and spent the rest of the weekend doing impressions. Claudie announced that she wanted a Dalek teddy so I scoured the internet but perhaps unsurprisingly you can’t get them. Luckily I stumbled across this pattern which I think is brilliant so now I’m knitting a red and silver one. If I have time I’ll knit Jake a blue one but you know how this christmas knitting gets. Good intentions turn into stress around mid-December. It happens to me every year. Still, now I only have 1 sock, 2 scarves, 6 bookmarks and 2 daleks to knit for actual christmas presents, that’s around 1.5 projects a week. It sounds do-able at this stage. Oh, but I bought some fabric at the Quilt show to make a christmas tree skirt and saw a great pattern for some hohoho bunting which I thought I’d have a bash at too. I’m sure it will be fine…

We have been embracing National Knitting Week here at the shop! We organised goody bags for our Knit’n'Natter club here in Malvern. Thanks to the generosity of Sirdar, Viridian and Designer Yarns we gave away bags worth £40 for a £10 donation to Breast Cancer Research. We had about 20 people there last night which was great, about half of those were new faces so the word is spreading about our club. We still have a few bags which we are offering to people who call into the shop so that we can reach our target of a £300 donation.

Here we all are. The photo is dreadful and thanks to my rubbish camera (I should have known I can’t rely on it after it let me down at a pivotal moment on Monday) it is the only one I have despite taking at least 6! Still, hopefully you can get the gist that we were having a good time!

We are busy getting ready for the Autumn Quilt Show at the Three Counties in Malvern where we have a stand. We are taking some new kits there which will then be in the shop and also on the website before Christmas. Very exciting!

I am still having a finishing off phase at the moment which has been quite successful. I finished my Colinette Cadenza jumper which I’d started in April and have started on a Rowan Denim jacket for Jake which now I only have the sleeves to do. My shop knitting is a Noro Aurora wrap over cardigan and I have only the sleeves of that too and the mile long ties. However, christmas is creeping up on me and I’m mindful of the fact that I have 3 socks (1 got finished last night), 2 scarves and a pair of gloves to knit and 3 bookmarks to crochet. I should have time. Also, a lot of my friends and relatives are pregnant which means a lot of knitting but no babies are due until February which is good for my stress levels.

Have now returned from a super holiday in S. Africa.  Saw so many things, whales at Hermanus, beautiful flowers on the Cape and lots of wild things on safari up near Kruger.  Weather was very mixed but it really is a beautiful country.

Needless to say I took some knitting with me and actually knitted the bits for a cardigan for Jess,  now I have to sew it up and knit the collar and frill.  It is in the new tealy colour in Sirdar Tiny Tots and I am really pleased with it even though there are a lot of stitches on the needle for the frill.

My sister has been trying to knit a Debbie Bliss entrelac baby shawl and has been having huge problems with it.  It has been the subject of lots of phone calls.  Anyway after the last useless effort I suggested she phoned Designer Yarns who knew there was a problem straight away with the pattern and are sending her more instructions .  In the shop we have used helplines before and always found them very clear and knowledgable.  We are always very willing to help sort out problems in the shop if we can but it is good to know there is more expert help if we need it!

It’s good to be home and believe it or not back at work.  Once the garden is under control and the bulbs planted there will be more time for knitting and sewing!