A little knitting round-up

After realising in the middle of writing my post about my coat last week that I hadn't yet blogged my Land of Sweets cowl, it quickly occurred to me that there were a few other knitting projects that I hadn't shared here too, so I thought I'd do a little round-up of them for you. Let's start with my cowl being as it's what inspired this post in the first place.

The Land of Sweets cowl is a pattern by Helen Stewart that's designed to use the mini skeins from a yarn advent calendar. Instead of doing that, I used 10 mini skeins from a variety of UK indie dyers (they're listed on my Ravelry project page) that I collected together gradually over the course of a year or so. As I had 10 colours, I used each one twice and omitted four of the sections in the pattern so I have 20 stripes instead of the intended 24.

It was a really fun pattern to knit, and became slightly addictive as I was always wanting to get to the next colour change. If you're thinking about knitting this pattern and wondering about how much yarn you'll need, it's worth mentioning that having used each of my mini skeins twice I still had about half of each one left so my Mum is currently in the middle of knitting another cowl for herself using my leftovers.

Going back in time a bit further, last autumn I knitted a Sockhead Slouch Hat for my sister for her birthday. The Sockhead hat is a free pattern by Kelly McClure. It's super simple so was nice and relaxing to knit. The yarn that I used for this one was from Lamington Lass. It's on her Soft Sock base in the Swirling Flock Splash colourway, and I loved it so much that I was "forced" to buy another skein so I'd have some to knit for myself (more on that later!).

I really liked the feel of the hat and decided I'd like one for myself. I don't wear hats that are too slouchy though, so I made mine significantly shorter - I knitted 3 inches of rib, then 5 inches of stocking stitch before starting the decreases. It worked out really nicely and it's a very useful hat - warm enough to keep me cosy, but small enough to be easy to shove in my bag when it's not needed.

The yarn that I used is from What Mustard Made - it's her Bert the Yarn colourway. It's super fun with all the colourful speckles, and the good news for me is that this hat used less than half of the skein so I think I've got enough left for some socks if I combine it with a contrast colour for the heels/toes/cuffs.

Speaking of socks, last year I decided that it would be a good idea to knit socks as Christmas presents for my Dad, siblings and siblings-in-law. I'm not a quick knitter, so thankfully I had the foresight to get started early! I cast on the first pair in August so I effectively had to knit a pair of socks per month to meet my deadline - definitely do-able! In the end I actually managed to finish them well ahead of schedule, which is rare for me as I'm often making Christmas presents right up until the last minute.

I used different patterns for all of them (because knitting the same pattern five times in a row would have been a bit tedious!). Working clockwise from the top left, the patterns for the four above are Vanilla Latte, Atlantic Current, Riverbend and Rockpool. The final ones, which are in the foreground of the first sock photo, were Staggered Path socks.

Once I'd finished knitting all of those socks, I was definitely ready to make something for myself again! As I mentioned earlier, I'd ordered myself a skein of the yarn from Lamington Lass that I used to knit my sister's hat and I decided to combine that with a semi-solid skein from Woolly Mama Yarns to make the Right Around The Corner shawl by Lisa Hannes.

This pattern is beautifully simple but effective, and it was the perfect pattern for me to have to knit on whilst still being sociable when I was with family over the Christmas period. The two yarns that I used also work perfectly together, which is a happy coincidence being as they came from different dyers!

I think that's about all I have to share for today! I really enjoyed knitting all of these projects. In fact I've been really enjoying knitting in general recently. I've got a cardigan almost complete and another shawl and two pairs of socks on the needles, so hopefully I'll have some more finished projects to share with you soon. Have you been knitting anything recently?