Rhien, the perfect spring shawl

April 8, 2016 Sarah Alderson

Spring has definitely sprung around Yorkshire. The crocuses have been and gone and the daffodils are now in flower. The hills all around are changing from brown to a light green and there is definitely some warmth behind the sun. Even my Nan's orchid is gracing me with its beautiful flower.

As spring arrives my knitting likes to move to lighter weight accessories from the cozy winter woollies. Rhien, from my An Elven Reckoning book, is my favourite shawl to knit in warmer weather. The lace weight shawl is light enough to feel summery and yet it is warm enough to wrap around me as a shawl or scarf on colder days and a pretty wrap to cover my arms on warm evenings.

It is also a great project to travel with. The garter stitch and simple repeating lace pattern becomes easy to remember and it only needs one skein of lace weight so is light and portable.

I used Garthenor Organic Pure Wool Shetland Single Ply Laceweight yarn to knit this sample with and it was a lovely yarn to work with. The Shetland wool shows off the Shetland lace pattern beautifully and I love the natural colour. It would work well in colourful solid or semi-solid lace weight yarns too.

The pattern uses a percentage system to work the increase and decrease sections so all the skein can be used. Lace weight yarns are so beautiful it seems a shame to leave some unknitted!

The name Rhien means a crowned lady or Queen in Elvish. This shawl was inspired by my Nan Queenie, who was often called 'Queen' for short. She always wore a shawl no matter how warm the weather to keep her neck warm. I think she would have loved this one with its elegant lace pattern and curve.

To celebrate the arrival of spring and shawl-wearing weather I have released Rhien as an individual pattern for download and it has 15% off the regular price for this week only. No coupon code is needed, the discount will automatically be applied on checkout. Don't forget to sign up to my newsletter here if you want an even bigger discount!

I hope you are able to enjoy some spring weather and flowers too. What are your favourite things to knit in warmer weather?

Happy knitting,

Sarah x

The KCG Irish crochet lace trunk show

March 19, 2016 Sarah Alderson

On St Patrick's day our local branch of the Knitting & crochet guild had a trunk show of the beautiful pieces of Irish crochet from the collection. We got to hear all about the history of Irish lace and how it was made. You can watch my periscope of the event on katch but I thought I would share some of the lovely intricate lace pieces in more detail here.

I find it amazing that such fine and tiny white stitches were made by women who had very light to work by, only candles and possibly oil lamps, and they would not had bathrooms and hot running water so how they kept it so clean just amazes me.

The hook and thread is so thin, it is almost impossible to see the hook on the end. I think it is 0.4mm or less, they must have had good eyesight!

My favourite piece in the collection is this lace blouse. It was worn with the bottom of the blouse tucked in. The motifs are beautifully created and have such fine stitching, it is almost impossible to see the individual stitches. I love the little newt - can you spot it?

The baby gowns are also beautiful. I guess they would be for christenings or special occasions. I would not like to put a vomiting/drooling child in one of these too often!

Another fascinating piece was a book of patterns that was used to help join motifs together. Each motif was laid onto the pattern page and mesh stitches worked around to join them. The book was made of an interesting type of paper, it felt like the paper used in bank notes, almost fabric-like.

The motifs themselves are very beautiful and I intend to have a go at making some. This vintage book had lots of fun and pretty motifs including tennis rackets, the newt, butterflies and of course, lots of flowers and sprays.

My other favourite piece was this 1960's (?) shift dress made up of lots of Irish roses. They had sparkly beads in each centre and I love the style. I could imagine wearing that now!

After the event, Marie and I continued our celebration of St Patrick's day, but as we were both driving we had bottles of green apple fizz. We are so lucky being close to the KCG collection in Holmfirth. They do a great job collecting and preserving knitting and crochet pieces and it is well worth a visit on one of their open days if you get a chance.

MKAL finishing party!

March 5, 2016 Sarah Alderson

On the Other Hand MKAL finished two weeks ago and I am still catching up! It was a fantastic four weeks of fun. Thank you to everyone who joined in and contributed, both Ann and I had a great time watching everyones progress and seeing what wonderful colour and pattern combinations you all chose.

The final pattern was released with the official photos with both myself and Ann doing a live periscope.

My mittens were knit in Woolyknits 4ply classics in Navy and Duck Egg Blue. The corrugated rib and slip stitch mosaic and cable pattern was my design.

Ann designed the corrugated rib and lice (not an errata as many people thought!) and stranded colourwork patterns knit in King Cole merino 4ply.

There seemed to be lots of people choosing both designs and lots of mix and matching too. There was also a lot of very speedy knitters out there that managed to get both patterns done in the 4 weeks! I managed one and a half mittens in Ann's pattern and it is still on the needles waiting for me to finish....

It was very hard for us to choose the winners in the prize thread as there were so many fantastic colour combinations and people challenging themselves to try new techniques. I wish I could have given everyone a prize but we promised winners so my winning mittens were:

First prize to Yogelgryff for her wonderful use of colour and I love the addition of adding the buttons! She won an ebook copy of my book An Elven Reckoning.

Second prize went to Knittingyogi2 as I love her fraternal mitts and colour choice, and also for being adventurous and trying lots of new techniques! She wins 2 balls of Woolyknits 4ply classics.

Third prize went to EvilOverLady314 for a really fun mitten picture! Personally I am hoping that the little Totoro won the card game as he is one of my favourite characters, but it does look like EvilOverLady314 might win this one. She won a choice of a digital download of one of my patterns.

I hope everyone enjoyed the MKAL as much as we did. Ann and I are already beginning discussions about what we might do next year but we both need a bit of a rest from all the fun for a while! Don't forget to sign up to both of our newsletters for exclusive discounts and be the first to get news of our next MKAL! Thanks once again for all the lovely comments too, it is really great to read how much you all enjoyed it too.

On The Other Hand MKAL

January 29, 2016 Sarah Alderson

I have exciting news about my first Mystery Knit ALong (MKAL)! Over the next few weeks my friend Ann Kingstone and I will be releasing the pattern for On The Other Hand - a pair of fingerless mittens that are a mystery. Each week starting on Friday 5th February a section of the pattern will be released, until the whole pattern is released three weeks later.

What is very unusual about this MKAL is that there are two designs to choose from each week, each one by a different designer. Ann and I have been working together to come up with two great linked designs. On February 5th the cuff patterns will be delivered, then a week later the hand and thumb gusset and finally the finger and thumb cuffs. Each week you can choose to make either Ann's or my design as both will work with each other. This means you get lots of different options to choose from and it lets your creativity run wild!

The pattern is available to purchase now for £3.50 and you receive the initial information. Then each week an email will let you know that an update is available and you can download the next part. The patterns will be available to purchase after the MKAL for £4.25 so purchasing now and join in the MKAL fun for a bargain price!

The mittens use 4ply yarn in two colours. I recommend using colours to contrast well for the pattern to show at its best. The designs use 100m at most of the main colour and 90m of the contrasting colour, so it works well with 50g balls and leftovers. I am going to be joining in and making another pair with everyone and I have chosen to use some BaaRamEwe titus that I have left over from my Nórui jumper as I just love these two colours together. I might have a change and use the parkin as the main colour and the eccup as the contrasting colour.

The best thing about MKAL's though is the fun and social aspect. We have set up a Ravelry group for chatting, planning and any questions you might have about the MKAL. There is a sense of companionship and sharing that happens with MKAL's that you don't get from other pattern releases. Please come and join us over there and let us know how you get on. You can also share on twitter and instagram with the hashtag #ontheotherhandMKAL

Throughout the MKAL Ann and I will be holding your hands with online tutorials for some of the techniques used and we will be broadcasting these live on periscope and then uploading them to youtube so you can see them if you miss the first showing. I will also post the links on my blog.

So please come and join in the fun!

A letter to a moth

January 22, 2016 Sarah Alderson

Dear Mr (or Mrs) Moth,

This is the last straw. I wish to make it quite clear that there is now a war between us and you are not welcome in my house. Not that you ever were. You have been having free meals on my handknits for far too long and this week was the end.

After the past couple of years of finding you in the house eating my carpets and hexipuffs, I thought we were finally through. There was also the felted wool dress that you had for lunch. I was not quite so sad about losing that as the dress was not meant to be felted and dolls size but I did have nice plans to make a bag out of it, but what use is a bag full of holes? I had not seen you for a few months so I thought I was safe. How wrong I was.

In 2011 I knitted a Swallowtail Shawl for my Nan's birthday. She always wore a shawl around her shoulders to keep her neck warm. It was beautiful and she loved it. In fact, she loved it so much she hardly wore it because she was frightened something might happen to it. She wore it for her 90th birthday party in 2013 and loved it.

Queenie died just over a year later and I still miss my Nan. I kept her special shawl to remind me of the birthday party fun we all shared with her.

So last week when I was sorting through my clothes as part of getting organised I took out the shawl and found you and your children had been munching through it.

It was obviously very tasty as there are large parts of it now gone and it is far beyond repair. There are other just as lovely and yummy (now don't go getting any ideas) shawls and scarves in that drawer but none that meant as much to me as Queenie's shawl.

I mean, I know it is a lace shawl and maybe you thought you was helping to add some more holes but there are holes that are meant to be there and holes like the one below that really are not.

So this means war. So far I have not found you in my yarn stash or my design samples but let it be known these and all other areas of my house are no go areas for moths. Things are now so serious that I am even letting spiders stay rather than getting them evicted when they show their hairy little bodies with creepy legs. Despite my terrifying fear of spiders I currently prefer them to you and they are welcome to eat you if they find you.

I have prepared all my weapons (moth killers) and my shields are up (essential oils). You will not survive here so give up and leave. Please warn all your children, and your children's children that I am on the warpath and I am not taking prisoners.

Yours sincerely,

Sarah the moth killer

Two colour Crowberry

January 16, 2016 Sarah Alderson

Eighteen months ago (was it really that long??) I knitted myself a Crowberry cardigan. It is one of my most popular patterns but I did not have a sample of my own. The original sample is owned by Woolyknits who supplied the lovely Bluefaced Leicester DK yarn. I had been wanting one of my own to wear but was having the usual problem of so much to knit and too little time - a perpetual problem for every knitter.

When I finally decided I was going to treat myself to my own version I fell in love with the navy Rowan felted tweed DK. I love navy and the tweedy effect adds an extra bit of prettiness. The navy balls of yarn were sitting in the shop next to the pretty white with blue tweedy bits balls.... and they looked so good together I just knew I had to use them both. The idea for a two coloured Crowberry was born.

The contrasting colour is used to accentuate the Crowberry pattern on the front of the cardigan and also used in the i-cord cast off and button holes. I have to confess I love it and I wear it frequently.

The PDF pattern for Crowberry has now been updated to include instructions for the two colour version as well as the original one colour. It has also been updated to my new Aldersign layout. Thank you to everyone who has purchased this pattern already, you should get an email letting you know it has been updated. For those of you who would like to buy it and make your own, there is a discount of 25% off the usual price for this week only. The discount will automatically be applied at the till.

A knitterly review

December 31, 2015 Sarah Alderson

2015 is nearly over and I am sitting with my family ready to watch the fireworks in London, toast a glass of my Dads finest single malt and sing a rather out of tune Auld Lang Syne. It has been a very busy year and looking back through all my photographs, I achieved so much this year, I am almost too exhausted to start thinking about what 2016 might bring!

I set myself a few challenges this year. The first was to produce my first book of knitting patterns. I am really proud of An Elven Reckoning. It has got some great reviews and I loved having a stand at Yarndale where I got to show off all the samples. It was a fantastic weekend and the book is still doing well. I am about to order my second print run! Each of the twelve patterns all came from ideas that have been lurking in my head for several years and all mean something special to me. My favourite photo from our shoot made the front cover of the book. I give my heartfelt thanks to all my friends and family who helped me get it out there.

There were a few other designs released in 2015 as well as those in my book. Horwood is a cute textured hat that is published by the Knitting and Crochet Guild. There was also the Baby Owl Mobile pattern for crochet lovers and cute babies, Cozette Cowl in Knit Now! February issue and May Cowl in the BaaRamEwe book of Titus mini knits.

All that is left is for me to wish you all a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year and to persuade my Dad to open his whisky cabinet ;) Cheers!

Christmas shopping and store update

December 12, 2015 Sarah Alderson

It is that time of year when lots of shopping and crafting of christmas presents takes place in preparation for the holidays. I have been busy planning all my gifts for my friends and family and I am looking forward to seeing them open their presents at Christmas.

To make your present buying easier I have updated my online store with new products. Anyone who has followed me for a while will have seen the amigurumi kits I sell. They contain everything you need to make the amigurumi creature including yarn, pattern, knitting needles or crochet hook, toy stuffing, toy eyes and sewing needle. They all come with how to knit or crochet instructions so they are suitable for beginners.

There is a knit zombie or bat and crochet Cthulhu, alien, owl and voodoo doll. There is also a new kit for this year, a Yorkshire white rose corsage that contains a brooch back to make your own decoration.

All kits make great stocking fillers and are suitable from age 10 years and up.

I have also updated the button selection and there are now new sizes ranging from 15mm, 20mm, 25mm to 30mm, and new designs. Each packet comes in an Aldersign package and they are made of wood with a printed pattern on the front. They are great for finishing off hand knits and crochet garments for an extra special touch.

Of course my book, An Elven Reckoning would also make a great gift for any knitter with its twelve patterns all inspired by the seasons of Rivendell. The patterns are fun and interesting to knit and my first print run is selling out quickly!

Last ordering dates for christmas is Monday 14th December for Europe and USA and Canada and Sunday 20th December for the UK so get your orders in quick!

Crafty Secret Santa

December 4, 2015 Sarah Alderson

Each year my local knit/crafting group get together for a christmas meal and gift swap. It is one of the highlights of my year and the gifts are amazing every time. Each person brings a hand crafted gift. Names are put in a hat and whoever's name you pull out, you get their gift. So the secret is you don't know who you are making a gift for!

We had lots of fun at the meal, wearing the christmas cracker hats was compulsory (for at least ten minutes) and plenty of wine was drunk.

This year I decided to crochet a snowman for my gift. I have loved the short film The Snowman by Raymond Briggs and try to watch it every year. The spin off The Snowman and The Snowdog is also very cute, and the Father Christmas story is very blooming funny.

So the morning of the Christmas party (nothing like leaving it to the last minute) I began to design and crochet my Snowman. I am very pleased with how he turned out, especially his floppy hat. He looks quite cheery to me. I am planning to write up the pattern and release it as one of my amigurumi kits for next year.

For my present I received this gorgeous fluffy Santa from my friend Emily. Isn't he fabulous? I love his beard with the curl in the end and his long pointed hat. He is sitting on our windowsill looking very pleased with himself.

All the gifts showed so much love and creativity. There was a little potion bottle of homemade sloe gin, christmas bunting, a beautiful noel embroidery, luxurious organic hand cream, a pretty felt christmas tree, cross stitch heart ornament, a poinsettia type flower, a granny hexagon stocking and an elegant puff necklace. They are all amazing and I would have loved to receive any of these. Roll on next year, I'm excited already!

Dianthus

November 22, 2015 Sarah Alderson

November is pancreatic cancer awareness month and it is a topic that is very close to my heart. In November 2011 I released one of my first patterns, Dianthus, a beret hat that I donated all the proceeds from sales to Pancreatic Cancer Uk. You can read about the original pattern here.

Me & my mum. Apparently I was unhappy at being taken out the bath!

The hat was designed for my mum who sadly died before she got a chance to wear it. She had pancreatic cancer and only survived 12 days from diagnosis. Pancreatic cancer has one of the worst survival rates of all cancers and this has not changed in the last 20 years, compared with other cancers where survival is thankfully much better.

This November I decided I wanted to update the pattern. Initially only available in one size, I have now sized it from newborns to large adults. One size is not great for hats as people have very different shaped heads. It also works well as a kids hat and in the photo below the toddler size is being modelled by Jellica who has just celebrated her first birthday.

Jellica in the toddler version of Dianthus beret

I have also changed the finances for the pattern. Previously I had to send all pattern income to Pancreatic Cancer UK but that is not very practical so I have decided to make the hat pattern available for free to download, but to include a link to my donation site so the money will go directly to Pancreatic Cancer UK, rather than via me. I am hoping this will make it easier for people to make a donation. To go to the pattern page please click here. For the donation page please click here.

The hat is an easy knit in the round pattern that has alternating large and small lace holes and an i-cord finish. It is very quick to knit in aran weight yarn and I have made two new samples. I'm modelling the Artesano Aran adult version and Jellica is modelling the toddler version in West Yorkshire Spinners Aire Valley Aran. Both yarns show off the lace pattern well, are soft to knit with and warm to wear. I have not stopped wearing mine since I finished knitting it, especially as the weather has suddenly turned a bit frosty here and it is now hat wearing weather.

I hope you like the new pattern and thank you to everyone who has previously purchased it. You will receive an email to update your version for free. Thank you for all future donations too, let's hope one day we can improve the survival of pancreatic cancer.