27th January 2015
It has been an age since I have written anything on my blog and for those of you who think I have totally given up the quilting ghost, I shall surprise you by saying I am, in fact, hugely busy on a major project and have been so for the past couple of months. All rather under wraps for the moment but I am as busy with needle and thread as ever. With yarn too and I am constantly itching to get my fingers knitting and it takes a lot of self discipline to keep away from my ever growing yarn stash. The Aussie Open is giving me a pretty good excuse to get some knitting in this week.
I was lucky enough to get a taste (and samples) of a new Oakshott collection late last month. Michael’s parcel dropped through the door as a complete surprise and to say it hit my chartreuse need bang on the head would be an understatement. Oh what lovely clean, pristine colours. The collection also includes the most perfect off white. I find white one of the problem colours in my work and rarely find the right white. Whites tend to be too blue, too white or too cream. This one is perfect. Gorgeous greys, soft pastels so clean and clear. Not for me to divulge the name of the collection so keep your eyes skinned for the new collection the Oakshott website in February. I ran this cushion up to see how the colours looked together. I love the result, a contemporary look and for this reason (not laziness I promise) I left it unquilted. I seem to be leaving much of my new work unquilted these days – I think I am moving into a new more contemporary feel, perhaps affected by the Modern Quilt Movement.
I loved it so much that I made a it a partner….
I find that I have moved away from red backgrounds into greys these days. Soft warm dove greys and rich charcoals make such scrumptious backgrounds to highlight the colours of the design.
On the knitting front my lovely mother-in-law gave me some Brooklyn Tweed Loft for my birthday last month and I made up “Wake”, a beautiful very originally constructed sweater by Veronik Avery (available on Ravelry) with a curved wide back, stand up collar at the back of the neck and wide cables running down the front. Warm and snuggly it was none the less hard to photograph – this was the best we could manage to show off the cabling moving diagonally down the front panel. I find Loft hard to knit with as it is so fragile and breaks easily but once knitted it is perfect and worth the effort. I like it even more when it has been through the wash a couple of times and shrunk just the tiniest teeniest bit.
Finally I have decided it’s time to start designing my own knitwear and I have started with this very simple pair of fingerless gloves. The pattern isn’t perfect yet and needs a bit of tweaking for a better fit. I’m working on that now, or would be if I wasn’t writing this. In fact I must stop writing now and get on with my sewing project. If this blog lacks a bit of sparkle it could be that we woke up at 3.15 am to watch the Aussie Open!
deborahkemball 