Yarn Passion

Sweet Mother of Yarn, WHAT is this divinely soft lovliness?

It's Manos Del Uruguay Lace and it is silky soft beyond belief. Really. 'Tis.

I did think I was familiar with the delights of high-end yarns and not at all somewhat immune to the lure of a special skein of something. But by golly I was entirely and completely incorrect.

Of course there's a clue in the yarn content as listed - 70% Baby Alpaca, 25% Silk, 5% Cashmere. That's gonna be soft you'd think. But still I was stunned into a kind of yarn coma by the reality of its silky softness as I began to swatch with it yesterday.

Geez, and this has been in my stash HOW long? A YEAR? I should have had it on my pillow.

What? Oh yeah, it's for a super-secret-project that I can't even think about in case people near me can read my thoughts. So no peeking.

In the meantime, I'm just sitting over here. Petting yarn.

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Heavenly Manos*

Introducing this fabulous project** in Manos del Uruguay by one of our lovely and talented Wicklow Knitters.

Fabulous isn't it!

The yarn is soooo scrummy. Such wonderful drape and silkiness. Wow.

Love the front too. It drapes so well.

Well done L. And what a nice model you make too!

* or shouldn't that be Manos from Heaven?

** Pattern: Nicole from Artesano, scroll down this page

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TYR Open!

At last. And it's only 12 minutes from my house, including getting stuck behind a horsebox and parking the car. That's pretty convenient!

You might have thought that I'd be 1st in the door. You'd be right. I really thought someone would beat me to it, but no, I jumped into the car at 9:47 am and at 9:59 am I was on the doorstep. Hopping up and down with excitement.

You might also think that the day might be a letdown after all the eager anticipation. You'd be wrong. It was great great fun, with lots of laughter, chat, cakes, knitting and general hilarity.

(Let's just say that Ms Innuendo and her close friend Mr Double Entendre Esquire had a good day out. I'm mentioning no names :: eyes swivelling towards YOU and YOU :: and not entirely innocent myself of course ::)

Congratulations Stephanie. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.

Over here for some great pics.

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Manos & Little Mouse

A friend took this pic of Little Mouse and my Manos Beret at her house recently and sent it to me yesterday.

The Manos looks lovely, but Little Mouse takes the cake!

What cuteness.

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Glorious Manos

Ah the glory that is Manos!



The beret in Manos del Uruguay, she is finished....and isn't she just beootiful?!?! I've never had so many compliments over a knit project before....even for Ms Potters. Mind you, I've never worn a knit project so much either, so there's probably a connection.



Project Details:

Pattern: BOHO Beret from Artesano
Yarn: haven't you been paying attention?
OK, so it's Manos del Uruguay, Silk Blend

More Yarn details: 100g hank is 270m long. (Beret used just a shade over 1/2 the skein)
Needles: Recommended size for the yarn is 3.5mm - 4.25mm.
The pattern called for size 3mm dnps for the brim and 3.75m dpns for the hat. I used Brittany Birch needles from here. Lovely and smooth, much nicer than bamboo.
Colourway: Red

This was a reasonably quick and easy knit. The yarn is fabulous, and it was great to see all the colour variations appearing. Lovely.

See the purl rounds? This is where most of the increase and decrease rounds are placed in the pattern. I didn't like the slight jog this made in the round of purl bumps so I moved the increased/decreases to the following round. You can still see the increases/decreases, but at least the pearly purls are preserved.

The brim turned out slightly too loose. Who knew my head wasn't so big? I used some black elastic thread to give it more grip. (Thanks Mum.)

I only had one problem. You sharper knitters may not have fallen into this trap, but I did. Headfirst. (Headfirst...ha ha!)

The pattern called for the brim to be knit with 2 strands of the yarn in garter stitch. Now, I'm no ordinary eedjit, I know that garter stitch means that you knit all rows. So I did.

Ah hah! Spot the rookie mistake? Since the hat is knit in the round, knitting all rows, (i.e. rounds) gives you reverse stocking stitch. Given that I'm on 3mm dpns and knitting with 2 strands this resulted in an unpleasant stiff and unyielding band of fabric.

I lived with it for a while and knitted on despite my doubts...as you do. About 3 inches into knitting the hat I bit the bullet and frogged the whole thing. It would have been about as comfortable as wearing a luggage strap around your head. My thanks to Jellyknits for the moral support while this painful decision was made.

Anyway, it had to be done. And as it so often happens, frogging it and starting again gave me the beautiful outcome I had dreamed of. I love it.

And look see.



It goes so nicely with my scarf.

Matchy matchy.


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Manos del Uruguay

On Friday I paid a visit to The Yarn Room at their HQ in Moneystown Co. Wicklow, which just happens to be only 3 or 4 miles from where I live. I had a lovely visit with Stephanie, knitter and proprieter, which included tea, toast and lots of knitting talk. Fab.

I had a happy hour or so fondling and oogling soberly assessing the yarn and naturally, I came away with more for the stash. It's this baby, above. Manos del Uruguay Silk Blend in Red. Scrumptious. It looks like a really good weight for a lace wrap/scarf that I'm planning.

And besides then there's this...

Believe me, I don't do hats...and they don't do me. But Stephanie had this little beauty made for herself (in green) so I was able to try it on. It looked and felt lovely, and I think it's not the worst hat style for my particular head. And yes, I've cast on already and I'm 2 or 3 inches into it.

(I did have some problems with the pattern, but that's for another post.)

Funny enough, that was the same day that Aileen posted her very own beret pattern. Must have been something in the air. Go check it out. Doesn't it and she look just beautiful? Think I'll have to make one of these sometime also.

I got some of these also, and I'm delighted with them. I don't know if they're tough enough to live in my house however, since Little Monkey used one to open some (light) plastic wrapping yesterday and it snapped like a twig*. You should have seen her trying to hold both pieces in the same hand in a straight line so I wouln't realise what had happened. Very funny.

So...new project...new yarn...new needles. What's not to love?

(Yes, Ed. I know I have other projects to finish. Just shaddup! You want me to tell the people what you were doing Saturday night? Yeah right. I didn't think so.)

*Edited to Add: HAH! Of course it 'snapped like a twig'. It IS a twig!