New Year, new project! (...or three!)

Now that Christmas has been and gone and all the decorations are safely packed away until December I can at last turn my attention to some new projects that have had to sit on a back-burner (ok, filed away in the dark recesses of my brain!) while I got on with my pre-Christmas sock-knitting marathon - see my previous post.

Following on from the 'c2c' green and white blanket I'm indulging my fascination of patchwork quilts - but in yarn rather than fabric.

I started with a few colours (l-r) Sherbert, Turquoise, Claret, Teal and Midnight (all Stylecraft 'Special' DK)

Red might seem an odd colour to throw in the mix, but I wanted to do a variation of 'log cabin' patchwork. Traditionally, that starts with 'red' in the centre, representing the fire or hearth of the home, around which the strips or 'logs' of the cabin are arranged:

In this pattern, I have lighter colours one side (representing day) and darker ones the other side, ('night')

When I ordered the colours (online) it was hard to get a true idea - I think the 'Midnight'/dark blue colours is a little too much but it's growing on me.

Next comes the fun of 'playing' around with putting the blocks together!

I think I like this pattern ('fields and furrows') :

It creates the illusion of diagonal stripes (still not sure about that dark blue....)

Mind you, I'm only on my seventh block so it may all come together ok eventually, especially with a dark blue border, perhaps. I'll post progress, as and when - I'll need to order more wool, so it's just as well that as part of my Christmas present my son gave me a shopping voucher for Wool Warehouse!

-oOo-

Along the same lines, I picked up another project that had been abandoned in favour of the 'sock-marathon'. Similar in principle to the 'ten stitch blanket' but picking up stitches all along each new side and knitting out a few rows, I created this:

I'm using this yarn I picked up at a craft show last year: 

It makes for mindless knitting in front of the TV, as it's random-dyed yarn so no new colours to join in, just knit each block, cast off all but last stitch, turn 90deg and pick up stitches along the next side and away you go again. (Casting off loosely makes for easier picking-up!)

This piece is progressively looking like a piece of wood-block flooring, thanks to the yarn colour.

-oOo-

Living up to my Facebook icon......

......I went to Coventry with DD so she could buy some wool from our

favourite/nearest REAL yarnshop and I was just going to have

a look....honestly.....until this 'fell' into my basket!

The 'James Brett Marble' will probably become a cowl, the Robin 'Paintbox' is for a baby cardigan but the rest is all for another 'log-cabin'-inspired piece,,,,,,watch this space!