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I love knitting in the round and have done a LOT of it. So I thought I had fairly good knowledge on the subject. I was bought Circular Knitting Workshop by Margaret Radcliffe for my birthday and was quite surprised that there was a lot of information that I've been finding very useful. It's a beautifully made book, clearly written with lots and lots of good photographs. It's set up like a lot of knitting books with techniques and then projects to demonstrate the techniques. However, the first 103 pages of this 320 page book are filled with details of circular knitting from the cast ons, joining in the round methods, diffferent ways to graft,  to converting a pattern to circular knitting. I wish I'd had this book when I first started. It's very in depth. Much of the information I've seen in other places such as books, Youtube, Ravelry etc. but it's brilliant to have it all in one place and organised into sections. One section that surprised me was about Kitch...

I can't seem to settle with my craft life at the moment. I'm bobbing about all over the place. As well as the usual, knitting, I've been spinning and sewing too! As I mentioned last week, I've been doing some embroidery. My dropcloth sampler arrived this morning; so I've got another project to add to the list. I've got 3 socks finished at the moment, unfortunately none of them match each other! So I'd better get on and do the others. I have got some finished objects to show you. I've been wanting to spin the fibre I got for Christmas, but I'm a starter/finisher so wanted to finish the fibre I already had on the wheel. However, it seemed to be taking forever. I'd intended for the merino to be sock weight but somehow, it ended up thinner than that and in the end I've drafted over 2km and plied it into a 1km 2ply. I've no idea how it ended up being that much and I'll have to find another project for it, as it's too thin for what I i...

Not really sure what started it but I've had the needle, thread and embroidery hoop out this week. I ordered this  sampler to embroider and while waiting for it to arrive; I ransacked my supplies. It was like a very colourful bomb had dropped. I bought the latest Crossstitcher magazine, and wanted to try a little cross stitch. I like the bird cross stitch but didn't have many of the exact colours so after much playing about and matching colours. I found suitable supplies without having to buy anything. This is my progress so far... I'll see how much gets done before the knitting bug bites back.

I had some really wonderful surprises from my family this Christmas. I had lots of lovely knitting/spinning gifts. Some very helpful knitting books. And some gorgeous spinning fibre and some Knitpro Cubix needles. Going clockwise, starting with the braid, it is 100% BFL - Enjoy the Ride from Countess Ablaze . The others are from HilltopCloud , 100g Yellow Batts - shetland, merino & camel, and a 35g Frog Prince Batt and 100g Hand Blended Frog Prince Roving. And my best knitting present of all was made by my niece. I love it. Though, not sure what the warning is about, perhaps flying needles and balls of yarn! I'm sure I'm not a dangerous knitter...

I had a wonderful day, during this holiday week.  I taught my beautiful niece to knit. We had some help though from little Pippa. To be honest, there was more giggling, talking and music than knitting but it was lots of fun.