Hannelore plans

I saw a lovely lace pattern called Hannelore that Lacefreak blogged about. I fell in love!
I wanted, no: 'needed', to get this pattern and knit it just as soon as possible.
NB: there are also lovely pictures at Ars Una, Species Mille's blog.

I looked online, then at ebay, set up a search reminder for 'Burda Spezial E418', googled it again - but no joy. Then I found this project on Ravelry and realised that the pattern had also been published in 'Band 408' (that's volume 408 to you and me) by a company called Beyer Verlag. So back to googling and ebay and any other place I could think of.

Then Amazon posted the item: 'Kunststricken. Decken, Garnituren, Spitzen: Bände 408 und 760', saying: 'Not yet available but can be pre-ordered'. Hah!
Guess what? I did. (Big surprise)

It was supposed to arrive some time in late April if memory serves. It took a little longer - I got it some time in May. I don't mind: this is a treasure!

The two volumes are not bound books, they are more like brochures or folded booklets and come in a wallet that also contains the two sets of charts. And a loose leaf sheet of either errata or supplementing information.

Band 408 has more complicated, highly lacey looking doilies, the items in Band 760 are a little more robust looking, if that makes any sense. These patterns do not seem quite as complex with more stockinette stitch in them. The items in both are really lovely!

My Hannelore pattern that I was so desperate for turns out to be quite small. I must check Lacefreak's blog entry again to see how big you can get this if you use larger needles - I was rather hoping to be able to wear this as a shawl! The size in the book is that of a cushion cover, not quite what I had in mind!

I am playing around with yarn choices and have not yet decided what to use (my Silkbloom Extra Fino from BC Garn would be quite nice?) - I have this in undyed as well as my usual choice of strong pinks.
There are so many projects in these volumes I want to make that I started a medium sized one first: Image 20 on page 12 (I didn't find a name for this). I will post about this soon.

In the meantime, here's what the Silkbloom yarn looks like:

PS: I just realised that I didn't mention that these patterns are by a gentleman called Herbert Niebling. I think he was a genius! I've even found a picture* of him again (plus mini bio. He's not on Wikipedia!), though it took some doing - searching Google Images for his name brings up millions of doilies!

*: I just love that pot of Alpenveilchen on his table (on a balcony?) that he is apparently using to weigh the chart down! How endearing is that...

And very dapper he is too: the glasses and clothes are very 1950s/60s Germany.

My Portland Gussets

My Portland Gussets in blue - I am very happy with these!

Yarn: Uschi Sockengarn*
Needles: 2.0 mm (15 cm short DPNs, very useful!)
Pattern: Yarnissima/Three Irish Girls
Inpiration: Ignorant Bliss who makes the most gorgeous things!

I was knitting both at the same time, with two sets of DPNs which went swimmingly until I realised that I'd forgotten the five gusset decreases on the other edge (Chart 2). The instructions even say, very clearly: "Don't forget the gusset decreases" - which I had read, and processed, and proceeded to not take any notice of, as you do. I was going to highlight them in yellow, forgot, and there you are: I got to five inches from the toe up of BOTH socks so of course I had to rip them down. Unforunately those decreases start quite early on. Darn. That ought to teach me.

The nice thing was that I really enjoyed knitting these - and this way I got to do a bit more knitting, har-de-har! The pattern is lovely and relatively easy to follow. The only difficulty lies in remembering if you already knit those rows without increases or decreases. Sounds easy but I kept losing track (knitting in front of the telly has its disadvantages) and had to count rows from the last increase or decrease.

I was a bit nervous about trying these for my first pair of socks in something like twenty years or so. I had knitted socks before (all of one pair, woohoo. Yep, one single, lonesome one) but at the time hadn't appreciated that walking around in them would put them to quite a bit of wear - so I'd only gone and picked completely unsuitable yarn. The couple of holes from the first few wears very quickly turned into one big hole that extended to almost the entire length and width of the sock, that is to say: its entire sole... whoops.
I had lost my mojo in terms of sock knitting and hadn't attempted another pair since.

Another reason was that I hadn't actually encountered any proper sock wool back then, and remained blithely unaware that there was such a thing. I still wouldn't know today if it wasn't for the Internet. Isn't the spreading of knowledge a wonderful thing?
I love the Internet - I started using it pretty early on, with one of those modems that made this lovely doodely noise. Hearing that made me feel so empowered! It wasn't a 28.8 (or whatever) but the next one up 33.6 (my decimals could be way off), so a bit of time before the advent of broadband.
I am finding it particularly wonderful where crafts are concerned. What did we do before we could check things out on Ravelry, or Knitty, or just google stuff? Gosh, all of that was such a huge Effort! Reference libraries and buying books, or latching on to people who might know a bit more than you - wringing them dry for every last little bit of knowledge...

But anyway. Socks, first pair thereof in a long time. Very pleased. Downright chuffed in fact! ...must make them again: in pink, I feel The Need! Which will, in turn, necessitate more yarn buying (oh no! My evergrowing stash! Best wait a bit)...

* I got this sock yarn from a German supermarket so I can't provide a link. It's nice sturdy yarn.

London Crafts shops

Have you seen my page on London Crafts Shops?

I just updated it after going to Klein's in Noel Street last week. They have an amazing amount of trims, braids, ribbons and anything else that comes by the meter. Even in leather and rubber! I wouldn't be surprised if there are any glow-in-the-dark ones (I'm only kidding)...
Quite an old-fashioned shop that must have been in its location for a consider number of years. It is filled to the rafters. There is also a small downstairs area with fabric dyes, a small amount of yarn and bits and pieces. They also do others bits like tassels and bag handles.

Did I miss out any shops?

I have not yet had a chance to go to the yarn shop near Bethnal Green, nor those in West London.