Out of kilter

Last weekend I sat down on Saturday afternoon to get started on a weekend of sewing, when disaster struck, my sewing machine broke! The needle and bobbin have got out of kilter, and no stitches are being made. It wasn't until yesterday I was able to get my machine down to the repair shop, so as a result I've had to change my plans and find other things to amuse myself with.

I've done lots of knitting, and finished my second attempt at the fair isle Baikal hat - you can see my disastrous first attempt here. To solve the massive size issue, I dropped the size of the needles down to 4.5mm and 5mm needles, and although I cast-on the same number of stitches (96), I didn't increase the number the stitches after the rib.

I'm fairly pleased with the way the hat turned out, its a bit closer fitting than the original design, but it still fits my capacious head very well.  I love the pattern, its really effective in the two colours, and very easy to work. Plus, it matches my navy winter coat.

I've never worked with camel wool before, and it's really nice. I had the idea it would be quite course and rough, but its actually soft, and the resulting hat is lovely and cosy. I've got loads of the wool left over, and am planning to make some striped arm warmers.

 

To keep myself occupies I've also been baking away, I've got a loaf of bread in the over and I've made some very tasty passion fruit melting moment biscuits, with some cut price fruit.