Dennis is finished, just in time for winter...

Sorry I have been away from posting for a while. What with moving furniture into the new room, and other general life stuff, its' been rather hetic around here.

But I have managed to use my spare time to finish the Dennis the Mennis jumper. It has been quite a firsts has this for me.

• The first time I have made a jumper, in an adult size (all my other knitting has been one baby cardigan and several baby blankets)
• I looked at a few patterns to check tension/amount of stitches etc
• But designed the jumper myself.

As S.H. lives quite a distance from me I have not been able to fit as I go along. So I am really hoping it will fit but more importantly that he likes it. As soon as he found out I could knit he asked for a Dennis jumper with a big neck.

And here is its' big, baggy, and  got a big neck.

Honestly it is red and black, but camera/computer makes it look pink. Which I'm he would mind, but thats not very Dennis is it.

For those of you who may be unfamilar with the British Dennis the Menace, here he is.

I you wish to know more infomation on this Beano comic book character it can be found over at wikipedia here. He is descibed as 'Dennis is the archetypal badly-behaved schoolboy.'

And just to level things out a bit later they introduced a naughty school, not in any way similar to any St Trinian. The Beano had Mini the Minx

Any way back to the jumper I used Rowan 'big wool', which is 100% merino wool. It was lovely to knit up, so soft. The colours I used

   black and lipstick, which again does look pink (images curtisy of Rowan).

So whats next on the agenda

• Sew buttons on the victorian steampunk coat
• make dress no 3 for plain pattern project
• finish the next loud shirt

mmmm or start something else.

Take care everyone, Sew Vala. x

a manic week and what alot of pics,

so its been another week of work, work, work. no way am i complaining thou because i love it. i have been very productive and even managed to progress from using patterns to designing my own.

firstly heres a couple of U-handbags designs i have made this week, the easy peasy purse in a rather cute cupcake pattern from the lovely ladies at Cloth of Gold Wootton Basset.

i have been trying to uncifer the instructions for the yummy mummy purse but no matter what i do, i cant get it to fit the frame, so thats one for the back burner for now.

but what i have managed to do is for the first time design a bag to fit a metal purse frame , i think this was more from luck than skill. the pattern started life as a clutch but circular, but after making it in calico i didnt like it, the same calico was unpicked and tried as a circular bag, agin it didnt turn out like the image i had in my head. so there i am looking at the lovely frames i'd purchased wondering how on earth do people design fabric to fit them and there peeking out from underneath the mound of general haberdashery that is my working table was the circular calico , so i started with that and turned it into this

the same cupcake fabric with a small frill of pastel embroidary anglais. this got me rather excited that it actually fit and before i knew it i was on a roll.

funky bag with a bright orange lining, this ones for me, but i didnt stop there

a delicate floral pasley with a soft cream lining. there are actually two more on the work table waiting for the frames to be atached. and the only reason i stopped then was due to the light. yeah i get a bit manic now and again thats when i'm at my most productive.

ah and as for the bags i knitted last week, there is only one that i'm happy with, the others can sit there waiting, again i wasn't too pleased with how they turned out,

 

the inside of the bag has this gorgeous vintage looking sunflower fabric, the bag is lined with fleece and interfaced for support. i am going to add buttons at the end triangle point so the bag is reversible. its quite hippy looking not sure if anyone will buy it, but i love it.

i have been asked to make some bags for a 1950's event and so went exploring for 50's bags. i'v found that Lucite was most populer at this time so many bags are rectangle or shaped like cosmetic cases. very hard, plastic really took off in the 50's. buying lucite is not really an option so i bought some pelmit interfacing and started messing about and here is my work in progress for a hard box shaped bag

wow thats a lot of pics uploaded tonight.

the Dennis jumper is now back and arm completed. so thats about 40%. but wouldnt that be 50%, na, his lordship wants a large baggy cowl neck on it. are we sure he wants Dennis the Mennis or Mini the Minx? ether way as long as he likes it i'm happy.