This week I have been mostly frogging.  When you are knitting with lace-weight silk and baby camel hair yarn you don’t want mistakes.  Knitting with this yarn is like knitting with the dreams of baby fairies, it  makes cashmere feel like barbed wire and is quite frankly the stuff of which unicorn dreams are made.

I’m sorry I can’t offer a touch and feel blog.  I’m sure that will be possible in time, meanwhile you will just have to take my word for it.  Or go to Dye Ninja and buy some for yourself.  Hand dyed bliss from Livingston.

I didn’t go to Livingston to get mine, I went to Inverness.  For my birthday the Boss took me to a lovely cosy cabin on the Beauly Firth and sent me to the Loch Ness Knit Fest.  Seriously, how good can a guy be at present buying?  Two of the daughters (Medic 1 and the Rock Geek) joined us as did a friend travelling home to Thurso from Ayrshire.  And of course Poppy came too.  She spent the week making friends, particularly on the train.  She is quite the seasoned train traveller now.

LNKF was the bees knees.  It wasn’t huge, but every single stall was interesting and had something worth stopping for.  Lots of hand dyers (oh my the colours ….), spinners, unusual yarns (camel of course, but have you tried husky hair?)  But what really singled it out was the knitting hub.  It was big, it was comfortable with big tables and chairs and big squishy sofas and a splendid stage with live music, talks, demonstrations.  I sat and knitted and made lots of new friends from Denmark, from Birmingham, from the West Country.

It is a rather splendid fact that the best yarn festivals are held in places where the fishing is excellent.  Hence the enthusiasm of the Boss to join me at Shetland Wool Week, possibly the Iceland Wool Festival and maybe even Farnøstrik .  Lucky girl!

love gillie x