Easy Peasy!

Happy Easter to you! Hope you are enjoying the holiday weekend. We've had some unseasonably warm spring weather, and have been making the most of it, getting out and about. It was 25 degrees yesterday, although it's cooler today, and a sea mist keeps drifting in off the North Sea. It was lovely outside first thing - we could hear the local Salvation Army band playing in the distance. They always hold outdoor services once the holidaymakers start arriving. We don't make a huge thing about Easter in the josiekitten household. But I took the opportunity of being home for Easter to dig out our decorations, bought mostly in Germany and Poland. Our family in Germany always put up decorations, and as you walk around, you see lots of houses with painted wooden eggs hanging from the branches of trees. It's very pretty!

I love these wooden eggs - they came from one of our trips to Lodz in Poland, where Mr JK's family lived for many years. Egg decorating or pysanky is an Eastern European tradition, still very much in evidence today. We saw some amazingly intricate patterns created using hot wax and dyes. You can read more about how it's done here, if you're interested.

I finally finished my Peasy cardigan yesterday, and blocked it today. I do love it - so simple but beautiful too! I know that I'm going to get lots of wear out of it. I found some shell buttons from the Natural Dye Studio that go well with it, I think. I had to steam the bottom edge quite hard to stop it from curling, so I hope that isn't going to be a problem. Time will tell. I ended up making full length sleeves, as I had enough yarn, and am glad that I did.

Remember my spinning disaster that I blogged about recently? The single very nearly ended up in the bin after I'd over-spun it so spectacularly! There was so much twist in it, I don't quite know what went wrong! I ended up with pinky/purple fingers too!

Anyhow, common sense prevailed, and I wound the single into a skein (with many breakages en route!) and soaked it for a couple of hours, before hanging it up to dry with a heavy weight on it. I then wound that single into a yarn cake, and plied it from both ends, to create a 2-ply yarn. All things considered, it's turned out pretty well. The colours are very soft and delicate, reminiscent of lavender fields on a summer's day. It's about 18 wpi, so I think that's about a 2-ply laceweight, and I have approximately 250 metres to play around with.

I'm planning on spending time this afternoon working on Spriteling. I'd like to try and finish clue 1 today, if at all possible. So I shall love you and leave you, with one more picture of Easter in my little bloggy corner. My Easter Day breakfast - hot cross buns and English strawberries - deeeeeeelish! See you soon! xxx