Noro or Not?

I must admit that with the good weather we have been having this week, I have not been painting or crafting so much but spending time out in the garden attending to about a year's worth of outstanding jobs. It has taken me three afternoons to thin out a huge clump of bamboo which was threatening to take over the bottom of the garden and blocked out an awful lot of light. Summer bulbs and daisies have been planted, brambles hacked, leaves raked and new gravel has been spread. Sweatpeas, trailing geraniums and petunias are waiting in the greenhouse until it's time to be planted out and grass seed needs to be mixed with topsoil to repair the scrubby mess that used to be our lawn.


Two or three years ago I knitted myself a pair of wristwarmers from a pattern in Stitch & Bitch Nation using Noro yarn. I have worn them so much as they are perfect for keeping your hands warm while having fingers free for dog-walking, shopping etc.


I bought some yarn at Unravel a couple of weeks ago that I initially thought was Noro but is in fact called Creative Poems aran by Rico - same lovely colours, half the price! The texture is smoother than Noro, but that's not a bad thing. Instead of making more of the Stitch & Bitch wristwarmers, I decided to design my own, just keeping the 2 x 2 rib for the wrist & palm parts.
I've used a fairly complicated sunflower design from a stitch book which fitted perfectly on the back of the hand.


These will be for sale on Etsy when I can find someone willing to take photos of both my hands modelling them rather than these rather contorted pictures! At least they hide the red weals caused by bamboo and brambles!