New labels and some more knitting

Ooh, look what arrived in the mail yesterday - my new labels from Fancyweaver. They were quite reasonably priced and only took three weeks from the time I placed my order to arrive. After reading about these labels here and here, I knew to ask for extra space on either side of the text so I can easily sew them into seams. I did consider using a different name for my Etsy shop, but nothing I came up with really appealed, and I guess it's easier to just use my blog name. Looking forward to sewing these onto some new things this weekend.

And in knitting news, I've finished another couple of projects:

A shrug for me. The first thing I've knitted for myself that isn't a hat, scarf or gloves! I used this pattern, though I only used it as a guide for the shape. I read on Ravelry that a lot of people found that it came out too small, so I chose thicker wool (10ply), larger needles (8.5mm) and actually made a swatch (gasp!) to figure out my gauge and how many stitches to cast on. Since it's knitted in one piece from the top down it was easy to try it on part-way through to check the fit.

A baby beret. Modelled by Pooh Bear in the absence of a suitable model. This is a Sublime pattern from a new book I picked up on E-bay. Made from 8ply Naturally NZ Merino et Soie. We have a couple of friends who are due to have babies in the next few weeks, so I may give this to one of them if they have a girl.