A chance to join me in August at The Knitting Hotel and an exclusive offer from Read Loop, France

I know that’s an even longer title than my January post. And despite my plans to work less in favour of more making, nurturing and nesting, I’m currently busier than I’ve been for ages. Am I my own worst enemy? Of course I am! 

This past week has been particularly ‘screen heavy’ so I thought I’d drop in with a quick blog update before I shut down my Mac for the weekend and finally get down to some sewing and gardening. 

In my last post I introduced you to Hidden Star, my design contribution to Laine’s 52 Weeks of Accessories. This pattern celebrates my love of beaded knitting, and features a technique I call ‘beaded colourwork’ where beads are threaded in colour sequence, onto the yarn before casting on which creates a specific motif when they’re knitted in.  

In Hidden Star the blocks of different coloured beads draw the eyes to a dart-like shape on the back of each hand, and these mirrored darts reveal a star-like motif when both hands are placed together. The instructions offer a choice of either full mittens or fingerless mitts and another interesting feature of this design is the yarn.  I chose to use two close tones of John Arbon Exmoor 4ply Sock held together. This produces the most beautiful and gently coloured marl effect to show off the beads. Being me, I mixed orange (Quick Beam) and red (Peggles) for the top section and dark turquoise (Plashes) and navy (Whortleberries) for the bottom section, with an acid green (Oddmedod) stripe cutting across the centre of the mitt to give the eye a lift. But of course you can knit the design in your favourite colours with beads that either tone in or stand out. Don’t want to knit with two ends of 4ply held together? Knit it in a single end of DK instead. The choice really is yours. 

So why am I telling you all this? Because this August 1st – 5th  I’ll be at The Knitting Hotel in Dawlish, teaching a Beaded Colourwork workshop and Hidden Star is the pattern we’ll be exploring. You’ll learn all the techniques needed to knit your own pair of blingtastic mitts / mittens while enjoying the hospitality of The Knitting Hotel’s fabulous host, Belinda Harris-Reid (pictured above in one of her amazing rooms). The knitting inspired style of the venue combined with its stunning location on the Devon coast and a weekend of great food plus joyful learning in the best company make this the perfect opportunity to treat yourself. This retreat has been fully booked for some time, but this week I found out there’s just one place left that comes with a single occupancy room.

If you’re interested email katherine@theknittinghotel.co.uk. But you’d better be quick! Hope to see you in August. 


Me in my beloved Read Loop specs and my Pearls Please fingerless mitts pattern

Ok, here’s the offer from French brand Read Loop, mentioned at the top of the post. If, like me, you’re a postmenopausal woman of a certain age, you’ll be familiar with the panicked scramble for reading glasses whenever you encounter any text smaller than 18pt. In my younger days I simply couldn’t understand why older people pulled their glasses down their nose or held the unreadable item at arms length in an effort to make sense of it. Well, I hit my mid 40s and boy, did I find out. 

That’s when I entered the realm of the ‘ready reader’ and started wearing reading glasses. It’s also when I discovered Read Loop’s asymmetric Patchwork design which became my ‘go to’ pair of readers. (They’re the ones I’m wearing in the above picture). Well a couple of weeks ago – and after 10 years of much loved wear – my precious favourites finally broke. So, I posted on my @jeanettesloan Instagram feed about how much I’d miss them, particularly because they were a Christmas gift from Sam. Well following my post, the lovely people at Read Loop got in touch and we’ve come up with a fabulous offer exclusively for you, whether you sign up  to my newsletter, subscribe to this blog or follow me on Instagram

Shop on online at  www.readloop.fr and use the code JSLOAN10 to get 10% off, a free eyewear cord with each order and free shipping over €90 (around £77). Discount code expires 30th April 2024. 

I must say a huge thank you to Claudia at Read Loop who kindly gifted me three pairs of glasses; one from the everyday ‘Comfort’ range, one from the ‘Digital’ range (great for screen working) and one from the ‘Sunrise’ range for when I’m sitting, knitting in my sunny new garden.  If you do treat yourself to a pair(s) be sure to tag me and @readloop on social media. I really can’t wait to wear mine over the coming months and years. 

Until next time, happy making!

J x

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52 Weeks of Accessories: a new design and a new chapter. 

I know that’s a long title, right? Well, it kind of sums up where I‘m at right now. 

So much has happened in the last three years, culminating in a major house move towards the end of last year. And because I’m keen to give myself time and space to process these changes, 2024 marks the start of a new chapter. One where I’ll be adjusting to life in my new home city of Bristol and taking mindful steps each day to listen to what my body needs. Whether that’s reading, resting, cooking, crafting or soaking up the culture of my new hometown, this year, you should expect to see something a little different from me. 

And what better way to kick off the year than with a new design? Having kept this under wraps for several months, I can finally reveal I have a design in Laine Publishing’s new book, 52 Weeks of Accessories. 

Hidden Star is a mitten & fingerless mitt pattern that celebrates my love of beaded knitting, and as the temperature drops here in the UK, the timing couldn’t be better. Hidden Star is about snuggling up (remember my constantly cold hands) but with a twist on traditional stranded colourwork. Blocks of different coloured beads draw the eyes to a dart-like shape on the back of each mitten, and these mirrored darts reveal a star-like motif when both hands are placed together. So when one of my fabulous test knit team suggested the name Hidden Star, I jumped at it. It’s perfect, don’t you agree?

The mittens are knitted in John Arbon Exmoor 4ply Sock. After doing some initial swatching, I found knitting with two close tones of the yarn held together produced the gentle marled colour effect I wanted for this design. So, I mixed orange (Quick Beam) and red (Peggles) for the top section and dark turquoise (Plashes) and navy (Whortleberries) for the bottom section, with an acid green (Oddmedod) stripe cutting across the centre of the mitt to give the eye a lift. Of course, if you prefer, you can use a regular DK yarn in a single colour to make Hidden Star, as some of my test knitters did.

At this point, I must say a HUGE thank you to every member of my fabulous test-knit team who pulled out all the stops to meet an incredibly tight deadline when testing this pattern. They showed such grace and patience while I juggled with a new-to-me project management platform, responded to their queries and quickly picked up on my occasional lapses in concentration. You are all amazing, thank you!! #teamtestknit

As you can see, the results of the Hidden Star test show how you can channel your inner designer with the yarns and colours you use. I love how each knitter’s combination of yarn and bead choice reveals a little something about their personality. Seeing how every team member worked through their allocated version of the design was pure joy. Each was asked to knit a specific size and version for a full test of the pattern instructions, and what was even more gratifying was that some had never tried beaded colourwork before. That made it even more incredible that they could turn this test around in the time given while navigating such a steep learning curve. 

Oh, I should mention the beads; I mean, how could I forget them? As the pattern is knitted in a DK weight, I’ve used Debbie Abrahams size 6 glass seed beads in purple (Rainbow), orange (Fruit Salad) and clear. These colours really pop on the marl background, and slipping the beads in groups rather than singly – what I like to call beaded floats – makes the star motif stand out even more effectively. 

I’ve created many mittens and glove patterns over the years. I particularly like offering them in full mitten or fingerless mitt options, as I did for Toasty Cosy, part of the Warm Hands collection I co-edited with my friend, designer Kate Davies. With each design, I try to inject some intriguing details to make them more interesting for you – the knitter. After all, when you knit one of my designs, you’re investing both time and money into making the project, and both are precious. So you’ll be pleased to hear that short-row shaping and an i-cord cast-off also appear in this design (i-cord cast-off used in the fingerless mitt version only). 

Hidden Star can be found in Laine Publishing’s 52 Weeks of Accessories. It’s a stunning collection of inspiring makes, and I’m proud to have my design featured alongside such an impressive pool of international design talent. If you hop over to the Laine Publishing website, you can pre-order 52 Weeks of Accessories and get a sneaky preview of all the designs. I hope you like Hidden Star. It feels great to start the year with the release of this new pattern, and I’d love to hear what you think of it.

Oh, and before I go, if you’re in the mood for glove, mitten and mitt knitting this weekend, you can get 15% off Warm Hands over on my website. No code is needed, but the offer ends at 11.59pm Sunday, 14th January GMT.

Until next time, stay warm and happy making!

J x