Boozy Refreshment for the Pregnant

I always thought that if I had to choose a season of the year in which to be free from all the charming eating and drinking restrictions of modern day pregnancy it would be Christmas; Christmas with the port, and the sherry and the cool glass of Christmas day fizz, and the stilton, oh the stilton.

Now I think I've changed my mind - you can recreate some cocktails sans kick, but if anyone knows of a way to make virgin Pimms (that's more than a glass of lemonade with a few strawberries in it), please let me know; it's definitely Pimms season and I'd love a glass, almost as much as I want a large slice of brie on fresh crusty bread.

Still, enough complaining, I wouldn't swap the little bear for the world, let alone a brie sandwich with Pimms on the side, however often he or she decides that I really really need to hear the dawn chorus. At 5am.  And I have found a summer tipple substitute - summer tipple yarn:

The latest Tour de Fleece offering, another Purldrop Studios mini batt in Blue Martini.

Ice blue to Midnight blue with plenty of sparkle and all the colours of hazy summer sky in between.

I spun it up from light to dark working in strips down the batt at something a smidgen thicker than I spin a sock yarn, and when that was done I navajo plied the bobbin to preserve the colour changes.

It's the first time I've used navajo plying for a whole skein, rather than just using up the ends of bobbins and I think it's very effective on colour changes, I just need to remember to relax and let my fingers do their work without over thinking the process.

The one thing I haven't worked out is quite how to pause mid plying but happily I didn't have to move and got the whole thing finished in one fell swoop.

Finished result: 162 yards of sock weight ish merino/firestar that has a calling to be a hat.

In the meantime, well it wouldn't be me if I didn't go for the obvious cheesy shot would it?

It's the nearest I've got to a Martini glass!