A Sirdar Saga

On one of our recent trips south, and yes, there are so many they do all start to merge into one, we visited a big craft supplies shop, in search of the knitting needles that no-one seemed to be selling at the Edinburgh Yarn Festival.*

*Incidentally I received an email form the organisers of this a couple of days ago about next year's event and presumably in an effort to gauge numbers there was a one question questionnaire which asked about attendance next year. It went like this

Take the #EYF2018 poll!. Are you planning to come to EYF 2018?  No, I can't make it next year  I'm not sure yet  Very likely  Definitely - try and stop me Yes you're right, there is no option for You have to be kidding? No way am I coming again until you have your catering sorted.  And oh the arrogance that assumes that if you say you're not coming it's not because you don't want to, but actually can't.  But that's by the by. We went to this place to see if they had any of the needles I wanted and they did which was  a good thing. What they also had was a sample jumper knitted in the sort of yarn that the OH loves and I - well, let's just say that I don't. He wanted one. He wanted that pattern knitted in that wool in that colour and I said yes OK then, hoping that they wouldn't have sufficient yarn of the correct colour in stock. But they did, so we bought it and not long after we got home I cast on.  Here's a picture of the yarn. Sirdar Aura.  You will see from that picture that it is a multi-stranded, multi-coloured yarn. I was not amused to discover when knitting it up that the colour changes were marked in most balls with a knot as shown below. I was even less amused when one of the multi strand balls became single strand half way up the back and made what should have been an aran knitting experience more akin to knitting with embroidery thread.  The single strand  length lasted a long time and I had to cut it out of the ball in order to continue. I was worried that this would mean I wouldn't have sufficient wool to finish the sweater and I obviously couldn't go back to the shop where I had bought it to buy a top up, so I contacted Sirdar. They managed to ignore my e-mail for three weeks, which annoyed me a little bit so I sent a follow up and to be fair this time they sprang into action. I got an apology, an assurance that they would look into both the issue with the yarn and the reason I hadn't  previously had a reply ( and maybe they did and maybe they didn't) , and an offer of more yarn to finish the project. Well by this time the project was finished and the sweater had been clinging to the OH's back for days, so I thanked them nicely and said no need, because I had had enough to complete it. However their customer service department was insistent that they must send me more wool because they don't want dissatisfied customers and I was invited to choose something from their website to the value of my original purchase.  Now leaving aside that they don't want dissatisfied customers, I thought that was  above and beyond.  Because they must have a huge customer base and I was only one person and I had in the end, as I pointed out to them, got a wearable garment from the yarn that I had bought. However, who was I to turn down the offer of free wool? So I browsed the website and chose a couple of balls of their new Colourblock yarn and it came within a couple of days. Here it is I picked up a couple of patterns from my local wool shop the next day and have cast on a wrap in the one on the right.  And here is the OH modelling the jumper that started off the whole story  Roger Moore, eat your heart out!