Sleepy dog, jumper & Christmas

Just had to post this pic of my dog being very cheeky, lying on the bed with his nose under my pillow, aaawwwwww!!

Well here is the finished object.

Hooray. I started this when I got back from holiday at the end of September (there are various previous posts charting it's progress!), and finished it last Wednesday, just in time to wash and block it to get it dry and wear it on Boxing Day. The neck is supposed to be fully open, but it came down very low so I tacked a few of the crochet peaks together in case I wanted to wear it without a T-shirt underneath. The original pattern is here....... http://www.knitty.com/issuefall06/PATTlucie.html but I used a different yarn and mine has come out longer, which is fine by me. I love the colour of the original but the yarn was very expensive, as it was this one cost me about £35 to make. Not bad considering it it is hand-dyed 100% merino wool. And I absolutely love the colour. The yarn is from The Natural Dye Studio who have listings on ebay, it is in colourway Pacific Spring.

Well, Christmas............the actual day was quiet, just us two and the dog. And LOTS of prezzies!! I had various knitty gifts.....2 knitting bags, several sets of needles, a Rowan pattern book, and a page a day calendar with a pattern for every day of the year!! What a scary thought. And a gift voucher for the posh yarn shop. Other items included a lovely silver and amethyst necklace (which can be seen in the above pic), pyjamas, books, choccie, CD etc etc. And the Mighty Boosh Live DVD, woohoo!! It turned into a bit of a Noel-fest yesterday, because we watched the 2 hours of live show and then he was also on the Big Fat Quiz of the Year last night for another 2 hours, (with Russell Brand, another of my favourites) but hey, who's complaining???!!!!! The live show is still funny, not quite the same as actually being there, which we were in March in Warrington, but great anyway. Lots of very silly moments, and I've still got disc 2 to watch which apparently has another 2 hours of extras on it. GENIUS!!

Boxing Day we went over to some friends of ours and had a lovely day, great food and company culminating in a riotous game of Articulate, which my team lost by only one question. I'm not sure we got all the rules right and there was a bit of tactical play by our team near the end but it was great fun.

So coming up are a drink out on Saturday night with some ex-work colleagues of mine from when I worked in the bookshop, and New Year's Eve with the next-door-but-one neighbours. And then on January 20th is my ex-work's Christmas do!! They left it a bit late to book anything, but it is still Chritmas dinner with a Robbie Williams tribute act which should be interesting!

3 BTs

3 BTs from the last couple of days

1. Seeing Richard Hammond fully recovered chatting to Jonathon Ross on TV last night.

2. Going into town today and seeing Manny, the Big Issue seller wearing the gloves I made for him. He was very happy with them and said they were very warm.

3. Mark & Karen winning Strictly Come Dancing tonight. They both really deserved it.

Other than that, I did a swatch of part of my design for the Simply Knitting magazine competition socks today and it came out well despite it being an odd shape. So I can soldier on with them now. I'm not sure if anyone on the judging panel will even have heard of my celebrity (I'm sure he would hate to be called that too, so let's say fairly well known in certain circles) but I hope at least they will like the socks.

I also had a lovely email from Florence in the USA who had 7 sets of sheep from me through ebay, wishing me a Happy Christmas and telling me how much all her knitting group friends loved their sheepy gifts. She is going to want some more too!
I also had a phone call from my mum's friend Barbara to thank me for the scarf I made her which was a lovely surprise. One suspects my mum had a hand in it as our number is ex-directory!
No photos today, the next one will be me wearing The Jumper when it is dry.
I managed to join the Sexy Knitters Club today but had to open a separate blogger account to do it. Hope there is some way to merge the two at some point. I have added the button to the side bar but it hasn't got a link to the blog, any ideas anyone?

Tree, square & jumper

It is FINISHED!!!! The bluey green jumper is finished at last. I am just blocking it and when it is dry it is ready to wear. Hopefully for Boxing Day when we are going to friends.



I had a hospital outpatient appointment yesterday so I grabbed some left over sock yarn and 3mm needles and started on a square for the Knit A River Campaign for WaterAid http://www.iknit.org.uk/knitariver.html I finished it this afternoon after I'd done the last of the crochet on the jumper. It looks a bit odd shaped cos I didn't block it but it will be sewn onto another load of squares so it'll be fine.



Finally today, here is our Christmas tree, with and without flash! (especially for my Pwllheli friend!)


Oh yeah, the posh yarn shop has added some of my stitch markers to their website, the sheep should be on there in the next day or so, so go take a look, it's a good site.
http://www.celticove.com/acatalog/Handcrafted_Stitch_Markers.html

I only have one WIP at the moment, the lacy scarf, but I am ready to start my sock pattern for the competition, it will be basic stocking stitch but the design is what I have to work out on graph paper. I may have a break for a couple of days though as I have got very stiff fingers and I think I have got trigger finger in my right little finger, I had it before on the left hand and it took months to go away. I'll have to knit with my pinkie in the air if it carries on!

Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

I saw this on another blog and just had to post it!



Through looking at the Sexy Knitters Club blog I have found a wonderful knitting site which is UK based and has hundreds of gorgeous modern free patterns and also sells the yarn to make them at very good prices. The site is called www.garnstudio.com and the designs are by Drops Designs. I have just ordered 1 ball of their alpaca yarn to see what its like to make some gloves for my father in law for when he plays golf. The great thing is they take PayPal too so its so easy to order. Hope it gets here before Christmas! If it is nice yarn I'm going to order more for a really lovely fitted cardigan pattern I've seen on there.

Sheep in the shop

Yippee, I had a phone call just now to say that the posh yarn shop in town are going to sell my sheep stitch markers and they are going to pay me £4 for a set of 4. That's more than I thought and I was going to accept £3.50 so £4 is a bonus.

He has two sets each of each colour so far.

He is also going to buy the knit/purl ones for £2.50 so I have to nip up to the bead place tomorrow to get some more letters before they close for Christmas. Never gonna be a millionaire but its a few pennies in my pocket which will probably go back in their till for yarn anyway!!

Gloves, competition sock yarn & Fusion

I am struggling to post photos today. I have to download them through my husbands printer onto his computer and then send them across to mine, but there seems to be a problem. His computer keeps freezing! Very frustrating!

Anyway when I get the pics through the first one is of a pair of fingerless gloves I made with the American sock yarn. It was too rough to use for socks so I made the gloves instead. I have decided I am going to give them to the guy we buy the Big Issue from in town, to keep his hands warm. He is a really nice guy, and in his thick African accent he calls me "my lovely" and Colin "my braav". He is always happy no matter the weather.

The second pic is the sock yarn and fluffy yarn I will use for my competition socks. I will use white aswell, but that's all the clues you are getting. I'll be starting them after Christmas. I may have to change the fluffy yarn because it is not quite the same pink (it's a bit peachy), and I want it to match.

And finally a ball of Wendy Fusion which I got yesterday to try out. It should be just enough for a woolly hat!


I found a blog called the Sexy Knitters Club and am just waiting for them to confirm whether I can join. All members can then contribute to the blog. It's nothing saucy, just a group of younger knitters who like to make modern pretty items rather than old granny sweaters!

3 BTs

1. That lovely sparkly effect you get when it rains but the sun is shining.

2. I was chatting to an elderly lady at the bus stop about Christmas and she asked if I had children. When I said no, she said "It's just, girls as young as you do have them don't they?" I just nodded politely and smiled -- I'm 38!!

3. Knowing that I'm getting a surprise present from the posh yarn shop.

Pork, sheep and tango.

3 BTs for today

1. Walking through town we looked in the window of a cafe & sandwich shop and saw what looked like ham & stuffing batches. It reminded me of the Chester Food Festival in 2005 where we had hot pork and apple sauce batches, with the pork carved straight off the roast. As I was talking I said, "It's ages since I had a hot pork bap!" just as a man overtook me on the pavement. Realising this must have sounded odd as an overheard conversation I burst into fits of giggles, at which the man in question turned round with a big grin on his face and confirmed my worst fears!

2. Being brave enough to go into the posh yarn shop and letting them see my sheep stitch markers. They have agreed to sell them in the shop, we just have to negotiate prices.

3. Mark & Karen's amazing Argentine Tango on Strictly Come Dancing. Seeing Karen so happy brought tears to my eyes.

WIPs

I've just switched over from old Blogger to the new Blogger beta. Everything looks the same so hopefully this post will publish ok. I found with the old version that I could no longer post comments on other people's blogs. Haven't tried it with this new version yet, but I will later.

Okay, a couple of things I made in the last few days. When I was in Southampton my mum asked if I could make a white fluffy scarf for her friend Barbara, so here it is............

I will have to post it this afternoon.

And here is the first of 2 pairs of fluffy slippers for my neighbours little girls. These are a bright fluorescent cerise pink, and the other pair will be purple.

And here are a couple of works in progress (WIPs)............

A pair of fingerless gloves and a lacy scarf. You may recognise the yarns from a few posts ago.

Family reunion

So, here are the details of my exciting weekend in Southampton. It is full of BTs so I think this counts for a few days worth of those.
Ok, drove down Friday afternoon, pottered about Sat morning, then went to meet my aunt at a local pub in Mansbridge called the White Swan. We didn't know who would be there, I thought just my aunt Jane (my dad's sister) and her husband would be there and that we were going to go on to my Uncle Roger's house. We looked around the car park and decided to look inside the pub and there was a crowd of people at the bar. I recognised Jane straight away from recent emails and pics and waved and she came and gave me a big hug and there were a couple of tears. Then we all worked out who was who, Joanne and Claire (Jane's daughters and my cousins), and Alun (Jane's husband) and got a drink then went over to where my uncle Roger (my dad's brother) was sitting with Claire's children Ben & Shannon and Claire's fella, Bob. Looked at pics of Roger's daughters and grandchildren and reminisced and then went off to the cemetary to put some flowers on my nan's grave. When the old cremamtorium was built on, they moved the soil to a new place and it was at the cemetary we went to. Roger knew exactly where grandad was so I put a flower there and that the soil where my dad was originally, was put in the same area, so I left a flower there too.
So we all stood around chatting for ages and took some photos then all went off our separate ways again. We didn't go to the house after all, I thought it was my nan's old house but Roger has moved since so it wouldn't have been the same anyway.
On the Sunday I went to the other crem with my mum to put a wreath for my other grandparents and we had a bit of a chat about dad which we'd never done before so that was nice too. And then I took her round to where dad is, because she didn't know where it was. Its difficult when you marry again because you have to move on and she has been very happy with Bill for the last 30 years.
Anyway, here are some pics of me and my family..........
This is Uncle Roger,

And this is l-r Joanne, me, Jane, Claire, and Ben & Shannon in the front.
This is Aunty Jane!

And this is us all together.

And this one, my Pwllheli Friend tells me, looks as if Jane is screwing up her nose because I just let one!! How very dare he!! Ha ha ha!

Jane gave me some other old photos of my nan when she was small and also one with my great grandmother in it. Amazing. So all in all a very successful visit. Roger reckons he is going to have a party on his 70th birthday so I'm looking forward to that sometime in 2008.

On Sunday luchtime my step sister and her family came up to my mum's house. It was a bit brief because they'd had to go out and get a new telly, and we had to leave after lunch but it was lovely to see them anyway. The kids grow so quickly but then it is a year since we last saw them. Unfortunately in all the rush and chaos I forgot to get my camera out so sadly I don't have any pics of them. Hopefully they will come up and visit in the summer.

The drive home was rainy, and luckily we were warned about an accident on the M6 so we came off the motorway early and the GPS guided us a different way. As it was a bit late we stopped in a pub for fish and chips. It was a bit wishy washy but it filled a gap.

And now, it is back to normal, and I have a pile of washing and ironing to do, and still have a couple of knitting projects to get finished in the next couple of days, so I'd best go and get on with them............

Crochet, clowns and dreams

I went off to knitting club yesterday with my partly sewed up jumper and my pattern, and luckily a very nice lady whose name I don't know showed me how to do the crochet I needed to do. Here is a close-up of the bit I have done so far, not bad for a beginner eh?


We had 11 hand puppets made (2 not in photo) and they have now gone off to Operation Christmas Child. It was great that they were all so different.


Been to the hairdresser's this morning for a bit of a tart-up before visiting the folks. Bit of colour to cover the grey!! Not so red this time though.

I had one of my recurring dreams last night. It was the one where I am trying to get through a door but I can't reach it because it is high above me in a wall or something like that. Last night it was at the top of a staircase but the stairs didn't go far enough. My other recurring dream is of having exams coming up and I've not been to the classes for months and months. Oh, what can it all mean?

3 BTs
1. A man came to our knitting meeting yesterday. He was wheelchair bound and despite having never knit in his life, he showed great enthusiasm and had completed several rows by the time we went home.
2. A lady came to the hairdresser today with a very young baby. When it began to cry it was immediatley soothed just by the mere touch of its mother's hand.
3. The lady behind the glass in the post office wasn't grumpy today.

Cards, Bond, and 3BTs

On Friday I started on a few Christmas Cards. These are some of my efforts (you can click on the pics for a larger view) .....


They didn't take too long as I was using ready made stickers on the Santas and snowmen, so I made 10 altogether with slight variations. The other 2 are made with stamps. I really love the little Happy Christmas wording stamp, it's just right. That, and the others were all from Pixie Dust, a seller on ebay and they are unmounted so a really good price, plus she always chucks in a freebie! (in this case the snowflakes).

So, Saturday we went off to see Casino Royale with our neighbours. We decided to go to the 4 o'clock screening and booked a meal for after in town. I can't remember the last time I went to the cinema in the afternoon, it made it strange because it was only 7pm when we came out but it felt like 10pm. Anyway, the film........... definately a modern James Bond. I didn't see any Timothy Dalton or Pierce Brosnan Bonds, so I was comparing to Connery and Moore I suppose. It was a great action movie, and you could almost forget it was Bond at all. Brilliant chase scenes although the one on the building site kept flipping my stomach over with all the high up shots and dangling over great heights! Nasty torture scene too, but I won't give it away! Yeah, I did enjoy it, and I can say that Daniel Craig was better in this than Enduring Love but I still don't fancy him!! Haha!!

We then went off to a meal in La Taverna. My starter was delicious, baked vine tomatoes with chorizo, croutons and parmesan. Mmmmm. Then I had caramelised garlic and pumpkin risotto which was rather creamy and very filling. The 2 boys had mussels (ulgh!) then Paul had lamb and Colin had halibut. Kate had halibut too but I can't remember her starter. We then went for a drink and came back to ours for a while before they went home. A very good evening was had by all!

Now, I realise I was going to do 3 Beautiful Things and I haven't kept it up. I guess I won't be doing it every post cos to be honest I'm not out and about much, but yesterday we went out for a drive and I jotted some down....

1. We drove about 30 miles to see some art by a local artist which was displayed in a cafe in Market Drayton. When we got there it was closed. We rang them and they don't open on Sundays, but were inside cleaning up from their Christmas party the night before. The proprietor kindly let us in to have a look.
2. As we were driving the radio was talking about the Bunsfield Oil explosion a year ago. As we passed the huge Muller factory we giggled about what would happen if it exploded and the whole area was showered with bright pink yoghurt, with smatterings of rice and Fruit Corner thrown in for good measure. It reminded me of the end scene in the film Evolution where the alien explodes and everyone is splattered in Head & Shoulders.
3. Coming past Morrisons I noticed a very elderly couple, one with a walking frame and the other with a stick, standing watching a car going through the automated car wash. I would love to believe they were thinking about throwing away their walking aids and running whooping and laughing through the water jets and brushes hand in hand.

Hopefully this afternoon someone at the knitting club will show me how to do crochet. I have finished the jumper but it needs a crochet edging around the neckline, cuffs and bottom edge. I was taught to crochet by Colin's mum a few years ago but have completely forgotten. It will be great to get this jumper finished, I can then move on to the slippers I need to do for Kate. After that, I must think about my competition socks as the closing date is 1st March.

10 things, family & James Bond

Please note: This entry was posted on Dec 1st but because I saved a draft on Wed, that is the date on the post!!

Yikes, there goes another week of my life, off into the ether never to be seen again!

First things first. I was tagged by VincentBlackShadow to do a list of Things I Would Never Do, and I think he is getting impatient with me for not doing it yet. I think the etiquette of blogging is that if you are tagged you have to do it, or something. Anyway, I am really struggling to make it funny or interesting so some of these are bog standard, but here goes......

Things I Would Never Do
1. Smoke
2. Take drugs (non-prescription I mean, if I cut out everything I wouldn't be around for long!!)
3. Drink alcohol
4. Cheat on my husband
5. Bungee jump
6. Like Bonnie Langford
7. Eat a live grub of any kind (a la I'm a Celebrity)
8. Eat liver, kidneys or any kind of offal
9. Enjoy ironing
10. Dance again, the way I danced with you-oo-oo!

There you go, Rich. Happy now? (BTW, how's the back?)

Okay, today's pics........... first off a new baby card for a former work colleague of Colin's.



The next two are of various stages in my jumper. The pattern on the front matches the back, it's a bit blurry as I forgot to do the macro thingy on the camera when I took it. And this is the first sleeve which has striped quite nicely.


I just had to blog about this, which Colin overheard in our local Somerfield. There is a guy who works there called Peter and he is the most camp person in the world, think Sean from Corrie and multiply by 10. Anyway, he must have finished his shift and was in the queue behind several people to pay for something, and in a very loud voice he shouted down the line to the cashier "Oh I might have known it was you holding up the queue! And with a lovebite too, how tacky! Is it a lovebite or did you do it with the hoover? Hmm, must have been the hoover, you've got a Dyson haven't you?" Genius!

So I've been doing a bit of Christmas shopping this week. Apart from my step-sister's husband I think I am done for the Southampton lot. Men are sooo hard to buy for.

Talking of Southampton, it's quite exciting really. A bit of background first.................. My father died when I was 20 months old, and after my nan died when I was about 14 I kind of lost touch with that side of the family. Last year when I started doing a bit of a family tree on Genes Reunited, I got in touch with my aunt, and one of my cousins. After a couple of emails that was it, until a few weeks ago my aunt got in touch again, and as we both now have msn messenger we had a bit of a "chat". After a bit I mentioned I was going to be going to Southampton soon, and she said we should meet up. She is visiting from South Wales where she now lives but all her kids are in Southampton. Soooo, the upshot is that I will be meeting her, and an uncle and some of my cousins who I haven't seen in about 25 years and wouldn't know from Adam if I bumped into them on the street. Exciting eh? I'm quite nervous actually, but I think it will be cool.

Going to see Casino Royale tomorrow. Wouldn't normally go to see a James Bond but everyone is raving about it and we are going to go with some friend's who live two doors up, and then have some food afterwards. We watched Enduring Love the other night, which stars Daniel Craig. It was quite good but I don't think I would have liked it if I hadn't read the book, because it wasn't that clear what was going on. And they did that dreadful thing of completely changing the book which is so annoying. Huge chunks were missing and other details were different too. Grrr! It's like the Harry Potter film where they just completely omitted Winky!

Strictly, Reiki & bears.

Well it is Friday again, and that means..............tomorrow is Strictly Come Dancing!! Why is that programme so much fun to watch? I am afraid to say it has got to that point in the show where I have actually voted! I was so worried that my favourites Mark & Karen were going out last week that I picked up the phone. Then I decided to vote for Matt & Lilia too but I dialled the wrong number and voted for Clare & Brendan by mistake!! Aaargh!! So I voted for Matt and then added an extra one for Mark to cancel out Clare! What am I like? It is just great telly!!

I have had differing results with Reiki in the last 2 days. Wednesday evening I sent a half hour distant treatment to My Pwllheli Friend who is suffering with sciatica at the moment. It was the first time he has received Reiki, and had "no discernable change" as he put it. Of course I can't claim to cure sciatica in a single blow, I'd be rich if I could, so I'll send him some more and see if we can make a difference over time. Unfortunately this made me feel a little bit negative, that I hadn't made a difference, however slight, as I have had results in the past. I have only recently trained in Reiki so have only treated a handful of people, but have had positive feedback from these.
So I was a little nervous when my "live" client turned up yesterday for a full hour treatment on the couch. She is a friend but not someone I know that well, and she is not the kind of person to say it was good when she didn't think it was. Anyway, she hopped on the couch and off we went. I felt the heat immediately, which boosted my confidence. I worked down from head to toes, and then asked her to turn over, and worked shoulders to toes again on the back. About half way down her back, her breathing became very steady & calm and I wondered if she had fallen asleep, but wasn't sure as I don't think I could fall asleep with my head wedged in a breathing hole! Anyway, I finished the treatment and afterwards she said that she had drifted off into that half sleep/half awake state. She also said that the treatment was amazing! All in all it was a very positive experience and she is going to come bck for more and recommend me to other people. So my confidence in my abilities has been restored because I really respect her opinion and know she wouldn't give me a load of bull.

Well, now you can get ready for a good old chuckle.........I made my charity hand puppet!! I'm only posting a small pic cos it's slightly embarrassing...... at least I made an effort and it may make some poor needy child smile! (The eyes aren't as crooked as they look!)

I am now soldiering on with my jumper. I have just changed to a new ball so who knows how the colour is going to change now. And then it will be the slippers for the neighbours. I think I'll take those to do in Southampton.

Sheep

Forgot to mention that 3 out of 6 sets of sheep stitch markers sold on Monday. Even though there were watchers on the others, they didn't sell. Both the pink/white ones went and one set of black/white. The coloured ones didn't go at all. So maybe I'll do more of the pink/white and relist the others at a lower price. Or I could be really brave and take them into the yarn shop in town and see if they would be interested. They have some beaded ones in there.

Socks, hat & pump user's group

Today's pics are........

The socks I made from the Opal yarn for my step-sister and niece. They have been sent and received and the report back is that they love them. So job's a good 'un there then. I also sent the little baby slippers to the prospective parents, and those went down well too.

The hat is knitted for my mum to match a scarf I already made and sent to her. It came out slightly small but I think it will be okay. It should have been Bigga yarn but I used Lopi chunky which isn't quite as thick so it came out slightly smaller. I'm thinking now whether I should have used two strands together?
Today's project to be started is a hand puppet to go in shoeboxes which are filled with things for charity to send to kids who don't get much at Christmas in countries like Romania etc. I have a pattern for a bear and a clown so I'll see what happens there. Our knitting group is doing them so I can't really turn up next month without one, especially for charity!
As some of you know I use an insulin pump to control my diabetes. On Monday night there was a pump user's meeting at Liverpool with a talk by the Diabetes Consultant about future developments in treating diabetes. It was quite interesting, discussing inhaled insulin, closed loop feedback insulin pumps, and islet transplants. I also had a chat with a girl who started the pump the same day as me and we have kept in touch. She now has a 14 week old baby and she showed us a very cute photo. Also met a lady called Sally who lives in a village in N. Wales and knows some friend's of ours who live there. We exchanged numbers and emails so I will get in touch with her.
Christmas is hurtling towards us at a rate of knots! I need to get shopping done for the family for when we visit them. I have ideas I just need to get out to the shops.
Ooooo...........is that the kettle on.............?

And today's yarn is.........

65% teeswater wool and 35% mohair in mint.......



And I shall not be buying any more yarn until I have finished all my ongoing and planned projects.
Simply Knitting magazine are running a sock knitting competition to knit a pair of socks for a celebrity. I know who I'm knitting for and I have a design in mind, but apart from saying the socks will have a red and white theme, that's all I'm saying. Don't want anyone pinching my idea which I think is a corker!

Cards for a change

Just for a change, today here are some cards I made for some upcoming birthdays. (Don't panic there is yarn too!)
The teddy with a balloon is a sticker which I put on acetate in a window card. Behind is some yellow vellum which I stamped and embossed with Happy Birthday. This is for a one year old girl.
The Purple teddy with flowers is a stamp coloured in with watercolour pencils with chalk edging and then a strip of purple vellum behind to match and some punched flowers.
And lastly, the same stamp, onto shrink plastic and coloured with watercolour pencils, then shrunk and mounted on a small square of shiny paper.
Need to get on with the Christmas cards now!!!

Well the postman arrived yesterday with my American yarn. Ten balls of this..........


yummy colour eh? It is actually thinner than sock weight slightly, so I think I'm gonna have to make something lacy with it. It is 100% wool and lovely and soft. I was also very naughty and did one of those impulse bids where I was watching something and someone bid on it so i HAD to bid on it. It was only a tenner in the end, incl P&P so that was okay. It was 10 50g balls of DK 75 %wool, 25% mohair in mint. Again I have no idea what I'll do with it but it'll be added to the stash for now. I think that may make a lovely warm scarf actually. I really needed one earlier on when I was out with the dog. I have finished the adult sized Opal socks and have almost finished the first of the smaller size. I'm still getting a hole when I pick up stitches though, so I'll have to darn those after I've finished. The colours are good though........but I'll be glad when they are finished.
I also made a quick start on the front of my jumper and it is striping again. Who knows........

I have another Reiki "victim". A friend of ours who expressed an interest ages ago has finally made an appointment for next Thursday. She has loads of people lined up waiting to see what she thinks of it, and she said I could go to where she works and do a few people there. As its a hospital there will already be a couch so I don't have to lug mine there. I will probably do shorter taster sessions first, maybe 20-30 minutes, then I can get more people trying it out. Apparently they are all stressed to the eyeballs.

I finished the troll book. It was really good but a little bit iffy at times. I think the guy fell in love with the troll in the end, and it could have all got a bit icky, but the book ended. There was one icky bit but you'll have to read it yourself!! Now I have a book by a guy who started the bookring to get opinions on his own book. It seems a bit autobiographical, cos its about a guy who goes off travelling the world for 6 months and that's what the author did. Well I can only try it and give an honest opinion, after all that's what he wants.

Stitch markers on ebay

Just in case anyone reading this is a knitter and is interested in my sheep stitch markers, I have listed 6 sets on ebay.co.uk, 3 as auctions and 3 as Buy It Now. They are on for 7 days and end on 20th November at about 8pm ish.

Sheep disaster!

Hee hee, I had a bit of a sheep disaster today. I was going to throw them in the bin but even though they look really sinister, I wanted to record them. In my haste to make them and get them listed on ebay's 10p listing day, I put the oven on to 200 centigrade instead of 130, and this was the result!

They were supposed to turn out like this......

Luckily I got it right the second time. I also made this set.....


Remember the greeny blue wool from a couple of weeks ago? This is the WIP so far, the back of the jumper. It is hand-dyed yarn so the colour pools as it feels like it. As you can see it started off striping quite nicely but the next ball of yarn came out differently. Ah well, I'll see how the front goes, at least it will be unique! Still waiting on the purple-blue yarn from the USA. but if this jumper turns out okay I may use the yarn to make a purple one. Either that or a big shawl, haven't decided. I'll wait till I've seen it first.


My step-sister's socks are coming along nicely, I have just turned the heel on the 2nd adult sized sock.. The fun will start trying to adapt the pattern for a 5 year old's foot. I saw an amazing article on knitty.com today, a method of knitting two socks at the same time on the same set of DPNs. Every other stitch is one or other of the socks. It looked very complicated.

I made a list yesterday of projects I have to make. There was more than I thought and I have added to it today, because my neighbour has ordered fluffy slippers for her 2 little girls for Christmas. Talking of slippers, I adapted the fluffy slipper pattern and used sock wool and small needles and made a pair of these. They are so dinky, only about 8cm long. I think I will give them to some friends who are expecting in March. They'll be perfect for a baby, and the colours are so mixed they'll suit a boy or a girl.

I received a book ring book the other day. It's called Not Before Sundown by Johanna Sinisalo. It's the first book I've been able to get into for ages. It's about a guy who finds a baby troll in his garden and brings it in to look after it. It's written in a way that makes you really believe in trolls. I think its because it is translated from Finnish and is set in Finland which seems like the type of country that is full of folklore and would therefore actually have real trolls wandering about. It is a relief to find a book I'm actually enjoying tho', the last 3 books I've abandoned because I just couldn't get into them. I bought Derren Brown's book, Tricks of the Mind on an impulse on Saturday, looks quite interesting and there is a section on phobias which I'm looking forward to.

New sock yarn

Just a quick post today to show the new yarn I have. The first one is Opal handpainted sock yarn which I am using for my step-sister and neice's socks. The other one I got today from an ebay seller in the USA. It is also sock weight and handpainted. Unfortunately it is not as soft as I would have hoped but the colours are lovely. I may use this for gloves rather than socks. The Opal colours are a lot brighter, like the colours on an exotic parrot!

Knit & Purl

Phew, it was a mad week last week with slippers and sheep coming out of my ears. (Wonder where that saying comes from?) I managed to get the sheep sent off to the USA on Thursday evening and the slippers eventually went off yesterday.
These are two pairs of the slippers, I did another red pair too.

I think I must have seen stitch markers like these somewhere but I made these anyway and they will be going on to ebay next. Couldn't think of any other 4 letter knitting words at the time so just bought these letters. Really easy to make - no Fimo involved!!

And finally here is the hat for my friend to go with the scarf from a couple of weeks ago. It looks much better stretched over a head, maybe he'll send me a photo of him in it.
The link to his blog (which he taught me how to do, thanks Rich!) is VincentBlackShadow on the left under favourite blogs.
There is more I could write today but haven't really got time so will catch up with those later.

sheep crazy!!

On October 19th ebay uk had a 10p listing day so I had a sort out of my cardmaking stuff and listed a few things. I had sold some of my beaded stitch markers a few days before and had been looking on knitting websites at other markers. Then I had an idea. Why not make them with sheep on, after all that is where the wool comes from so they would make great knitting gifts for knitting mad friends. So off I went to HobbyCraft to get some Fimo polymer clay and a couple of hours later produced these! "I'll stick some on ebay and see what happens," I thought because no-one else had anything like them listed. By the end of the listing I had 10 watchers and the set sold for £4.50. I then sent a second chance offer to the person who had just lost out and she was in the USA. She was really chuffed to get a second chance and has asked me for a total of 7 sets!! I have another set listed for auction at the moment and someone emailed to ask if I would do a Buy It Now because she couldn't wait to get hold of some. So I sold her a set for £4.99.
In the meantime, one of my other listings was for a pair of the purple fluffy slippers. In the listing I stated that I could do other colours and had a request for a red pair which I duly made and have dispatched. The lady who bought the purple pair has now asked me for 3 more pairs, 2 red and 1 purple. I am so pleased that people actually want to buy my creations. So I'm gonna be busy making sheep for the next day or so. I'm going to make some coloured ones as well, not just plain black and white, but blue, green, pink, yellow, etc. Funky!!

Todays 3BTs
1. Getting the order for 7 sets of sheep stitch markers.
2. A lovely warm sunny day at the end of October.
3. Having a naughty sausage sandwich in a little cafe inside a local craft shop on a Sunday morning.