Last of the Christmas knitting

This is it, the end of the Christmas knitting. A pair of plain stocking stitch socks for Colin. I started them for me but they are good "man colours" so he decided he would like them. Okay, they don't match but he's not bothered and nor am I. All I have to do now is hide them and hope he forgets about them for the next 6 days!!

I got tickets!!!

Whhhoooooooooooooooopppppppppeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! I have Mighty Boosh tickets!!!!!!!!! What a palaver. I am on a fan mailing list called Modwolves and we were told that all our emails had been sent to the promoters of the live shows so that we would get an email link and a PIN number to get advanced tickets. Some other Booshys I know got their PINs and 24 hours later when some of the tickets had already gone on sale, I still hadn't had a PIN or link!! I started to panic and went on the message boards, and nearly everyone had a PIN and some already had tickets. Anyway someone gave me a number to call and I got through easily and was given a PIN number. So Thursday morning more tickets were released at 10am, so I refreshed for about half an hour before just in case. Well, 10am came and the page flashed up, and I was in there like a shot.......at 10.04am I had ordered 4 tickets and it was all over and done with. I think I was one of the lucky ones cos I went straight onto the message boards and there were all kinds of problems and people moaning and wailing about screens going blank and not getting tickets and how it was all a shambles. Anyway, I got mine and they are for Dec 2nd at Manchester Apollo. Of course they are not physically in my hot little hands yet, apparently they are not being sent out till August! But hopefully they will come, and I am a happy bunny. I just don't know where we'll be sitting. Or who is going to get the 2 spare tickets!!!

Colin finished his radiotherapy last Tuesday, and his arm is already starting to look better. It looks like strange sunburn now with lots of peeling. He went for a check-up on Thursday morning and had a chest X-ray which was clear. This afternoon he has gone for a CT scan cos they couldn't fit him in on Thursday as we had to get to the airport to go to Ireland. We'll get the results of that in a few days.

So we went to Ireland Thursday afternoon. We stayed with Colin's dad and also saw his sister Fiona who lives 5 minutes away. And on Saturday we went to Niall's which is about an hour's drive south, and saw him and his family. He gave me something which is quite possibly something rather special............

Yeah, yeah, they may just look like a couple of drinking glasses to you but there is a story. Niall worked for Telecom Eireann (Ireland's BT) and when there are big concerts at Slane Castle his team were responsible for sorting out all the phones etc, so he had access to the backstage areas. In 2001 U2 played Slane and afterwards Niall was able to snaffle these 2 glasses from the room where they had all been drinking champagne from them. These glasses could very probably have Bono's saliva on them!!!!! Or Edge, Larry or Adam's! Knowing what a huge U2 fan i am Niall has kept these for me for 6 years!

Onto the knitting..........

I started a pair of plain socks in some Lana Grossa Cotton Fantasy sock yarn that I got from Stash's bargain bin. The colours are 812 - blue/brown/grey and Colin decided he would like them so I am trying to get those done for Christmas. I also worked on my Drops 88-4 sleeve in Ireland and have nearly finished the cabled bit so that shouldn't be too long to finish now.

I got this from ebay last week, 150g of sock weight Kauni yarn for a grand total of £4.20.

And what did I do when I was opening the packaging with scissors?
Then I tried to wind the skein by myself and it has all ended up as two small balls, 2 large balls and one lovely knotted mess that I am trying to unravel, ulgh!

On other knitting things I have been chuckling along to the limenviolet podcast that I mentioned a couple of posts ago. They are just 2 American women talking about knitting but some of the things are funny. They record it in one of their houses and she has a couple of mad dogs who you can hear breathing or running around in the background. In one episode they fell about laughing cos the dogs were humping, and in another the husband came in to get the dogs out and he was chasing them round the room wearing just a pair of boxer shorts with hearts on them. Good job this is not on a webcam!

On TV I am getting excited about the final of Strictly Come Dancing. My favourite, Matt is through to the final but I think he will have a job on to beat Alisha. I don't know how the winner is decided, by the judges or the public vote?

Tomorrow morning I am going for another pre-op appointment about my thumb. I guess it has been a while since I went before but it shouldn't take too long as I can't see that anything has changed. Then the op is on Jan 11th.

Jaywalkers

Just a quick post to show off my completed Jaywalkers. I'm pleased with them, but the yarn wasn't the softest in the world.

Now I shall get onto the second sleeve of my Drops 88-4 and probably cast on another pair of socks. You should always have a pair of socks on the needles.

Stitch markers

While I was out shopping yesterday I popped into the bead shop and for a change it was empty and I could see all the beads without having to try to peer over the shoulders of much taller than me teenagers. I thought I would make some more stitch markers because if i am going to make another Clapotis I will need a lot of stitch markers. These are the markers I made this morning......
and individually................
I think the dice ones are my favourites. I could only get small jump rings so most of these will only fit up to 5mm needles (fine for the Clapotis), but I did have some larger ones left over so I have made some of them to fit up to 7mm. Plenty there I think, and some may end up in other people's Christmas stockings!

Bah humbug!

It has been over a week since my last post. I was sort of waiting because i didn't have any photos of anything, but I can't see any photos happening in the next few days either so i thought I'd just get on with a new post anyway. Does a blog post need photos or pictures? I'll admit that I do tend to look at blogs if they do have photos than if they are just plain text. So I'll not be expecting many readers today!!

So what has been happening this past week? A bit of planning for Christmas. The mad "buying presents and getting them in the post" rush has been averted this year because we have decided to go down south to visit my folks on 27th Dec for a couple of days. I have still been doing a bit of shopping though. I am finding it really hard thinking of presents for people this year. I remember when it used to be that if you wanted something you waited until Christmas or your birthday to get it, but these days if you want something you just go and get it. Then when people ask what you want for Christmas, there isn't anything you want. And when you ask them, they can't think of anything either!! Grrr. And wandering round the shops just doesn't inspire me either. I like to get things that are a little bit different for people, not just the same old thing. But everything in the shops is the same. I guess I could have knitted everyone unique gifts but what with my hand problems this year, and the fact that I want to knit stuff for myself, it wasn't practical. I also think that you only get the benefit if you knit for people who appreciate the work and effort put into it. Like other knitters. I have made a couple of things for other knitters. And something for my mum.

I was in town today wandering aimlessly. It wasn't helped by going to the optician first thing and being informed i needed new glasses which I will have to wear all the time instead of just for driving. Varifocals!!! But "THAT BIRTHDAY" isn't until August!!! Yet I'm getting varifocals!!! The price tag was a bit of a stunner too, I won't say how much, but it was round about "that birthday" times ten. Yikes!!!

We are also going to Ireland for a few days next week to see Colin's family. His 6 weeks of radiotherapy finishes on Tuesday, can you believe how quickly that has gone. But you should see the arm, red doesn't start to describe it, and the heat, phew! We were joking the other night that I wouldn't need to shave my legs, i could just let him singe the hairs off with his arm. He was supposed to have an appointment with the consultant tomorrow but it has been postponed until nest Thursday. We think it is for a scan. Fingers crossed for that.

We had our works meal on Tuesday night. Well as me and Colin are strictly speaking the only employees of our company it would have been a bit sparse but we asked various people who rent the offices from us so there was a total of 7 of us. Unfortunately the food wasn't brilliant, so we will try elsewhere next time. It wasn't bad by any means but not inspiring either.

I can't believe it is already the 4th episode of The Mighty Boosh tonight. It has improved every week so I have great expectations for tonight's episode. It's been great having a double dose of Noel on a Thursday night, but sadly it is his last night on Buzzcocks tonight.

I have been catching up on a few podcasts. The knitting ones are really good for listening to while knitting. I found a new one called Lixie Knits It which is an English one rather than American. She sounds quite sweet but goes a bit bonkers sometimes especially when her husband gets involved! Also the Lime & Violet podcast. Boy can those two talk! I've only listened to one episode and there are 48 so far!!

As for my knitting I am still working on the Drops 88-4. I have finished a sleeve and am leaving the second one to take to Ireland. So I am back onto my second Jaywalker for the time being and am getting near to the heel flap. I have an urge to start something else as well though. I am waiting for some yarn from ebay for another Clapotis which I am going to make wider than the first one as I am getting 10 balls of yarn so should have plenty. I don't know what the yarn will be like though, its one of those "unknown yarn impulse ebay bargain purchases for a tenner from China" type things so i hope it is okay when it comes. Their feedback is good and it says that it is 100% wool so we will see.

I'll stop now as I have thought of something I may have photos of tomorrow, so I'll post again then.