kreachr's little corner

Where did I go wrong?

2012-01-23T17:00:00.000-08:00

My sister and her brood are coming to stay tomorrow, and I decided to get baking so they'd have some yummy goodies to eat when they got here. There was a recipe I've been wanting to try for a while, in the 'Short Cuts' section of one of my Taste magazines. Basically you just throw together a few ingredients and voila! Something yummy. In this case, some dark chocolate, dried apricots and brown sugar (along with the requisite flour, baking soda, butter and vanilla essence) to make some chocolate apricot biscuits.

I followed the recipe, and put the biscuits into the oven to bake, and... let's just say they didn't come out looking like the picture in the magazine. I did manage to take just one non-blurry picture of my resulting... could you really call them biscuits...? I was laughing so hard it was rather difficult to keep the camera steady long enough to click the button and take a photo. I've tried them, and they do taste nice, but really, would you eat these?

Needless to say, this particular recipe will not be added to my culinary repertoire. Back to the kitchen...

Food, glorious food

2012-01-19T12:36:00.000-08:00

I've made so many yummy things over the last couple of weeks. With a proper kitchen space, a food processor!! (thanks mum!) and plenty of time stuck at home without a car (still), my food magazine collection has been getting a good run. Just before Christmas, I sat down at the table with my hefty stack of food mags and went through each and every one, ripping out the pages of recipes I wanted to try, or keep, and discarded all the ones I had no interest in. My poor bookshelf was starting to bulge and droop with the weight of all the magazines, so I decided something had to be done about it. Of course, while I was flicking through all the pages and ripping out hundreds of these recipes, inspiration struck. Since then, I have tried everything from biscuits and puddings to stews and curries, and thoroughly enjoyed all of it.

I even baked bread! What is it about making a loaf of bread by hand from scratch that makes you feel like a superhero? I've always been a little scared of baking with yeast, as I know it can be rather fickle. I was pleasantly surprised to check on the dough after an hour and find that it had indeed risen, and even more impressed when it came out of the oven actually looking like a loaf of bread.

I was overjoyed by the fact that it tasted just like 'real' bread. But the best thing? The kids absolutely loved it :-)

I had to line my loaf tin with aluminium foil though, as both my loaf tins are looking a little the worse for wear. I grumbled a while about this (you know the old saying, 'they don't make things like they used to'), thinking that these loaf tins just hadn't lasted very well, when it occurred to me that these were a gift from our engagement party. Fourteen years ago. Perhaps it is time we got some new ones...

I have many more recipes lined up to try out over the next few weeks, and will probably keep going for a while before I start to miss the 'regular' meals, but I'm already thinking of goodies I can make for Christmas presents. I just have to remember them all come December! Now there's a challenge for my colander-brain.

Another new thing that's started with moving into this place is gardening. Ooh, just remembered I have to water my herbs! Wait there...

Okay, I'm back. Now where was I? Oh yes, gardening. Alright, so my idea of 'gardening' is more or less just weeding, but for me that's quite a huge step. I've been really good, and have weeded the garden every week since moving in here, and kept the courtyard swept and looking tidy. I've watched some lovely flowers bloom:

Although I have no idea what they are. I know I have several camellia bushes in the garden (are these a different type of camellia?) - one of the few plants I recognise (or maybe not) - and a decrepit lemon tree by the kitchen window that I think has done its dash and won't be producing any fruit for the foreseeable future.

My herbs are still alive and growing slowly, but unfortunately are far from the edible stage. (Patience.) Many people will laugh at me and my meagre attempts at 'gardening' (my sisters would find it hilarious) but I'm happy that I haven't killed anything yet - for me, that's progress :-)

Speaking of progress, the knitting is going slowly at the moment. I finished the socks for my sister:

Knit in Vintage Purls Max. They're a little on the short side because I ran out of yarn, but I rather like the 3x1 rib, so will do that again on the next pair (I have another skein of Max I bought at Knit August Nights last year that I'm looking forward to cracking into some time soon). Ugh, speaking of Vintage Purls, I just signed up for the Summer Sock Club. It's gonna be great, but eek! I wasn't going to buy any more yarn at this stage. But I just couldn't help myself. It's a sickness! Ask any knitter.

I cast on a Mandel sweater with some lovely natural Touch Yarns Merino Possum - it's beautiful to work with, very soft. And thankfully, not much in the way of shedding. I was a little concerned I'd be spending a large amount of time rubbing my nose and blowing away loose strands of possum fibre, but it seems to be pretty well woven into the yarn. Okay, so there's a little bit of shedding onto my shirt while I'm knitting, but it doesn't fly around in the air much. So yay. This is quite a slow knit compared to the last few projects (such is the danger of knitting with thicker yarns - they lull you into a false sense of speediness, then you pick up a fingering weight and BAM! Reality hits). I think its coming along nicely though, and hope to have it done in a few weeks. Although I'm starting to have thoughts of straying to other projects. Perhaps a pair of socks? Maybe casting on a shawl? Or that other worsted weight sweater I was thinking of knitting? How about that cotton short-sleeved sweater? Hmmm, I shall have to see how quickly I get bored with the acres of stocking-stitch. On the plus side, I can read at the same time, as stocking-stitch doesn't require concentration or eye focus. I'm currently reading The Book of Fires by Jane Borodale which I'm finding quite good (love my historical novels). Sadly, as it is an 'actual' book, I find it tiresome trying to find ways of holding the pages open, so I may move on to a book on Hedwig or my phone - just downloaded the last Melissa Marr book from the library, so perhaps that will do.

Just randomly, thought I'd share (I'm good like that), I got up this morning at about 4.40am for the usual nocturnal bathroom visit, and noticed the most beautiful fingernail moon (what my older sister always called a waxing or waning crescent moon) perfectly framed by the bathroom window. It had just a touch of fluffy cloud, with moonlight illumination. It really was rather lovely. I would have taken a picture, but I had just had the most bizarre bad dream involving large, shiny black spiders that looked remarkably like scorpions, and scary, creepy, fluffy attack kittens (I did mention the word bizarre, right?) and I didn't want to wander all the way down the stairs and stick my arm into the hall cupboard to get the camera. Plus, it was 4.40am and my eyes were all bleary, and I just wanted to go back to bed. If I see another one though, I'll be sure to take a picture ;-)

Vrrrrrrmmm

2012-01-14T19:04:00.000-08:00

That's the sound this month is making as it whizzes by. It's already the middle of January! Wow, this year is speeding along already. Gone is the general falumphing of the holiday season. The usual daily routines have settled back in to place, like my weekly trek to the library cafe on Sundays to get together with my fellow knitters and have a good ol' yak and a laugh. Much excited exclaiming over new projects, or big ongoing projects, or recently completed projects. Such fun!

I finished my Derry Raglan and Cowl, and decided after trying it on that the sweater is definitely a go, but the cowl... not so much. Perhaps the cowl would benefit from some blocking, but at this stage I think it'll just stay as a possible accessory if it gets really cold (which is unlikely up here). Still, I'm more than happy with the sweater:

Just so you know what I'm talking about re the cowl, here's a pic with it:

Meh. Looks better in the book, on the professional model (hehe, don't they all?) This photo at least shows the fittedness (is that a word?) of the sweater - my gauge was about 17.5 stitches to the inch, compared to the 16 recommended by the pattern. I was knitting the 34" bust size, and my bust measurement is 35". With this combination of factors, I ended up with a nicely fitted sweater, as opposed to the much floppier version suggested by the pattern in the book. I'm very happy with the result. I also knit the sweater about an 1.5" longer than the pattern recommendation, and the sleeves I just knit until I decided they were long enough (I like being able to tuck my hands into them when its cold). To take into account the difference in gauge, I omitted four decreases for the sleeves, so they didn't end up too tight. Otherwise, I followed the pattern exactly. The yarn is so lovely and soft. I'm wearing it as I type this, with nothing but a bra on underneath (probably TMI but oh well) and its not at all scratchy - very soft and smooshy-feeling.

I only used eight balls of yarn for both the sweater and cowl - one less than I thought I'd need. I was contemplating what to do with the two leftover balls, and by a happy coincidence, I received an email this morning from a knitter in the US who is making this exact same sweater with the exact same yarn and has found herself short by two balls. Hurrah! They shall be winging their way to her first thing tomorrow. Glad I could help out a fellow crafter :-)

I finished the cowl on Friday, and that night cast on for a pair of these socks for my sister, in the leftover Vintage Purls Max yarn that I knit my blue socks out of last year.

I'm not sure how long this will continue, but I have found myself so far this year (yes, a whole two weeks) knitting only one project at a time. Only one project on the needles, finished, before starting another. It seems a little odd. Perhaps I should just cast something else on for the hell of it?

In contrast, I have found myself reading more than one book at a time - at the moment I'm reading an Aurora Teagarden short story from the first omnibus - a book I bought my mother last year, and I started a Rizzoli & Isles novel on my Kindle while at the cafe this morning, waiting for other knitters to join me. The other day I had a vampire romance on my iPhone and a crime mystery on my Kindle. Too many options? I don't know. Either way I'm enjoying reading a lot at the moment, and am absolutely loving being able to read things so many different ways. Much as I love a good old-fashioned book (and I always will) these new-fangled devices are incredibly handy and transportable.

And oh, I just have to give you a quick update on the herby-herbs:

Aren't they looking great? Soon they'll start looking like actual plants, and not just weeds! Hopefully.

Ah, ah, ah, ah, stayin' alive, stayin' alive

2012-01-07T22:14:00.000-08:00

My herbs are hangin' in there. I haven't killed them yet. On the contrary:

Doesn't look like much, right? But wait, there's more:

Even the parsley's joined the party. It's grown a little more since I took this picture a couple of days ago. Lookin' good!!! Although, I have no idea how much longer they'll last. I'm doing my best to keep them alive and growing. If they last six months, I may even name them. But not yet. I have to prove to myself I can keep a plant alive for longer than two months first. Y'know, it's funny... I can keep animals alive, my children appear to be thriving, and yet, plants... they are a mystery to me...

Something else that appears to be thriving is my knitting. I finished the cutest little cricket vest for a wee babe the other day:

How sweet is this?!? It's a Sirdar pattern, in Sirdar yarn (Snuggly Baby Bamboo DK). The pattern itself was fine, as was the yarn, except for the fact that I got three knots in just two balls of the white - I haven't used all of the other ball of white or the red, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had knots hidden somewhere in there as well. Talking to a knitterly friend today, she says she had the same problem. Colour me disappointed!! I think I will write to the company. I expected better from a well-known, international brand. Their quality control sucks.

On Thursday, I cast on a sweater. Although it is summer here, the weather has been rather attrocious of late - rain, rain, and more rain. Not very inspiring for summer activities like backyard cricket and walks on the beach. Very inspiring for winterly knits though. So as soon as the wee vest was blocking, into the yarn stash I went, and settled rather quickly on the Derry Raglan and Cowl I've been eyeing up since last year, thanks to KiwiPurler over at Kiwiyarns Knits (this post specifically. And yes, I'm eyeing up the skirt too).

I've had the yarn for a little while now, although that was a mission in itself. You see, when I saw the picture of the sweater and cowl on the blog, I hunted down the book in the library. On closer inspection, I decided that I liked the yarn so much I wanted it exactly the same. So to the internet I went. A search on Ravelry (ah, blessed Ravelry, how I love thee) informed me that it was only possible to purchase in America (of course). After a few days of hunting, I finally found a store in Colorado that had enough in stock and were willing to sell and ship internationally. The transaction took place, and the yarn was sent. I waited, and waited, and it didn't arrive. There was plenty of email correspondence back and forth, until eventually it turned up back on their doorstep. It had been labelled 'unclaimed'. I was furious! Not with them of course, but with the people trusted to deliver my package to me, safe and sound. Had I known the parcel had arrived in the country, I would've been happy to pick it up, but nobody had bothered to notify me, and it was sent back. I gave myself a few days to calm down, then went and spoke to the people at the post depot, explaining what had happened, and asked very nicely for them to please make sure that it didn't happen again.

The nice ladies at the yarn store resent the package, and thankfully it arrived via courier a few weeks later. Then it sat in my stash until earlier this week. I have to say though, its lovely yarn, very soft, and not a single knot so far! Its Karabella Soft Tweed, in colour 1310 (I have it memorised - must've been all the hunting I did for it last year...) and I guess I could say it was worth the extra effort to get it. I haven't yet come across a New Zealand tweed yarn that is as soft. I'm not saying there isn't one out there, I'm just saying I haven't found it yet.

Anyway, I'm enjoying working with it so much, I've already completed the body of the sweater, and only have the sleeves to go. And the cowl of course. I should be able to wear it by the end of next week. Wonder if it'll be cold enough?

2011 Roundup featuring 'It's Alive!'

2012-01-02T00:14:00.001-08:00

Yes indeed - It's alive!! Not Frankenstein's monster, my basil ;-) For a few days I've just been looking at this:

Excuse my 70s TV sitcom humour... ahem. I noticed this morning that things were starting to happen in one of the pots:

Can you see? Can you see it?!? The basil is starting to grow!!! Either that, or its a weed (probably the latter knowing my luck). This is very exciting for me, as I have a habit of killing any and all plants that cross my path. Be warned people - if you give me a house plant, expect it to leave the realm of the living within the month.

For now though, the seeds appear to be surviving despite the odds - I may actually have herbs on my windowsill soon! Oh, happy day.

Anyway, I thought I'd do a bit of a round-up of what I achieved in the year of 2011. Being a lowly housewife, I do not achieve greatness on a daily basis, but what I do accomplish is something I am proud of - my little personal challenges that keep me on my toes. First up, the book list:

How to Kill Your Husband - Kathy Lette
Wicked Lovely - Melissa Marr
We Need to Talk About Kevin - Lionel Shriver
Hot Six - Janet Evanovich
Love Bites - Lynsay Sands
Ink Exchange - Melissa Marr
Seven Up - Janet Evanovich
Single White Vampire - Lynsay Sands
At Knit's End - Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Hard Eight - Janet Evanovich
Fragile Eternity - Melissa Marr
A Touch of Dead - Charlaine Harris
Tall, Dark & Hungry - Lynsay Sands
The White Queen - Philippa Gregory
Grave Sight - Charlaine Harris
The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson
Tome of the Undergates - Sam Sykes
Moab is My Washpot - Stephen Fry
Lord John and the Custom of the Army - Diana Gabaldon
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest - Stieg Larsson
The Fry Chronicles - Stephen Fry
A Tiny Bit Marvellous - Dawn French
Magpie Hall - Rachael King
The Secret Life of a Knitter - Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Fallen - Lauren Kate
Free Range Knitter - Stephanie Pearl McPhee
Year of Wonders - Geraldine Brooks
How to Knit a Love Song - Rachael Herron
Dead Reckoning - Charlaine Harris
The Bad Beginning - Lemony Snicket
Torment - Lauren Kate
Uglies - Scott Westerfeld
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making - Catherynne M Valente
Lucy's Kiss - Rachael Herron
The Secret Life of Bees - Sue Monk Kidd
Room - Emma Donoghue
A Leaf on the Wind of All Hallows - Diana Gabaldon
Heat Wave - Richard Castle
The World House - Guy Adams
Quite Ugly One Morning - Christopher Brookmyre
Snuff - Terry Pratchett
Honeymooning - Rachael Herron
The Vampyre; A Tale - John William Polidori
Naked Heat - Richard Castle
War Brides - Helen Bryan
Loose Screw - Rae Davies
Ethereal - Addison Moore
The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening - L J Smith
Lord John and the Plague of Zombies - Diana Gabaldon
A Bite to Remember - Lynsay Sands
Passion - Lauren Kate
Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account - Dr. Miklos Nyiszli
Pretties - Scott Westerfeld
Grave Secret - Charlaine Harris
Radiant Shadows - Melissa Marr
The Family Tree - Barbara Delinsky
All I Want for Christmas - Ros Clarke
Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M Auel
The Tycoon's Convenient Wife - Ros Clarke

59 books. Wow, is that right? Let me count again... yep, 59. Dude, that's a lot of books. Guess you could say I like reading ;-) And people think I'm hard to buy presents for. Pfft.

There's a bit of variation in there, although I notice there's quite a few romances (oh dear). One author I got to meet in person (Lauren Kate), a few more I'd like to meet in the future (Diana Gabaldon, Charlaine Harris, Terry Pratchett, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee and (ahaha) Richard Castle). One, I have knit in a competition with (Ros Clarke - Sock Madness). So many good books!! So many more to read!! Hooray for a new year!!

And on to the knitting. I decided to make up a wee collage of all the projects I completed (and got a picture of) during 2011:

Unfortunately, in order for the blog to not have a hernia and be able to actually upload the collage, I had to make it kinda small, so now you probably can't see much.

Let's break it down a bit...

19 pairs of socks, and a mini sock.

Seven garments.

Plus 27 other miscellaneous items (and an extra Deane head). Hats, mitts, shawls, toys, a freaking huge afghan... I do love me some variety.

That's a total of 54 different projects, not including the three I didn't get pictures of - a Milo vest, a vanilla soaker, and some blanket squares for the Christchurch earthquake appeal. Phew! That's a lot of knitting.

And oh, so many ideas for 2012!! Already this month I've managed to finish the shawl I didn't quite get done in time for Christmas:

This is a shawl for my mum - the pattern is Yvaine, knit in Knitsch sock yarn from the last yarn club, 'Terry's Treat'.

I'm also over halfway through a wee baby cricket vest for a friend's baby, born ten weeks ago (the recipient of the Milo vest and vanilla soakers). I was planning on getting this done before Christmas too, but the afghan took over all my knitting time, so this will be for his first birthday instead, as I am knitting it in the 1-2 years size. Pics to come soon!! It's super cute :-)

Also in 2011, I completed a quarter marathon (officially, plus a few more unofficially), ran a 15km, saw my boys turn seven and nine, got to read two of the best end of year school reports a mum could ever hope for, moved into a house with room to stretch out a bit (something we haven't had for quite a while, let me tell you!), and celebrated 11 years of marriage to the most infuriating, hilarious, caring, dorky, reliable, unreliable (yes, I know, very confusing), thoughtful man, who has come a long way since his teenage boy-racer days. It's been a wild and crazy ride watching him grow and change over the years.

This year will see my oldest son turn ten (oh my!), and who knows what else? I can't wait to find out. Onwards, 2012!!!

Oh, just one more thing...

2011-12-28T23:15:00.000-08:00

The Epic Aran Afghan.

Dude, it is awesome.

Of course, that's just my opinion, but you can judge for yourself:

Here's a pic of the whole thing (minus the bit hanging over the fence) outside:

Pretty, huh? So, time for the deets. I used only 30 of the 40 balls of yarn I thought I would need, meaning I used about 2,634 metres of yarn, not the expected 3,418 metres. Quite a difference! Although, I now have a sweater-lot of yarn left over, so will be scouring the patterns on Ravelry for something I can make with it. Bonus! I used John Q Mia yarn, a 10 ply yarn sold by Knit World - purchased at the Wellington branch. I don't think they sell it any more though. It's a composition of 29% merino, 25% acrylic (gasp!), 15% alpaca, 11% corn, 8% cashmere, 6% silk and 6% angora. Quite a mixture (probably what they scraped off the factory floor) but to be perfectly honest, its lovely and soft. I found it delightful to knit with, and have a hat and scarf already made with it. It is very hard-wearing, and comfortable. Very minimal itch-factor.

The pattern, of course, is the Burridge Lake Aran Afghan. Full credit to Anna Dalvi for writing such a fantastically beautiful pattern. I loved knitting every inch of this afghan... okay, so I may have grumbled occasionally about the endless cables, but this pattern was a favourite of mine the second I saw it on the 5th July 2009, and sat in my list of things to knit until I decided to bite the bullet and cast it on. The cast on date was 21st September, and I officially finished it on the 22nd December - three months. Not too bad if I do say so myself ;-) According to my Rav notes, the yarn cost $104 for all 40 balls, which means the cost of this afghan was the low, low price of $78. Bloody excellent.

It was gifted to my mother-in-law on Christmas day. For some reason, the second I saw this afghan pattern and fell in love with it, I knew I would be making it for her. I've never changed my mind about that, so although I'd quite like to keep it, I was more than happy to hand it over once it was finished. There's only one thing that makes me a little nervous.

Please, please Alison, for the love of all that is holy, keep it away from the cat!!!

That is all.

So how was your Christmas?

2011-12-28T21:43:00.001-08:00

I had a good Christmas, and once again got spoilt rotten :-) My parents got me a new food processor, something I've wanted since we left ours behind in Napier over four years ago. Now that I have a decent sized kitchen, I'll actually be able to use it. I plan on cooking a bit more now, and may even get back into baking. I'm convinced that the type of kitchen you have determines how much you cook. I had no real want to cook at the last place, and avoided baking as much as possible, simply because the kitchen was so tiny. Not only was there minimal bench space, there was only a half sized oven and two cook tops. Very difficult to feed a family of four in a kitchen like that, believe me! Since moving to this place, I actually want to cook, and am enjoying flicking through recipe books and magazines, thinking of things to make. Something I haven't really done in about a year.

I also got some herb pots and seeds, and planted them this afternoon. According to the instructions, I should start seeing results in about ten days. Hmmm, we'll see. I'm notoriously bad with plants. Still, I'm willing to give it a go. If all goes to plan, we'll have lovely fresh herbs to go with the fresh pasta Deane will be making with the snazzy new pasta machine his mother gave us. Yum!

Surprisingly, I haven't done one single stitch of knitting since I finished the afghan last Thursday. Not. One. I did finish Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M Auel, and read another book as well. I have to say, having an e-reader is just fabulous. No longer do I need to make sure I have enough books packed in the suitcase (taking up valuable clothing space) - I have all the books I need on one small device. And if not? It only takes a minute to download one. Brilliant. So brilliant in fact, I took great joy in giving an e-reader to both mums for Christmas. We can still share books! Yay!

The kids got some cool presents too - the most used so far I think would have to be the two books Santa brought them - Diary of a Wimpy Kid, and the sequel, Rodrick Rules. X has already read the first and is part way through the second, and T started the first book yesterday on the way home. I'm ridiculously happy about this. I always wanted my boys to be readers - I think they just might be. I'll definitely be getting the other books in the series to add to their collection (and I'll be reading them myself of course ;-p)

Must dash, Deane wants to order dinner online. I hope you have a good New Year - ours will be relatively quiet, as usual. Fine with me :-) See you next year!

Still plodding

2011-12-21T20:45:00.000-08:00

Apologies for the involuntary absence - our internet took longer to sort out than expected. Temporary solutions just didn't allow for extended browsing jaunts, much less blog-land updates. However, we finally have our permanent internet sorted out, and I have a little time available for a posting.

We have only three sleeps to go until Christmas day. All I have left to do is sew half of one border onto the Epic Aran Afghan, and weave in all the ends. Alllllll the ennnnnnnds. There are many. Still, I managed to knock out a good chunk of the border knitting yesterday and finished them early afternoon, so was able to block them last night. Thanks to some decent summer-type weather, they were dry by mid morning, and I've sewn on one border. I'm procrastinating about the other, but have half done. The ends I think I'll do tonight in front of the idiot box.

The plum pudding is in the freezer, the peppermint bark and shortbread are all secure in their cellophane bags, the crystallised ginger is sitting pretty (or not so pretty, since crystallised ginger is kinda ugly looking if you think about it) in jars, and I've well and truly finished the Christmas shopping and wrapping. Can't say the same for Deane of course, but that is none of my concern. He's always been one to finish things at the absolute last second, so I'm not going to worry about it (read: trying to ignore things I can't do anything about, in the hopes of avoiding hyperventilation).

He has organised transport for us to Napier, since our car is still out of action (damned meanies, breaking into our car at the most inconvenient time possible), and luckily it has plenty of boot space, so we can not only fit all the Christmas presents in it for the trip down, there might even be some room to fit my favourite rocking chair in for the trip back - I've been looking forward to being able to sit in it for a while, and I have just the spot in our new place. It'll be great to be able to sit in it and read or knit the day away. Not quite the same as the spot it used to reside in, next to the pot-belly stove at my husband's childhood home, but good all the same.

I have had no chance in the last few weeks to go for a run, and won't for some time yet, so have decided (because I'm a lazy cow) to leave it until the kids go back to school in February. Thankfully, I have a good metabolism so I won't pile on the weight (in fact, my weight hasn't changed at all in the last four years), but I am a little concerned about my cardiac fitness, which is undoubtedly taking quite a dive right about now. Still, I know I can put in the effort to work it back up again, it'll just take a little time. February, there's no hurry to get here, mm-kaaaay?

The timer is about to go on the stove, letting me know the baked potatoes are done, and X is sitting right next to me, patiently waiting for the computer, so I better go, but I just wanted to leave you with a few colourful pics I've taken over the last week. Have a Merry Christmas, a wonderfully fun-filled New Year celebration (if I don't see you before then), and I'll post pics and deets of the finished (in time! Hurrah!) afghan next week. Enjoy!

Bought these the other day at the supermarket. After the weekend we had moving in, I needed a little cheering up! These hit the spot nicely :-)

The pohutukawa I see outside my window every day. Gorgeous!!

A simple, yet beautiful and delicious snack, to go alongside freshly baked gingerbread loaf on a lovely Sunday morning with friends.

And this picture again. Why, you ask? Just because its funny ;-)

UPDATE
It is 9.47pm, and I have officially completed the afghan!!!!! Oh, joy of joys!! I am so happy and proud :-) Sadly, there is nobody to share it with as Deane is still at work, and the boys are in bed asleep. Oh well...

Tomorrow, packing and washing. But most importantly, photos of the finished afghan before wrapping it ready for Christmas. Three sleeps to go, remember!

Phew! Now that mammoth project is out of the way, I feel an itch to cast on some of these (thank you Yarn Harlot!). Alas, I don't have the yarn for them :-( Plus, its summer. I'll add them to my to-do list...

It's never easy, is it?

2011-12-13T16:10:00.000-08:00

So we moved this weekend. I thought I was organised. Guess not. The actual move itself was pretty smooth-sailing, except of course for the bits that Deane had anything to do with (ie: packing the stuff in his 'office' etc - he left it until the movers were there moving everything out of the apartment. I was at the new place by then, so for all I know, the movers did it for him...) The new place is great - so much more space, storage room, everything is great. Except there was no hot water (the electrician had failed to install a rather essential wire in the fuse box); our new fridge had a hernia the first night and threw the RCD so we had no power for a while, until we unplugged the fridge. Then we just had no fridge until the next afternoon; the downstairs bathroom sink had no cold water (turns out we just needed to turn on the tap thingee on the pipe under the sink - duh); the TV aerial can't pick up analog channels, and we've lost the remote for the Freeview box - still waiting for the aerial guy to track down a spare remote so he can reprogram the box for us. It would be nice to be able to watch TV again, even if its just to entertain the kids for a while.

At seven his morning, I was standing at the kitchen sink and saw the rubbish truck whizz by. In the hopes that they hadn't done our street yet, I went out the gate to check, and discovered some ::insert expletives here:: had smashed two windows in our car and ripped out the ignition. Oh, and yes, the rubbish truck had already done our street, so now I have a full rubbish bin for another week.

Once, just once, I would like to move to a new place and not have any problems. Is that too much to ask?!?!?

Deep, calming breaths...

The kids are loving the proximity to school. We're all enjoying the novelty of being able to walk across the road instead of having to drive. I stand on the corner and wave them goodbye in the mornings, and meet them on the same corner in the afternoons. They cross the road on their own. Hopefully soon I'll be able to say goodbye without leaving the house, and wait inside the gate for them to come home in the afternoons (and just secretly spy on them out the window). I don't think I'm quite ready to let go that much yet though. Baby steps.

Sadly, with all the craziness of the move etc, I didn't manage to finish the third panel on the Epic Aran Afghan. Happily though, I only have two repeats left! I may be able to get those done tonight (especially since we have nothing to watch) and get to blocking them tomorrow. I can't wait to see it all put together! Oh dear, I hope I can let go of it once its finished, I really do intend to give it away but I'm not sure if I'll be able to... Perhaps I can visit it every now and then, so it won't really be like its gone...

The Christmas tree is finally up, the presents are laid below, and I can see beautiful pohutukawas outside my window. I must get a photo to show you - in the next few days, I promise. It really is a lovely kiwi Christmas icon, the pohutukawa. Such striking red flowers! Very festive.

I hope your week has gone a little smoother than ours, and you're looking forward to the Christmas break. Just a few more things to do myself. The boys finish up at school next Tuesday, so I'm extra glad we have space for them to run around in now. And of course, the school playground across the road if they get bored ;-)

Enjoy the rest of your week!!

Same again, thanks

2011-12-05T20:57:00.001-08:00

This has been my view every day for the last week:

The only thing that changes is the length. I should be glad of that at least...

As of right now, I have knit 17 of the required 24 pattern repeats on the third and final panel (which is a mirror image of the first panel). The end is in sight! Just seven more repeats to go, and the two borders for the top and bottom, which are only 20 stitches across and won't be as long as the panels. This afghan has been a bit of a challenge - the pattern itself is not hard, but the sheer enormity of the project, and the added difficulty of fixing mistakes that any munson could avoid by paying attention have made this a mission and a half. I have thoroughly enjoyed knitting it though, and have to say I'm rather proud of it so far. I can't wait to see it all put together!! It will need to be blocked though, which will have to wait until we've moved into the new place and I can't knit the border pieces until that's done (or at least can't finish them). Still, at the rate of two repeats a day (and enough of today left to get one done), it will take me until Friday to finish the panel. We move on Saturday, and if I'm organised enough, I can get blocking on Sunday. With only 2 1/2 weeks left until Christmas, I have to say I'm rather relieved. I think I'm going to make it!

Oh, and btw, if you receive this gift and don't want it for whatever reason (and please be honest - some people just don't dig Aran, I get it), believe me, I'd be happy to take it back no questions asked ;-) Just sayin'...

The completion of the afghan has come at the expense of many other planned projects I have to admit. I wanted to knit socks for my sister, something for the boys' teachers (who've each had one of my children for a year and a half - they deserve something lovely), I had cushion covers to sew (also for my sister), a shawl (which is half done, maybe I can still finish it in time...), and oh, so many other things!! Still, I'm happy with the presents I've got everyone this year, and my sister's birthday is in March, so I can always knit the socks and sew the cushion covers for her then. The teachers are getting yummy goodies from Lush, and the shawl was an 'extra' present anyway.

Sadly, my running has taken a bit of a hit as well. With the kids sick quite a bit this term, and Deane so busy with work and often away, I missed a lot of chances to hit the pavement. My 15km achievement seems to have been a one-off. I've managed only two runs in as many weeks, and they've been a measly 8km and 6.5km respectively. I have learned that fitness is a hard won thing - you need to earn it, and work to keep it. I'll keep digging away at it for now, and when the kids go back to school next year, get into a better routine. At least, that's my plan. We all know what happens to my plans...

I've rather enjoyed reading the Yarn Harlot's suggestions to non-knitters about what to buy their knitterly friends and relatives, particularly the first one - here. It's a must read. She's updating her blog every day with new ideas for knitters. So many cool things!! And the best part? The wonders of the internet have made it all accessible. I've really got the hang of this internet shopping lark - several of my family's Christmas presents were bought over the net this year. Oh, such fun. I love making things for people, and I love thinking of things to give to friends and family that I think (hope) they'll love.

Christmas. A time for getting together and enjoying great food and good company, with fantastic summer weather and lots of relaxing. Ah, yes. Next week's plan (apart from finishing the afghan of course) - plum pudding, shortbread, peppermint bark, and home made crystallised ginger. Mmmmm, yummy. Did I mention that Christmas-time has good food? I have to say, there's something about my mother-in-law's roast veges that I absolutely love. Whether its anything to do with being cooked alongside turkey and lamb, I can't be sure. But I look forward to them every year. Fresh, juicy, delicious strawberries and cherries!! Oh my. Hawkes Bay has the best berries, without a doubt. Breakfast with the fan-dam on Christmas morning, making all the kids wait not-so-patiently to open their presents... I'm looking forward to Christmas this year. I think our little faux tree will be going up on Sunday. Maybe Saturday. Depends on how well the move goes.

I hope you're looking forward to the 'silly season':

Mwaaahahahahaha!!! Yes my husband is a dork, but he's a happy dork, and I love him.

In the mean-time, for me at least, it'll be more of this:

Psst, just so you know, I edited about 20 million exclamation marks out of this post before publishing it.

You're welcome.

Or. Ga. Nised.

2011-11-29T22:20:00.000-08:00

Gasp!! It has been over a week since I last posted! It's been pretty busy here though, I am knitting like a madwoman trying to get this afghan finished in time - I am now almost quarter of the way through the third and final panel (not including the two border strips). Much less mistakes this time around, as I think I may have it sorted finally ;-)

I have booked the movers, organised the carpet cleaner, and have packed everything that can possibly be packed in the house.

Please don't send me hate mail, but...

I have finished my Christmas shopping!! All that is left is for Deane to get a few bits and pieces for the boys, and a couple of family friends, and we're done. A couple of items still have to arrive in the mail, but everything is wrapped and stashed in the top of the wardrobe (which was emptied last week thanks to packing). Oh my, it feels good to be so organised. Now all that's left is to knit knit knit. And make a plum pudding. But that will happen after we've moved.

How is your Christmas planning going?

Next year? Sleep overs.

2011-11-20T21:37:00.001-08:00

Ugh. The boys' birthday party, although not a complete disaster, didn't exactly go off without a hitch. I had to wait for Deane to finish a phone call before we could leave (at the absolute last possible second so as not to be late). On our way we were to pick up one of the kids attending the party. He wasn't home. The babysitter had 'got confused' about the times, and had gone to the park. Grrr!!! After knocking on doors, speaking to the next-door kid, phoning various phone numbers and driving around the block a few times, we managed to find the child. Unfortunately, he was wearing shorts, a t-shirt and jandals. Not ice-skating appropriate clothing!!! So we had to go back to his place and grab appropriate attire before zooming off to the venue. We managed to arrive only five minutes late, and only one other kid had turned up.

We hauled everyone inside and got them kitted out with skates and frames (none of the kids were able to skate without them) and I went out to wait for the others. It turned out to be a waste of time, as nobody else turned up. At least not for another hour. Meanwhile, the coach came along and said to ditch the frames, as she was used to teaching kids how to skate without them. Well, after about ten minutes, T was off the ice and refused to go back on, one of the kids had fallen over a number of times and was very sore, and very upset, and wanted to sit down. Only X and his friend were left on the ice, clinging to the sides of the rink. After another five minutes or so, the coach gave up. Waste. Of. Money. It was supposed to be a half hour lesson :-/ Falling-over kid got some better skates, and we gave him back his frame, so he was happy. The other two grabbed their frames back as well, and all was hunky-dory again.

Just before we headed up to the party room, the only other kid to turn up, turned up. So we went in and scoffed as much food as possible (although there was still enough left for four kids. Funny that...) had some cake, opened the few presents (un-organised kid didn't have a present. Wonder why?) and then we all trooped back downstairs for another hour of skating. Thankfully, with frames again available, T decided he wanted to skate after all, and I just kept watch on all the gear.

Unfortunately, even with only five kids in total, we still had to pay for the minimum of eight, so it ended up being a very expensive birthday party. Next year, the boys can invite one friend over for a sleep over each. I can't deal with the stress of a party that people don't RSVP/bother to turn up to. I'm starting to wonder if I'm the birthday-party jinxer. Last year, I was away for X's party, so Deane went it alone. Every child turned up, they had a great time. For T's party, Deane and X were away, so it was just me. Nobody turned up to that party, so T and I hung out together. This year, both Deane and I were there, and less than half the kids turned up. WTF? Must be me... ;-)

Some good news though, we're moving! In three weeks' time, we will be residing in an actual house, with three bedrooms and two bathrooms, one of which has a bath tub, with an actual garage, and an actual real-life laundry, two decks, a proper-sized living room, and actual kitchen with cupboard space, and there is actual storage!!! Oh, and there's a grassy outdoor area too. Did I mention there was parking for more than one car? OMG, there will be space to move around in!!! And somewhere to put my spinning wheel!!! And it's across the road from school too, so X can be all responsible and walk to school by himself ;-) Using the pedestrian crossing of course (^_^) The rent is astronomical, and the landlord is anally-retentive, but it's about time we lived somewhere that doesn't resemble a shoe-box. Deane's happy with it, even though it'll be about a half-hour walk to his office. I'm certainly not going to complain! Supermarket five minutes' walk away, school, dairy, laundromat (mwahaha), doctor and chemist across the road... sorted ;-) And the library is only 15 minutes away too. Can't wait. And the best thing? We can have visitors!!!

I spent several hours yesterday and today packing up the stuff we don't need out, which is actually a lot easier with Deane away at yet another conference, or two, or three. (Taupo/Christchurch this time, and Auckland later in the week so at least I'll see him at some point). I have this horrible feeling though, that when he arrives home, he'll ask where ::insert item name here:: is and I'll have to find which box I packed it into... For now though, I'm enjoying the extra space and tidiness I have created by squashing everything into boxes and shoving them into the spare room/Deane's temporary office. I can't do much more though, all that's left is stuff we're using, so I just have to clean clean clean. I've got quotes from five different moving companies, and have narrowed it down to two, so I'll book that tomorrow. Our current landlord is being really nice about everything, and coordinating open home times that suit us. She's also organising the carpet cleaning for us. Fabulous. For once, I'm actually happy to be moving!

And now for a bit of randomness:

I have four repeats left of the centre panel for the Epic Aran Afghan, then I can start on the third and final (not including the borders) panel. I might actually make the Christmas deadline, if I really put in an effort...

This week, I'm re-watching the Twilight movies in preparation for seeing Breaking Dawn Part 1 this weekend. Life is so much better when you have things to look forward to, don't you agree?

Hope you're enjoying your week!

Busy week

2011-11-16T14:01:00.001-08:00

Sitting here taking a breather (read: avoiding housework) in amongst the craziness that is this week. And it's only Thursday! Here's the condensed version:

Monday:
15km run. Dude! What a mission!

Tuesday
Athletics Day at school. Got a wee bit sunburned - oops. Guess that's what happens when you run out of the house in a hurry, thinking you're going to have time to swing by home and grab sunscreen and a hat before heading out again to sit in the sun for a few hours, only to find that your plans (as always - why don't I ever learn?) don't work out.

Wednesday
Christmas shopping. Yep, being all organised and stuff this year. Had to get birthday party supplies for this weekend as well. Then sat and made up the goodie bags for the kids to take home after the party. This year, the boys are having a combined party, at Paradice. Easiest party organisation ever! Book the party, send out the invitations, make a cake, and just meet everyone there. Food/drinks/entertainment: covered, courtesy of the ice skating rink. Awesome. Now, if only people would bloody well RSVP!!!!!

Thursday
8km run. Housework (supposedly). Laundromat. X's 9th birthday. Wow. N I N E . Trying to ignore the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 DVD sitting on my shelf, newly acquired during by shopping expedition yesterday. Seriously resisting the temptation to say 'screw it' and head to the movies to watch The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 all by myself. Nobody needs to know, right? Damn, housework and laundry... At least I don't have to cook dinner tonight, I believe X wants McDonalds for dinner. Sweet.

In amongst all this, I have managed to get some knitting time in (of course ;-P) I have nine repeats of 16 done on the centre panel of the Epic Aran Afghan. I'm nearly at the halfway point!! Although, considering I started this monster project back in September, and we only have (oh dear) 37 days left until Christmas... Somebody stand behind me and crack the whip, will you? I need to get my butt moving!!

Yet to happen:

Friday
Meeting Miss Jenny for coffee/brunch for a good ol' catch up before she heads off on a plane outta here. Haven't seen her since I was last in Wellington. About a year ago. Must get back down there some day... Baking the birthday cake needs to happen somewhere in here too.

Saturday
The all-important combined birthday party for my two boys. One already nine, the other very-nearly seven. My, how time flies.

Sunday
Um... sleep in? Please?

You knit and learn...

2011-11-08T20:59:00.000-08:00

I knew fairly early on that I'd miscrossed a couple of cables at the beginning of the centre panel of my Epic Aran Afghan, but I couldn't quite figure it out just by looking at it, and decided to knit a full pattern repeat and part of the next, so I could compare and see where I'd gone wrong.

Can you see it? Here, I'll help you:

In my 'I've fixed plenty of mistakes, I know what I'm doing' confidence, I carried on knitting, figuring I'd do a Yarn Harlot and snip a thread, re-knitting the mistake row and grafting it back together later. I'm getting pretty good at this knitting lark, right? I'm sure I can fix a wee mistake like that no problem. So I kept knitting. About 3/4 of the way through the third repeat, it was starting to get to me. So I decided 'I'll just fix that now, then it'll be over and done with, and I won't have to worry about it staring back at me any more'.

I searched the net, found a little tutorial on how exactly to do this type of 'repair', and found the strand I needed to snip:

Then it was just a simple matter of undoing the row, picking up the stitches, reknitting it, and grafting it back together, right? Wrong. So very, very wrong. After spending a good quarter hour trying in vain to pick up the stitches (the bottom ones were fine. The top ones? Not so much...) I gave up and decided to revert to my fail-safe method:

Quite some time later, all is well again:

The lesson? Fix a mistake as soon as possible, before it turns into a nightmare!!

On the road again

2011-11-07T15:03:00.000-08:00

Yes indeedy, on the road to getting stuff finished! I spent a good couple of weeks basically avoiding my knitting - with only the vanilla handspun socks and the Epic Aran Afghan to knit, I wasn't overly inspired to pick up the needles, getting distracted instead by the second Nikki Heat novel (which, by the way, is just as awesome as the first) and surfing the net for thoroughly excellent Christmas presents (because, y'know, I like to at least pretend to be organised).

So, socks are done:

Didn't get them done before the end of October (see previous paragraph) but they were finished in the first week of November, so better than nothing. I just knit generic toe-up socks with a 2x2 rib for the legs, and used Cat Bordhi's most excellent sweet tomato heel. The yarn turned out to be a fairly thick fingering weight, nearly sport-weight, so the socks were only 52 stitches around. They could've done with a few extra stitches in the legs, but I didn't increase before the ribbing, and I couldn't be bothered a) frogging back to include increases, or b) increasing in the ribbing, so they stayed at 52 stitches around. They still fit, so it's all good.

I have started the second (centre) panel on the afghan - cast on yesterday. So far, I'm only 1 1/2 repeats in (of 16) but I expect to get quite a bit done over this week, with X at home with chicken pox. His are worse than T's, and he's rather miserable, so there's lots of sitting on the couch doing bugger all at the moment. I'm not complaining...

If I get stuck in and actually spend some time working on this thing, I still have a good chance of getting it done before Christmas. Although I also have other projects on the list - ie: a baby cricket vest (special request) that I have the yarn for - some yummy Sirdar Snuggly Baby Bamboo that I can't wait to cast on. I have the pattern ready to go, I'm just waiting for an extra ball of red (because I accidentally ordered pink, which just won't do for the wee little boy it's being made for) and I'm good to go. I also have some sewing projects to get stuck into, and maybe some foodie stuff. Although that can probably wait until last minute. I wonder if I should make a plum pudding again this year...?

Speaking of 'on the road again', I got my feet out on the road (or rather the footpath) yesterday morning, for my longest run to date: 12 kilometres. I nearly reached Kelly Tarlton's! (Which is my personal goal. The next goal after that is running 15km. One step at a time.) It felt good, and I still had some juice in the tank at the end of the run. Made me feel better about the whole quarter marathon thing - I think the combination of head cold/upset tummy/earlier-than-normal start to the morning was probably what got to me at the end of the race. I've come to the conclusion that paying money to enter a race I have no chance of winning is a little pointless, particularly when there's nobody to cheer you on at the end. I'll just keep setting myself goals and cheering myself on (in my head of course - not going to do the whole Rocky-at-the-top-of-the-stairs thing, that would just be weird).

I think it's important, being a stay-at-home-mum that doesn't have to go out and work, to set personal goals. It gives me something to to, and gets me out and about. I don't want to become one of those people with no motivation in life, sitting around all day wearing track pants and sweatshirts with the curtains closed watching movie after movie. Oh no, I'm waffling...

I am however, currently in danger of becoming an internet blob, so I best get moving. Washing to do, dinner to organise, sick kid to tend to, and personal goals to achieve. Onwards!!!

The race is run, and I'm still here

2011-10-31T19:21:00.000-07:00

What an experience. We had Indian for dinner on Saturday night (my idea) - it was yummy, as usual, but I did not feel well later that evening, though I couldn't decide if it was the food or nerves. I ended up having to take a couple of ginger capsules to deal with the nausea and went to bed early. I woke up at 5.30am Sunday morning, got out of bed, and only managed one piece of toast for breakfast. No cup of tea, just a small glass of water. Not the best breakfast before a race. Got myself all geared up and wandered down to the start line for the Quarter Marathon.

Thankfully, it wasn't too cold, as standing around for ten minutes with just a singlet on at 6.40am isn't all that fun. It was interesting listening to the pre-race chatter from other participants who were clearly with a friend or in a group. Discussions on what music to listen to during the race ('Eye of the Tiger' on repeat was one guy's idea of motivation. I'm 90% certain he was joking), how far they'd run before, who dragged them into signing up for it, etc etc. Then the race started, and the chatter turned to near silence.

The sound of thousands of feet hitting the road over and over again all around you is quite something.

I felt pretty good running the race, and knew my pace was steady. It was just before I hit the 4km mark when the race leaders started flying past on their way back to the finish line. I started counting (just for something to do, since I hadn't brought along my iPod) and lost count somewhere around 185 - they were coming too thick and fast after that. A little while later I swung around the halfway mark and started heading back. I was feeling good, so I think I may have picked up the pace just a little - I could see some people up ahead of me that where a little bit closer earlier on in the race, and I thought it would be nice to be able to keep up with them as they seemed to be setting a good, easy pace.

I think it was around about 6km or 7km when we saw the first full marathoner running along the road - he got a large round of applause from us measley quarter-marathoners. I gave a wee clap to all the full and half marathoners that ran past us, until about the 20th or 30th runner - by then I was a bit sick of clapping while running. After a while, I noticed there was a lady who appeared to be keeping pace with me. If she got a little ahead and realised, she'd slow down a bit. When she saw me approaching out of the corner of her eye, she'd speed up just a little. Some time after the 9km mark she looked over and asked what the race distance was, and I told her - 10.55km. Well, if I'm honest, I actually said "10.3km, but mine's a little out". Then realised she was talking about the race distance, not what my sportband said, and replied "oh, you mean the race! 10.55km". She probably thought I was a bit looney.

Unfortunately, it was about 300m from the end of the race that my energy was running at its lowest, and I was in danger of passing out. When everybody was digging in for their big strong finish, I had to slow down, out of fear of vomiting or flaking, whichever came first. I kept going though, determined to finish at a run, not a walk. I tried to keep an eye out to see if there was anybody cheering me on - sadly, there was not. Oh well. I crossed the finish line with an official time of 1:05:08 - 544th place overall (out of 1,689 finishers) and 240th female across the line (out of 1,041). Not bad for a first-timer, who wasn't feeling 100%. The lady who'd kept pace with me for the last third of the race came up and said "thanks for setting the pace for me" to which I mumbled an inarticulate "huhyahmsrigh", or something to that effect. I passed on the banana and bottle of water, still battling the black fuzziness at the edges of my vision, and walked through to the area set up for removing and returning the timer tags. It was about then that I remembered to press the stop button on my sportband (oops! According to Nike, I ran 11.03km in one hour, six minutes, with a severe drop-off in speed at the end). I sat down, removed my tag, dropped it in the bucket, and headed through the exit arch, grabbing a bottle of Powerade Isotonic on the way. Then I walked home.

I hadn't brought my keys with me, so I had to buzz the apartment. Deane sent X down to let me in, who told me to wait outside the door. After several minutes, the door opened, and Queen's 'We Are the Champions' was playing on the laptop. Deane had set up a 'finish line' across the kitchen for me to run through. Wally.

I went straight to the shower, then we finished packing our suitcase and jumped in the car. Six hours later, we arrived at Cooper's Beach, in Doubtless Bay. We stayed in a lovely apartment right on the beach

View from the downstairs deck

Where the kids built sand castles

and I made starfish (but no sponges)

Collected shells

many, many shells

And went swimming

or paddling

There was a bit of exploring too

X played a game of chess with Deane that took two and a half days, and I read the rest of Snuff by Terry Pratchett, all of The Vampyre; A Tale by John William Polidori and Honeymooning by Rachael Herron, some of Big White Panties by Dale Alderman and Shattered by Sophia Sharp before deciding they were crap and starting on Naked Heat by Richard Castle. I only knit a few inches on my handspun socks though. It was a nice, relaxing few days.

We're back home now, T's fully recovered from his bout of chicken pox, and X is showing no signs of them yet. I feel much better, and keen to get back into the swing of things. School tomorrow - hurrah!!! Oh God, it's already November...

Two more sleeps

2011-10-27T13:03:00.000-07:00

I went and picked up my registration pack for the QM yesterday. The official 2011 shirt is bright lime green. Totally in-you-face green. I won't be wearing it for the race. My official number is 20850. After seeing how many people have signed up for this race, I'm thinking I'll be finishing somewhere closer to 2,000th. Even that may be a little too optimistic...

The point of this race for me is not to win (obviously) but to participate, and set myself a challenge. Call me crazy, but I'm seriously considering signing up for the half marathon next year. Lets not jump the gun though - I should get this one out of the way first!

Unfortunately I'm battling a head cold at the moment, which turned up yesterday and has been getting steadily worse. It has appalling timing I must say - I do not fancy running when feeling like absolute shite. So I'm getting lots of Vitamin C in the form of fruit juice, resting (ie: sitting on the couch and knitting) and getting to bed relatively early in the hopes that I can kick it in time for the race. Fingers crossed!!!

I finished the first panel for the Aran Afghan yesterday - it took me over a month, which does not bode well for getting the entire thing finished by Christmas, so I'll have to pick up the pace a little bit. At the moment though, I'm knitting a pair of handspun socks (my first handspun socks!!) - they'll be relatively plain so shouldn't take too long to knit. I was intending to get them done by the end of the month, but with only a few days of October left, I'm not sure I'll make that deadline. We shall see...

Well, I'm off to 'rest' some more - wish me luck for Sunday!!

Trying my best not to hyperventilate...

2011-10-25T18:16:00.000-07:00

Only four more sleeps until the quarter marathon!! I've printed out my official eticket, and I can go and pick up my t-shirt, timing tag and gear bag tomorrow, when registration opens at noon. OMGOMGOMG..... deep breaths...

School started back yesterday, but I still have one kid at home. The poor thing is absolutely covered from head to toe (literally) in chicken pox. I'm sure it will only be a matter of time before the other one suffers the same fate. Oh, the joys of childhood disease. Thankfully (I think) I'm in the clear - I had chicken pox as a child, as did Deane. So unless this is some awful mutant strain that we are not immune to, we should be okay. The XBox has done a surprisingly good job of distracting T from scratching, but he can't be on it 24/7 so he has managed to do a bit of damage. And he scratches in his sleep. A lot. What can you do?

Having a child (or in the case of last week, children) at home has given me plenty of knitting time, and I managed to finish off a pair of socks:

Gretya in Knitsch 'Cook's Beach', knit on 2.75mm needles (a nice change from 2.25mm!) This was a very quick pair of socks to knit, but it took me a little longer because I got sidetracked knitting a Milo vest and a Vanilla bum cover for a wee baby boy born to a family friend last week. No pics at this point, because I knit them while in Napier over the weekend, and handed them to the proud new mum as soon as they were finished. I had neglected to take any form of camera equipment with me at all, so had to borrow a digital camera from somebody else, who doesn't actually own a computer. They assured me they would get the pictures to me eventually, but I have no idea how long that will be so you'll just have to take my word for it.

The Milo vest was knit in Naturally Loyal in shade #931 (a turquoise-blue), and had two owls on the front. As this wee boy (who is as yet unnamed) was born a healthy 8lb 14oz, I skipped the newborn size and went straight to the three month size. Same with the soakers, which were knit in Naturally Loyal in shade #913 (an olive-green - here's the shade card so you can see). Both were excellent, well written patterns. They shall come in handy in future, I'm sure. The best thing was that I was able to send them directly to Hedwig, and have them on hand at the touch of a button. No more carting around bits of paper! W00t!!

I have less than two repeats left on the first panel of the Epic Aran Afghan - I'm very excited to be finishing this panel, and look forward to starting the centre panel. I'm a little bored with the cabling on this one, and it will be nice to have a break from these cables and do some different ones for a while, before having to revert back to them to finish panel #3 (a mirror image of panel #1). I have no idea whether or not I'm going to get this done before Christmas, but I'm determined to try, so I'll keep you apprised of my progress. I know you want to know. This is nail-biting, hanging-on-the-edge-of-your-seat knitting, isn't it? ;-) Mwaaahahahaha!! (Yes, I know I'm an idiot. Let's move on)

Just wanted to say before I go, that the Rugby World Cup final was an absolute nail-biter, but the boys brought the Cup home, and did a fantastic job of making this country proud. Sadly, as we were travelling, we missed the ticker tape parade in Central Auckland, but I hear it was a doozy. Way to go ABs!!!! Now I have to go pick up the not-sick child from school, which means dragging the sick child away from his distraction. Ugh.

Enjoy your week, and think of me this Sunday morning, when I will be getting up (ridiculously early) to run 10.55km with a bunch of like-minded loonies. And coming in somewhere around 200th place, would be my estimate... ;-)

Deep breaths. In... Out...

2011-10-18T13:20:00.000-07:00

We're well over halfway through the school holidays, and I'm managing to hold it together. I started out this time around with a bunch of activities written onto little cards. They were thrown into a bag, and every morning the bag would be shaken up and one of the boys would grab a card out. The rule is that we have to do whatever activity is on the card, whether they want to or not. I was nice, and included a few XBox days for them (it's always best to avoid meltdowns, non?). The first Monday of the holidays was officially a bum-around day, because they'd stayed up late the night before to watch the All Blacks play Argentina in the quarter-finals. The rest of the first week ended up being almost all XBox days as well, although we did get a baking day - they made biscuits with mini M&Ms on them - and on the weekend we took them ice skating.

They had so much fun ice skating, they wanted to go again the next day! In fact, they're still asking if they can go again. Maybe we'll have a couple of ice hockey players in the future... ;-) Deane would be happy! Perhaps next holidays I'll sign them up for some lessons. They started out scooting around with frames, so they didn't arse over too badly, and by the end of the session, they were both able to shimmy across the ice without them. T was a little clingy with his frame, but gave it a go (without holding a hand too!) and did surprisingly well. I was certainly impressed. I rather like that they make such small ice skating boots - they're so cute!!

I don't know if you've ever noticed while ice skating, that by the end of a session, there's all these little spots of blood in various places around the rink - inexperienced skaters falling over and injuring themselves. Thankfully I've not yet done this (although I've seen Deane fall over many times while showing off - quite a laugh I have to say) - but there's always a first time, right? Ice skating is fun, and a great excuse to get out the woolly hats and mitts :-)

This week we went out to a place called Crystal Mountain. I'd never heard of it, but a work colleague of Deane's had told him about it, and said it wasn't bad for a day's outing. So we went out and had a look. To be honest, I was a little dubious when I pulled into the car park - the place looks really run down. All the grounds are overgrown around the outside, the fences and gates look about ready to fall over, and when you pull up it looks rather sparse. But we went in and paid our admission fees, and started with the crystal museum, which they've set up under the main building. You take an elevator down (80 metres, according to the light panel in the elevator car) and walk into what looks like a cave, chock-full of natural rock crystals of every size and shape - amethyst, rose quartz, lapis lazuli, hematite, agate... there's even petrified wood, dinosaur bones and fossilised insects. I found it quite fascinating - particularly the desert roses - though the kids were only mildly interested. Still, they walked around (looking for kryptonite, which we didn't find) and pretended they were in the home of a really smart cave man, who had invented the elevator.

Once we'd seen everything in the museum, we headed back up and got stuck in to the activities - trampoline bungy, pony rides, a roller coaster, train, feeding the animals (llamas, alpacas, lambs, goats, peacocks and peahens, chickens galore, roosters, a turkey, ducks, rabbits, guinea pigs, emus, horses, probably some others that I can't remember...) - they had a great time. We went on the roller coaster twice, they rode the horses at least three times each, and I lost count of how many times they went on the trampoline bungy. X was very proud of completing a total of 22 back flips! Somewhere in the middle we had some lunch, and they drew a picture (paper and crayons supplied - hurrah!). We were there for about 3 1/2 hours, and could have stayed longer if I'd allowed them more roller coaster rides, pony rides, and bounces on the trampolines. Not the flashiest theme park, but good for a day of children's entertainment that won't have them bouncing off the walls.

Yesterday we went swimming at West Wave, before dropping Deane at the airport. By the time we got home and I got them to bed, it was quite late, so it's probably a good thing they've pulled another XBox day out of the bag today (I'm sure there weren't that many to start with!!) - fine by me, I have knitting and reading to be getting on with ;-)

I was so excited about getting my Kindle, Hedwig, that I started knitting covers for her that very afternoon. She now has two (plus the neoprene cover she came with):

Hedwig's Sleeping Bag, knit with some Vintage yarn left over from the Ron Weasley blanket squares. I had to adjust this pattern a bit to make it longer, as the original pattern appears to be made for a smaller version. The width was fine, but the length was way too short - I added 12 rows of the stripes at the top, and it still could have been longer. Still, I quite like it.

Not happy with just one cover, I made another one, again with leftover yarn in my stash - from my blue sweater, and some white aran weight from my Lupin scarf:

Hedwig's Argyle Pyjamas! The fit is much better, so I know the pattern is written for this size Kindle (of course, it didn't occur to me until I saw the pattern name that there would be different versions of Kindles, and they could quite possibly be different sizes... never mind). I may block this to get the corner of the cover flap to sit properly, but I like it all the same. Rather stylish, don't you think?

I've also been knitting more on the Epic Aran Afghan (only 6 1/2 repeats left on the first panel!!!) and some socks as well:

The first sock of the pair - Gretya - knit in Knitsch 'Cook's Beach' (yarn club colour). I was going to knit a pair of gansey socks in this yarn, but the pattern didn't really show because of the twist of the yarn and the slight variegation, so I picked this pattern instead, and I'm glad I did. It's a nice pattern, and very quick to work up. The second sock should only take a couple of days to knock out but I'd like to get some more done on the afghan first.

Although I keep getting distracted by books - I read the first Nikki Heat novel (which Deane had kindly loaded onto Hedwig). I thoroughly enjoyed it, and want to read the other two, but feel I should read the two library books I have in my possession first. So I'm currently reading The World House by Guy Adams. This dude must have a seriously warped mind!! It's quite an interesting read (although the editing is a little unfortunate - there's a number typos throughout the book). I find myself wanting to keep reading to see what happens (which I suppose is the point of a story). Next on the list is Quite Ugly One Morning by Christopher Brookmyre. I remember somebody recommending it some time ago as a good read, so I'll give it a go.

Right now though, I have to get the boys cleaning up the lounge, and I have to get dressed (sitting here in my bath robe - not a good look). Enjoy the rest of your week!! Only six more sleeps before school is back (Labour Day next Monday, an extra day off school - ugh).

Thirty two

2011-10-10T16:54:00.001-07:00

Yep. 32. Starting to feel old...

I remember way back (ahaha) when my parents were this age. I thought they were really old. Of course, its all relative. When I was a new entrant in primary school, the ten- and eleven-year-old kids looked huge. I was below average height, which probably didn't help. Still am. Other people still look huge - the tall ones at least ;-)

I got a cup of tea in bed this morning, and the boys came in all dressed (hurrah!) with a parcel nicely wrapped up in fabric (from my stash - guess Deane went digging. I wondered why he needed safety pins).

It was a Kindle e-reader, named Hedwig. Here's the back:

The owl, while not the 'real' Hedwig, is a snowy owl, hence the name of the Kindle. Clever Deane ;-)

And here's the front:

Yep, I will always have eyes watching me while I read, saying "are you sure you've got time to sit around and read? Don't you have some housework to do or something?" I shall master the art of ignoring its stare ;-) Shouldn't be too hard, with the books Deane has already loaded on there for me - A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R R Martin, and the three Nikki Heat books by Richard Castle (aka Dan Brown and other real authors). I love the Castle TV series, and I'm very much looking forward to reading the books - I hear they're very good.

There's also a couple of knitting books on there - Vampire Knits and Lily Chin's Knitting Tips & Tricks. Fabulous! Deane always comes up with the best presents (^_^)

I finally got around to getting some pics of my Simplicity cardigan, and was quite horrified to see how wide my shoulders are in comparison to the rest of me - totally disproportionate!! I now know why so many people asked me when I was growing up if I was a swimmer...

I knit the 35" bust size, with Vintage Purls laceweight yarn in 'Quinn'

Last night, I finished knitting my Danu socks:

Aren't they beautiful? Knit in Malabrigo Sock yarn in 'Ravelry Red'.

Because of these socks, I haven't got any further on the first panel for the Epic Aran Afghan, but will knit some more on this now before casting on another pair of socks. I need a wee break from tiny needles!

For now though, I'm going to pry the children off the XBox and put on a movie to watch, before Deane and I go out this afternoon. I assume we're having dinner somewhere among other things - you never can tell with that man...

How do you sleep?

2011-10-05T16:34:00.000-07:00

I sleep on my stomach. Always have. In recent years I've been sleeping in what I like to call a 'Superman' position - one arm extended straight up above my head, the other curled around my pillow, tucked into my chest. An advantage to being short is that I fit perfectly into the length of the bed, fingers curled just over the top edge of the mattress, and toes not-quite touching the bottom edge. Deane has had to adjust his sleeping position to fit around me, because I refused to change. That may have a lot to do with my recurring neck problems (not to mention of course, the large amount of looking down I do in a day, what with knitting, reading etc).

My neck has been quite stiff and sore this week, so after some discussion at knitting group yesterday, and more discussion with Deane last night, I decided to try sleeping on my back. Horrible. Uncomfortable. Boring! There we were, both lying on our backs, nearly a metre between us (gotta love a king-sized bed!). I started imagining us as an elderly, chaste couple, sleeping together. Me, with a full-length flannel nightgown that tied up under the chin, Deane with stripey long pyjama pants and a baggy white singlet. I started laughing and just couldn't stop! For some reason I found this picture quite hilarious. It took a while for me to settle - I'd quiet down for a while, then another giggle-fit would errupt. I eventually got to sleep (on my back I think), but I have to admit it wasn't the bed night's sleep I've ever had. Several times I woke up and just gave in, flipping over onto my stomach and snuggling down. No surprise that my neck isn't any better today. At least it's not preventing me from knitting, so it's not the end of the world ;-)

Things may improve with a round of physiotherapy or a few visits to a chiropractor, but as I very much doubt their prices will be reducing any time soon, this will quite possibly never happen.

I have been rather busy in the knitting department of late, although not much to show for it. I finished my Simplicity cardigan last Saturday night, and blocked it straight away. Thanks to the wonders of laceweight yarn, it was dry by morning, so I could weave in the ends and wear it to knitting group at the library. Still haven't got any pictures of it though - all in good time...

The last blanket square was finished:

June 2009 Afghan square in Vintage Porcelain and Port Wine

I've turned the heels in my Red Danu socks, and am now working on the feet. I'd knit one heel at knitting group yesterday, but mustn't have been paying attention, because the heel flap was a few rows too short - something I discovered when knitting the second heel last night:

I frogged the offending heel, and reknit it, so all is well:

Knit in Malabrigo Sock in Ravelry Red

And I'm over halfway on the first panel of the Epic Aran Afghan:

Hmmm, now that I've posted this photo, I have spotted an error in my knitting that will have to be fixed. Can you spot it? Here, I'll help you:

Thankfully, I have mastered the art of dropping down a section of stitches and reknitting them, thereby avoiding having to rip back row upon row of knitting. Should take no more than half an hour to fix! I guess the little reminder I gave myself to check my work thoroughly while knitting this afghan hasn't yet sunk in. I wonder how far I would've got before realising my error, if I hadn't posted the update photo on here? The mind boggles...

I took a little time out from knitting last night, and we, as a family, went to the boys' annual school art exhibition. We were pleasantly surprised to find that T had won a prize for the second year in a row!

X was a little disappointed, especially since they spelled his name wrong when labelling his artwork, but I think he's moved on now. Again this year, the winning artworks will be displayed at the local supermarket for all to see, so it'll be fun to go along and have another look during the school holidays, and T can put on his proud face and say "that's mine". Yay. Mum will have her proud face on too ;-)

Right, I'm off to fix the afghan! Enjoy the rest of your week!!

Mind ever-changing, patience of a squirrel in Autumn

2011-09-28T17:27:00.000-07:00

You know how last week I said I really wanted to cast on some socks? Well, I did, but not the ones I originally intended. Instead of casting on Toxic socks, I went on a hunt, tracked down a digital copy of Yarn Forward issue #26 from July 2010, and cast on a pair of Danu socks instead. Few people (on Ravelry at least) have made these socks - whether its because the pattern was published in a magazine, or because they're knit on 2.25mm needles with 80 stitches around I can't really say, but they're lovely socks, and I'm glad I decided to make them.

I've been a member of Sock Knitters Anonymous on Ravelry for some time now, but almost never participate in the monthly Sockdown Challenge, for various reasons. They've just started a new cycle of the Challenge though, and I was determined to join in! So with the designers for the month of September named, I spent most of the month um-ing and ah-ing over what socks I would make, and whether or not I would actually have time to knit them, before I finally decided on the Danu pattern. Of course, looking at the picture, they look like fairly simple socks. It wasn't until I'd purchased the online copy and printed the pattern that I realised they were knit on small needles with lots of stitches. I will not be deterred though, and have managed to get through six pattern repeats on the legs so far:

And the yarn? Oh, the yarn!! Malabrigo Sock in Ravelry Red. Simply stunning!! The more I knit with it, the more I want to buy skeins and skeins of it to make anything and everything!! Of course, the budget will not allow it, but dude, its good stuff! And the colour is just gorgeous. I'm going to love these socks for ever and ever and hug them and kiss them and marry them. Oh wait, I don't think you're allowed to marry inanimate objects... Oh well, I guess Deane will suffice, and I can just wear the socks :-) I have until the end of October to finish these (which I'm sure will be no problem at all) and I will enter the draw along with hundreds of other crazy sock knitters to win a prize. The odds aren't in my favour, but on the plus side, I get a cool pair of socks! I've already picked out the pair I'm going to knit for October - they look much simpler. Its Tea Time socks, which I think I'll knit in the September Knitsch Flights of Fancy Yarn Club colourway:

Isn't it a beautiful blue? Its called Cook's Beach. LOVE it!!

In other knitting news...

My poor, neglected Simplicity cardigan has one sleeve done. It only took me a couple of days, so I know the other sleeve will only take me a couple of days as well, then I can block it and wear it, but I've been sidetracked by socks, and blanket squares, and a cabled afghan. I'm on the last square of ten, but me being the impatient wee thing that I am, blocked the squares and sent them off before remembering to take a picture!! And I sent them to the wrong address! The person I sent them to participated in the last round, and I still had her address (or so I thought) so I posted them off, only to discover she moved last month - oops. Hopefully she'll be able to arrange something at her end to get a hold of the parcel. Way to go, Jody... I'll post a pic of the last square when its done though - this one is being knit with Vintage yarn again, in Porcelain and Port Wine.

The afghan is coming along nicely - I'm over quarter of the way through the first panel so far:

I'm knitting it in John Q Mia yarn I bought a couple of years ago from Knit World in Wellington, for something ridiculous like $2.30 or $2.80 a ball (can't quite remember now). The afghan will take around 40 balls of yarn, so I'm glad I got it at a good price. Its not the flashest yarn around, but it is remarkably soft, and I quite like working with it, even with the slight hint of sheepy smell it has.

I managed to drag out my sewing machine yesterday too, for a bit of a change of pace. I got the most awesome swap package in the mail the other day:

OMG look at that fibre!!! Yummy!! And dude, the brown fibre in that little bag there? It's yak! Yes, YAK!! Wow!!!! Anyway, the fibre was wrapped in some really nice fabric, which was the perfect amount for a box bag - something I've always wanted. So I hunted out a tutorial on the interwebs (amazing place, this internet thing), and away I went. I also dug out some neat fabric from my stash, that my friend Margaret had given me a little while back - perfect for a knitting project bag. So after a few hours sewing, I ended up with two (slightly wonky, but who's looking that closely?) box bags:

This one I'm going to keep for myself, because the fabric is beautiful:

And this one, I have an idea for:

I have enough interfacing for one more, I just have to get another zip. And have a good ol' dig through the stash to find the perfect piece of fabric :-) The size of the bag is perfect for a pair of socks-in-progress, but they can be used for other things as well. Me? I think I'll use mine for socks. Of course ;-)

Gosh, time has flown yet again, and its time to pick the boys up from school (oops, so much for doing the housework...) Hope you're having a good week!!

Yarn diet? What yarn diet?

2011-09-21T16:01:00.001-07:00

Since declaring that I was going on a yarn diet on or around the 29th July, I have spent a little over $400 on yarn, fibre and needles. In my defense, over half was spent at KAN which totally shouldn't count, and about $66 worth was for a swap, which also shouldn't count. So really, I've only spent about $100. Not bad for two months' worth, huh? Think of the investment! ;-) (Us yarnies are really good at justifying purchases of the fibery kind).

The blanket squares for the Ron Weasley swap are coming along nicely - I blocked the first five, and here's a wee pic:

The top three are knit using some green Naturally Loyal left over from knitting Cecil(ia), and the darker green was a ball of Skeinz Prism yarn that was in my KAN goodie bag. The other two were knit using the Vintage yarn I bought from The Little Craft Store last week. The pattern is deceptively easy - you only knit with one colour at a time, and its a simple slipped stitch pattern that any beginner knitter can do. I've knit another 2 1/2 squares since, and should have them done in time for send out, the date for which has been extended to the 8th October. Yay! Gosh, its hard to believe its nearly October already!! OMG, I'm going to be 32 in under three weeks...

Let's not get sidetracked though. I finished the Rick socks I was knitting in the Knitsch Kelly yarn:

Love them! Don't have skinny enough legs!! Good thing they're already assigned as a Christmas present ;-) After I'd bound these off, I found myself with a lonely two works-in-progress. I knew the blanket squares would be finished soon, so I wanted to cast something else on. Of course, I have the problem of wanting to KNIT ALL THE THINGS so I couldn't decide between Toxic socks which would look seriously awesome in the bright pink Wollmeise and black sock yarn I have in my stash, or the Burridge Lake Aran Afghan that I've had on my to-do list for about two years. It finally came down to the fact that I had the afghan yarn in stash taking up valuable storage space in the spare room, plus the pattern already corrected with errata on hand. So cast on the afghan I did. I haven't got far because, seriously, this thing takes concentration!! Cables cables everywhere! All at different stages! Oh, the fun I will have!! I was hoping (because apparently I'm crazy) that I could get this done by Christmas, because it is supposed to be another present (ever since I first decided to make the thing, it was going to be a gift. I just never got around to it). We shall see how it goes...

I have the feeling though, that the Toxic socks will be cast on soon. They're just too awesome to wait for long. The afghan isn't the kind of project you can cart around, my squares will be done soon, and I'm avoiding the sleeves on my Simplicity cardigan (although I'm not sure why...) Did I mention, I want to KNIT ALL THE THINGS?!?!?!?

I really should just dive in and knit those darned sleeves. It's silly to put them off. We're coming into Spring now, and I'll want to wear that cardigan soon. No excuses really. Perhaps I'll finish the squares first, then the sleeves. Hmm.

Speaking of putting things off, I've been avoiding road running for a while, and working myself up into a lather about the impending quarter marathon I stupidly signed up for several months back. It's at the end of October, which is arriving at a fair rate of knots. I've gone a little soft, and have been sticking to treadmill running because its easier. Well, this morning I bit the bullet, and went for a run along Quay Street/Tamaki Drive - a popular waterfront running route. Turns out I had nothing to worry about!! I had no problems, an ran a nice 9.36km at a fairly easy pace in a little under an hour. I don't think I'll have any issues running an extra kilometre or so come race time. As I like to say (and it makes X laugh every time) - piece of piss! I can do this quarter marathon - bring it on!! And just think, when I've finished, I can reward myself with a nice, hefty yarn purchase ;-p Ooh, what shall I buy myself for my birthday? (Or rather, tell Deane what to buy for my birthday). A couple of skeins of Fibre Co. yarn, or a skein of Sweet Georgia from Little Country Wools? The Sweet Georgia just because it is gooooorgeous, and the Fibre Co. yarn because I want to make this hat and OMG that yarn is squidgy soft! A few skeins of TouchYarns Merino Possum so I can knit the Mandel sweater? A subscription to a knitting magazine? Perhaps I should start leaving hints around the place now...

Hey, where did Spring go?

2011-09-13T19:16:00.001-07:00

We had some really nice weather last week, but this week has gone back to crappy wintery climes. Rain, chilly winds... bring back the warm sunshine!! Although I am a little jealous that Wellington got a really awesome hailstorm with massive thunder and lightning. Seems I always miss out on the good stuff. Woe is me ;-)

With Deane away in Singapore last week, I churned through a season of Buffy and a season of Bones on DVD, and a pair of socks for dad, not to mention half a pair of socks for somebody else. They were originally going to be for me, but you need skinny chicken legs for this style of sock (a little too snug at the top) so they'll be going to somebody else. Plus, I maintain that I don't like green! Even though I happen to be wearing green right now, but I digress. The sock looks fantastic, and absolutely needs its mate. I'm so very glad I decided to repurpose this yarn:

Don't you agree? I shall try to get the pair finished this month, and declare that this shall be the first project for the 2011 Christmas Gift List. I have already chosen the lucky recipient (because, you know, everybody wants a pair of handknit socks, even if they don't realise it yet) ;-) Anyway, project deets:

Pattern: Rick by Cookie A (love her!!!)
Yarn: 'Kelly', a Flights of Fancy Yarn Club colourway from Knitsch
Needles: Ummm... (runs off to check) ...2.75mm - the pattern calls for 2.5mm, but I had an inkling that this pair would be a little on the tight side due to the bias pattern, and went up a size. Glad I did! Wouldn't have fit otherwise (still don't fit me well, but you know...)

A deceptively simple pattern to follow and memorise - very intuitive. The foot chart does require a little more attention, but not much.

And my dad's socks are on the way to him now for his birthday (which isn't for another few days, but what the hey?).

Pattern: Earl Grey by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, aka the Yarn Harlot
Yarn: Regia Havanna Colour - although I don't know what the colour name is, because I can't understand German, nor their yarn ball bands O.o
Needles: 2.5mm - I finally got to use the 2.5mm ChiaoGoo RED circular needle I received as a prize in Sock Madness. They are fantastic!!! Love love love them! Want more! Don't think anyone stocks them in this country though :-(

I knit the entire pair in Continental (almost - I picked up the heel stitches using English). They were a remarkably fast knit given the size of them (10" feet, 72 stitches around). I'm really getting the hang of this speed-knitting thing I think. I'm very happy in the knowledge that I can now easily change between the two styles without any problems (unless its a difficult pattern, in which I will always revert to English).

I was aware before starting these socks that the cable pattern on the side would not show well due to the dark colour and the variegation in the yarn, but I've had this yarn in my stash for a few years now (it was part of a Harry Potter group swap in 2009 I think) and I've been wanting to use it for ages. Plus, I don't think dad will be showing off the patterning to his buddies ;-) I didn't continue the cabling down the feet, mainly because I'd worked 24-odd rows before realising I should have cabled right after picking up the heel stitches and continuing in the round, but it was optional anyway, and like I said, I don't think dad will care.

I got Deane to put these socks on for a pic, but he is such an appallingly atrocious casual sock model, I decided it was best to just leave them on their own. Trust me, you'd have agreed ;-)

I have also managed to knit two more blanket squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap, and popped in to The Little Craft Store today to purchase some yummy Vintage yarn for the other squares. I love the Vintage colour range, it is quite delightful. I'm looking forward to working with it!

Alas, time has flown by rather quickly today, and I have to go cook food lest my family starve. After which, I shall be knitting some handspun mittens. Not that I need them right now, but its a project I've had on my 'to-do' list for an age, and there's a class in the HPKCHC they will fit into perfectly, so why not? Enjoy the rest of your week!!

Calibratin' mah doodacky

2011-09-07T17:57:00.000-07:00

I was at the gym the other day, with a personal trainer. She was checking my running gait pattern for me, because I've been having a few issues with my left hip, and my right lower leg. She also showed me a few good stretches and self-massage thingees that would help me improve my running and avoid injury.

We discussed all things running, and I told her about how I'd moved to treadmill running for several reasons (new city and not knowing where to run, not knowing how far I've run because there's no distance markers, forever coming up with lame excuses to just go to the gym and run on the treadmill because its easier etc etc), but that I would have to start running outside again, to prepare for the quarter marathon that is coming up way too fast (OMG less than two months now!!!). She showed me her Nike SportBand, and how it tracked your distance, time, pace and calories burned (not that I care about calories, but the rest is rather handy information), and told me she got it at Dress-Smart for $40 (normal retail $100).

So what did I do? Drove on out to Dress-Smart in Onehunga and bought me a Nike SportBand!! Unfortunately the only colour they had was pink, but for a $60 saving I wasn't going to complain. And it matches my iPod and headphones :-) For some reason, Deane seems to think I like pink, and keeps buying me pink running accessories...

Anyway, before you go all gung-ho and start running all over the place, the website recommends you calibrate your SportBand by running a known distance (say, on a track) and setting it to your running style/speed etc so on future runs it can get an accurate reading. It took me a few days of research online, but I finally found a park relatively nearby (read: 15 minutes drive away in Mt. Roskill) that had an accessible running track, and I headed down there this morning to 'calibrate mah doodacky'. As per the very minimal instructions, I pressed the wee button down on the wristband for three seconds, then off I went. Five laps later (2km) I pressed the button down again for another three seconds, as per the very minimal instructions. I drove home and plugged the sensor into the laptop, and apparently I'd only run for 0.01 miles, for less than 30 seconds. Something obviously went wrong there! After mucking around with it for a wee while, I figured I had it set.

So I drove back out to the park, and tried again. Another five laps (and another 2km) I drove home again, and plugged in the sensor. It worked! Unfortunately, it was all set to miles. No good. I tried changing the settings to kilometres, and it kept saying it had, but my run still said miles. And I couldn't get it to calibrate on the site - apparently I had no valid runs. The instructions were not helping!!! The minimum run distance for calibration was 400 metres, but they recommended 1.6km (hence the 2km/5 lap thing).

I deleted my profile, and set up a new one. Now I am heading back out to the park for one last 2km run in the hopes that the third time will be lucky. Fingers crossed!

*************************************************************************************

I'm back, my doodacky is officially calibrated, and I have run 6km today. I think its time for a cup of tea and a hot shower. Technological genius I most decidedly am not :-)

Fibre love

2011-09-04T20:57:00.000-07:00

I've had a few squidgy blobs of goodness arrive at my place over the last several weeks, and I haven't featured any here lately, so I thought I'd better catch y'all up ;-)

I spied some loveliness being spun by a certain someone with a talent for colour during the Tour de Fleece, and declared 'I must have some'. She kindly obliged:

gypsy kids on 100% polwarth from Miss Tracee of maude & me. Isn't it just delightful? I thoroughly enjoy just looking at it peeking out of my (slightly overflowing, ahem) fibre basket next to my Lovely. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it, but we're perfectly happy with the status quo for the time being.

Now, keeping in mind my 'yarn diet' (I've never been good at sticking to diets, that's why I never go on them, just sayin') this is technically the only fibre I've purchased recently. I have bought a few other bits and pieces, but they're for swaps, and totally don't count ;-) Moving on...

I won me some yummy m&m fibre during the Tour de Fleece (although I'm pretty sure Tracee just likes giving her stuff away, and finds any reason possible to do so) - this one is called arms aloft:

Also 100% polwarth. Again, I have no idea what I'm going to do with it yet, but I don't think that's really the point now, is it?

I won some more fibre in the HPKCHC for some other handspun I turned in for a class (its a vicious cycle I tell you!!!):

Two batts of punta wool, tencel and bamboo in the colourway Resurrection Stone from linuxchic of Nerd Girl Yarns. I'm seriously looking forward to spinning these up! No, I don't know what I'm going to do with them! Refer to my previous comment ;-)

Now that you've seen some of the goodies coming in to my hot little hands, I must show you what I'm actually doing with some of the previously acquired fibre that has been languishing in the fibre basket for a while. I started spinning my sock pencil roving from Vintage Purls:

Although I stopped, because I was fairly certain it wasn't coming out thin or twisty enough to become durable sock yarn. I'm undecided as to whether I should attempt to fix it, or just spin it as it is and knit it into something non-sockish. I think I'll leave it a bit longer. You never know, I may have an epiphany...

I also started spinning some BFL/silk fibre on my snazzy new spindle, Eric. He is dreamy!!! He spins beautifully, and I love him. I haven't spun much, but I'm in no hurry for this fibre (you guessed it, I have no idea what I'm going to do with it yet), so just pick it up and put it down as and when:

And just because, here's an extreme close-up!!

See how thin that single is??? Jeez, I'm such a show-off...

Also absent from the blog of late is some knitting pics!! Yes, I have actually been knitting, but mostly on one project. My Simplicity cardigan:

As you can see, I have (finally) finished the body of the cardigan, and just have the sleeves to go. It is in need of a seriously good blocking (because it looks really bizarre right now) but I can be patient, and wait for it to be finished before I do that. I'm really hoping it comes out looking like the pretty cardigan in the pictures, and not some weirdly misshapen short, wide, semi-transparent... wrap-type-thing... (is quietly cursing self for not knitting and blocking a swatch before starting the project)

I finished my Crazy Knitting Lady mitts:

Totally non-matchy, but that's all part of the crazy!

And since the endless rows of stockinette stitch in laceweight was driving me a little crazy (ie: weirdly misshapen cardigan, as seen above), I cast on some Rick socks (love that Cookie A!):

These are being knit in the Kelly yarn from Knitsch that I was originally using for the doomed Pisqu socks I frogged a couple of weeks ago.

I appear to be suffering a bout of start-itis, as I have also knit a square for the latest round of the Ron Weasley blanket swap, and will be knitting another nine in the next few weeks. I would show you a picture, but the square needs to be blocked, and I can't be arsed right now.

And this morning, I cast on for a pair of Earl Grey socks for my dad, whose birthday is coming up in less than two weeks (gotta love a deadline!). I sent him a bunch of Lotto tickets for Father's Day, and the envelope they came in said something like 'I know you really wanted socks but...' Of course this made something in my brain go 'tweak', and an idea was born! I wrote 'hand knit' into the wee sentence on the envelope, and will (with any luck) be sending him those hand knit socks that he really would have preferred for Father's Day, and would have been all disappointed (I'm sure) that he didn't receive. You see what I did there? Clever, aye! ;-P btw mum? If he really doesn't want any more hand-knit socks, let me know, K? Thanks :-)

I was a good girl and went stash-diving for the yarn for these socks, even though I was actually going to go to the LYS and buy some. I am attempting to stick to the diet, sort of... (using stash yarn for the blanket squares too!)

Well, I have me a lot of knitting to get done, and some dinner to cook for a couple of hungry boys (who will start squawking 'I'm hungry, what is there to eat?' in about two minutes) so I must dash. The sooner they're fed and watered, the sooner I can ship them off to bed, and sit down in front of Buffy with my yarn and sticks ;-) Have a good week!!

Happy Father's Day

2011-09-03T16:02:00.000-07:00

I was up nice and early this morning to cook my husband breakfast - I'd been to the supermarket the night before to get all the special ingredients. Unfortunately, going later in the evening means you don't get the best baked bread selection. I was after some sourdough, and thought I'd grabbed a multigrain sourdough loaf, but when I sliced into it this morning, it didn't look right. I checked the bag again, and it was actually a rosemary and garlic batard. Oops. That wouldn't work. So I chucked on some clothes and rushed down to the supermarket again, with instructions to the boys to 'leave dad alone' while I was out.

The only sourdough loaf I could find was an organic vienna loaf from Pandoro Panetteria for $8. Oh, the things we do for our loved ones...

I zipped back home and got started. Within half an hour I had served my beloved a heaping pile of Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon on sourdough, with free range middle bacon and black pudding, and a cup of steaming hot coffee with honey - just what he likes. The kids woke him up with their hand drawn cards and a present - a jar of hand made 'Father's Day Rock' candy from Sweet, with pictures of tools, cars, and things like 'dad' and 'I love dad' in the middles. (There's some pics on their facebook page, which I've linked to. Their website is cabbage.) Deane and the boys scoffed down their breakfasts (I just had sourdough toast and a banana, much better) and I believe they're planning a day of XBox, and perhaps an outing. Me? I'm off to knitting ;-)

My new favourite place

2011-08-29T15:23:00.000-07:00

We live in a shoebox apartment. It has a small washer dryer unit, that only takes three towels at a time (I'm exaggerating of course, but not by much...) and never dries anything properly, unless you put your load of washing through two dryer cycles, which take 150 minutes each. Ridiculous, and a huge drain on power. So we have a clothes horse permanently set up in our lounge room, which is a little annoying.

The washer dryer has been playing up lately, not cooperating with every load. Sometimes it would work, other times it would do this annoying thing where the dial would just click around and around, and it wouldn't wash or dry anything. Then of course there was the night that it stuck on the wash cycle and it took me about five hours to realise (it was night time, and I'd gone to bed, and woke up at about 2am to the noise of the machine still running. Grrrr). We had quite a washing pile by the end of last week, before we headed to Napier. I had to buy X new clothes so I had enough to pack for the weekend and for his camp trip. As soon as we got back Sunday night I put a load of clothes on to wash. And the washing machine wouldn't work. Not good. Not good at all. I sighed, and gave up on the machine, making plans in my head to check out laundry services and self-service laundromats first thing the next morning.

On Monday I researched the local laundry service, and after some discussion with Deane we decided it wasn't worth paying $20 for pick up and delivery, when we had a self-service laundromat across the road from the boys' school, and I could do it myself. So that afternoon I lugged two large rubbish bags full of clothes (I kid you not) to the laundromat, armed myself with an arsenal of $1 coins, and away I went. I filled one of the commercial 16kg washing machines with clothes (some of which were dripping wet, thanks to the useless washer dryer at home) and bunged in the required $5, added my laundry liquid and pressed start. Then I loaded another smaller machine with another load, which cost $3. 15 minutes later, the first load was done, and it went straight into a 16kg dryer for 30 minutes ($3). The other smaller load took a little over 30 minutes, but only took 20 minutes in the dryer ($2). And that was it. Washed, and dried, in less than an hour. This pile of clothing would have taken me the better part of a week to do at home, and for the cost of $13 and an hour of my time, it was done. I was shocked and amazed.

Full of excitement, I decided to try this speed-laundry jaunt again. This morning I carted another two large rubbish bags to the laundromat - one choc-full of towels, the other with bed linens. Two 15 minute 16kg washes and two half hour 16kg dries later (a total of $16) and I was done. My giant pile of washing that would have taken two weeks, was done in two hours. And I got a good chunk of knitting done while I was at it. I think I'm in love with the laundromat.

Knit August Nights: 2

2011-08-28T15:55:00.000-07:00

Oh wow, what a weekend!!! I had the best time! I got to see some familiar faces from Wellington (and Auckland of course), a whole bunch of new faces, and some faces that had names attached but had been blank in my mind until now. It was so great to meet so many wonderful knitters all together at once, and at such a fantastic venue!!! Here's a few pics of the view from our knitting spot:

Of course, Napier turned on the 'awesome weather' machine specially for the occasion, so we had nice, mild temperatures and sun all weekend. This meant that I couldn't wear my Crazy Knitting Lady boot toppers and matching mitts without instantly breaking out in a sweat, but I'm not complaining ;-)

Friday morning, once Deane had been to the gym, we piled into the cars and headed on down, arriving at around 2pm. This gave me a little bit of time to shop before my class. On the first day I bought:

This gorgeous fibre from Matt of WabiSabi Fibres - its a blend of merino,alpaca, silk and angora. I love the colour, but what clinched the deal was the name - Ballroom Blitz. Who wouldn't want to buy some of that? ;-)

I also bought some sock yarn from a new supplier - (apparently they've been dyeing for a while now, but are only just breaking into the retail market):

'Cantiacorum' by MaKe Original - Impilia. The colour caught my eye immediately (probably helped that they were right inside the door!) and I decided I had to have it.

After that, it was time for class - 'Getting Set From the Top Down'. Morag from Vintage Purls taught us how to knit top down set in sleeves in the round - a very useful thing to know if you're going to be knitting a lot of sweaters in the future!!

Here's my little sample - it's not quite finished, but this is how much I got done in the three hour class:

You can probably make out the sleeve caps... from here you go on to knit the sleeves down, and increase for the underarms to the point where the body meets under the sleeve, then you split off the sleeves and continue working on the body in the round, then finish the sleeves later. Very clever ;-)

So that was my Friday! On to Saturday!! I arrived at East Pier (the venue) bright and early - about 8.30am. Did a wee spot of shopping:

'Smoke and Mirrors' 50/50 merino silk laceweight from Spinning a Yarn.

This beautiful creation is a swamp kauri spindle, hand turned by none other than miss Frances, from Spindles by Sourkraut. Gosh, that woman is amazing! This little puppy is only 22g - perfect for spinning laceweight yarns. Isn't he just lovely? I think I'll call him Eric.

I also scored me some more scrumptious Max yarn from Vintage Purls - now that I know I can get a pair of socks from one skein, I though it would be rather lovely to have a pair in this colourway - Ink Blot:

Such a beautiful colour!! Of course, as always, its better in person :-) To you, on the other side of the screen, it probably just looks black. Trust me, its not.

And dude, you wouldn't believe the softness of this yarn!!! Rose Pink 45/55 silk merino laceweight yarn by Fyberspates, bought from Tash at Knitsch/Holland Road Yarn Company.

There's a whopping 1,000 metres in this skein - it will have to become something freakin' amazing! All in good time of course...

There was also the Design Spun factory tour, and shopping spree at Skeinz afterwards. Here's a few interesting pics of machinery our precious yarn is made on:

And this is what I bought while I was there:

Just a couple of balls of sock yarn, which will most likely turn into some socks for the boys. Pretty restrained really ;-)

That evening we had the knitters' dinner and quiz night. A whoooooole lotta fun! Our team sadly came second-to-last in the quiz, but we still won a few prizes, and I had a great time, so it was all good :-)

Sunday morning, I just whizzed into the market quickly to snag a skein of alpaca/merino sock yarn from another new supplier - Verandah Yarns:

Meet 'Mr Darcy' - isn't he yummy? He'll make some lovely socks I daresay.

As for taking pics of myself or others, it appears we all had a mild case of camnesia. I forgot to take the camera out most of the time, and when I did, I couldn't get pics because nobody would consent (although they were glad that I asked first, which is nice I suppose). Still, you get the gist of the weekend, and there was a loud cheer at the dinner when Maree (the organiser) announced that there would definitely be another KAN next year (hurrah!!!) so perhaps another time ;-)

The boys and I left Napier just after lunch on Sunday, and arrived home at 6pm, which allowed them to have an early night (that they sorely needed!), and I have to say its the first night in a very long time that they didn't get up umpteen-million times for a drink, or to go to the loo, or because they were hungry, or anything else. They just went to sleep. Yay! X headed off to camp this morning with much excitement in his sweet face. On a double-decker bus no less!! Oh, how I wish I could be there to see all the fun he'll be having! But of course, I'll be home with T, while Deane is back in Napier. I'm sure he'll have lots of excellent stories when he gets home though - can't wait to hear them :-) Have a good week people!

Yay for the weekend!!!

2011-08-24T21:05:00.000-07:00

It's Thursday afternoon. The suitcase is packed for the weekend (I have waaaaaay overpacked, but at least I'll be prepared, right?). I have my knitting organised, and all the bits and pieces I need for my class on Friday afternoon. X's bag is packed for camp on Monday and everything is named as per instructions. Now all that's left to worry about is the long drive first thing tomorrow morning.

Oh my gosh, how exciting!! I'm going to KAN tomorrow!!! Okay, so the family will be coming down with me, but Deane is fully aware of the fact that he will be looking after the kids while I'm enjoying classes, markets, factory tours and dinners full of knitting and knitters and yarn. (And food). Can't wait!!

I finished my Snake Feet, and I rather like how they turned out:

Nagini socks, knit in Vintage Purls 'Tilia'. I used 2.25mm needles on the feet and heels, then changed to 2.5mm needles for the legs, and changed again to 2.75mm needles for the last three pattern repeats and the ribbing. Probably could've just used 2.5mm or 2.75mm needles for the whole sock, but I didn't, and that's okay. Because I said so.

I picked up my Pisqu sock again, and got past the heel turn and partway down the foot (then tinked back and reknit the heel because I didn't like it the first time), then decided that I had fallen out of love with the sock and frogged it completely. The pattern is incredibly well written and easy to follow, with excellent instructions and links to demonstration videos for the tricky cuff stitches, but it just wasn't working for me. Not sure if it was the green yarn, or my slightly-less-than-awesome stranded knitting, but the sock just wasn't doing it for me.

(Photographic evidence that I did indeed get past the heel before frogging)

I think I'll use the green yarn to knit a pair of Rick socks. What do you think? Or Kai-mei socks. Or BFF socks...

While thinking about what socks to knit, I cast on for a pair of fingerless mitts with the remainder of my kentucky ave handspun. Finished one in a couple of hours last night, and will knit the other one tonight, all ready for KAN tomorrow:

Don't you just love the colour gradation?

I also whipped up a wee hat and scarf for Egbert, although the egg wearing it in this picture is actually Egbert Maaktu - poor Egbert Schubert cracked up after his first day at school with X. Egbert Maaktu has been safely ensconced in a container full of scrunched up paper towels for the last couple of days, so he doesn't follow his predecessor's footsteps...

Right, must go. I'm getting the bum's rush from Deane, who needs the computer for 'very important stuff'! I'll be back with a KAN update (and pics!) next week :-) Have a good one!!

A Day in the Life of Egbert Schubert

2011-08-21T20:24:00.001-07:00

X's school class was set some homework this week for their 'Keeping Ourselves Safe' project - look after a hard boiled egg, document its days, and assess at the end of the week whether they'd acted responsibly whilst caring for their egg.

X is currently in Napier with his dad, so 'Grandma' stepped in to look after little Egbert Schubert (or Bert, for short) for the day. Here's what we got up to.

After dropping T at school this morning, Bert and I headed to the NZ Post depot in Grey Lynn to pick up a parcel. Here he is, waiting patiently for the parcel:

And after the kind lady had handed it over:

Next, it was off to the supermarket to get the groceries. First stop though, coffee!

Then the shopping:

At the checkout:

Then Bert helped me load everything in the car, so we could go home:

Of course, we didn't stop there. As soon as we'd unloaded the groceries and put them away, we headed off to the gym for a run:

Got a bit hot, as is the nature of exercise, so the sweater had to come off. It was just a short run today, only 5km:

Afterwards, home again, so Grandma could have a shower and get changed. Then, it was off to the library to drop off some DVDs and books. And of course, check out some neat picture books in the kids' section:

Time for a spot of lunch!

Back home again for an hour or so, before heading back to school. On the way downstairs, we checked the mail. None today:

We headed into the school library, where Grandma usually spends an hour every day, covering books for the school librarian.

We got quite a few done today:

Home once more, where we helped T with his school homework:

Afterwards, Bert and T played XBox so Grandma could cook dinner:

After dinner, its time for bed.

Gosh, what a busy day Bert had! Wonder what he'll get up to tomorrow, while he's at school with X?

Magic

2011-08-15T14:50:00.000-07:00

It hurts my heart to be stuck in Auckland right now, when I so very much wish I was still in Wellington. The city is blanketed in snow for the first time in many years, and oh it looks so pretty! There is a beautiful video going around at the moment that sums it up nicely - Wellingtonians going about their day in Cuba Mall, when it starts to snow.

Many thanks to Ro Tierney for shooting the video, uploading it, and having one of my favourite songs - Clair de Lune by Claude Debussy - for the soundtrack.

Absolutely magical! I know there are many, many places all over the world, and indeed New Zealand, that gets snow on a regular basis. But for somewhere like Wellington where it is such a rare occurrence, it is definitely something special.

Here in Auckland we had snow flurries, but as soon as the snowflakes touched down, they melted. I still had a chance to enjoy it though - I was at the school library helping to cover books when we had a small flurry right before a hailstorm. The Groundskeeper Mike in all his baldness went out and jumped around like a loonie, and Dale the Librarian took pictures. It was quite something! Definitely a good laugh :-)

So its been a little chilly lately, and I'm thoroughly enjoying all my knits - I have to say that for once, my feet weren't cold at all yesterday. I was wearing my Bug Out socks!! I had spinning at the local Guild, and the room was freezing despite having the heater going (large room, wooden floors, lots of windows, no insulation... you get the idea). I was cold, my hands were cold, and yet my feet were still warm. Quite unusual for me. I had an excellent view of the bowling green, and saw snow flurries and hailstorms aplenty (which probably made me feel a little colder). It was quite weird, because the rain was interspersed with sunny spells. You could actually tell when it was about to rain/hail/snow because you actually felt the temperature drop in the room by several degrees beforehand. Guess the heater wasn't much chop...

I've started spinning my 'Smugglers Cove' pencil roving from Vintage Purls, which will likely become socks. Not sure about it at this stage, don't know if I'm getting enough twist into it for socks - guess I'm too used thicker roving. Still, if it turns out to be too 'woolly', I can always knit something else with it :-)

I'm making good progress on my Snake Feet:

I'm knitting these in 'Tilia', also from Vintage Purls. Awesome green, huh?

I finished my Crazy Knitting Lady boot toppers:

Excuse my knobbly knees :-) These were knit in my handspun 'kentucky ave' polwarth from maude & me. I even have enough left over for some matching fingerless mitts - yay!!

Well, its 1pm here, and I'd like to watch an episode or two of Bones before I have to pick the boys up from school, so I must dash. Hope you're enjoying your weather, wherever you are!!

What is it with me and famous authors?

2011-08-11T21:27:00.000-07:00

I had the opportunity to meet Lauren Kate, author of the Fallen series. She happened to be visiting the Auckland City Library on Thursday 11th August, which was perfect because I recently finished reading the first novel in the series (that I borrowed off my bff who has the best bookshelf in the world) and really enjoyed it. I figured I could get the book signed for my friend. Again.

You may recall the incident earlier this year with Kathy Reichs? I know I do. Still haven't heard back from her, probably never will. Anyway... I was thinking this time things would go a little more smoothly, since I'd already made a dick of myself. You know, 'been there, done that' kinda thing. Second time around should be fine. Hmm, not so much...

There was a slight hiccup in the evening's proceedings - I'd been telling Deane for weeks that I had to be at the library by 5.30pm, so I would be leaving home at 5.15pm at the very latest in order to be there in time, and did he have it in his calendar? I didn't want to be late. Despite my near-constant harping, the man ended up getting stuck in a (very important) despicably badly-timed work meeting that ran way past when it should have, so I had to take the boys with me. I admit, they were very well-behaved. Okay, so I had to carry T all the way to the library because his new shoes were hurting his feet (damn me for throwing out his well-loved well-worn shoes earlier in the day despite his insistence that they were 'still good'), and although he was quiet throughout Lauren's reading, he was very wiggly. Still, I managed to remember to put my phone on silent (just minutes before Deane sent through two text messages to say he was sorry and he was on his way - phew! That could have been embarrassing), and I even managed to get out a very clear and consise question that turned out to have a very good answer without blabbering the words all together like I usually do on such occasions as speeches or answering machine recordings.

I gave the boys my phone so they could play Sims Pets while I waited in line to get the book signed for Tania, and when I got to the table I wasn't a blithering idiot. Until I walked away and realised that I'd forgotten to give her the shawl I'd brought along as a gift. You know me - apparently I have to give famous people things I have knit whenever I meet them.

I tried pushing the shawl at Lauren's publicist, insisting that it would be okay if she passed it on to Lauren after the book signing, but the publicist assured me that it would be fine if I jumped back in line to give it to her in person, and indeed I should. So I rudely interrupted some poor girl who had been waiting patiently for her book to be signed, and said "I'm sorry, I forgot to give you this. It's a shawlette I made, I don't know if you like the colours or anything, but I thought you might like to wear it, or something..." (because, you know, I'm such an excellent wordsmith, or something...pfft).

Perhaps by the time I get to meet Diana Gabaldon I'll have it down pat ;-)

Ah, what would life be like if we couldn't laugh at ourselves and our ridiculous behaviour every once in a while?

Oh, and I forgot to mention the particulars of my sweater in yesterday's post, so here they are:

Hourglass Sweater, knit in Naturally Aran Tweed, shade #84. I used 9 balls, and made the 37" bust size. I increased the length of the body by 1", but the sleeves are knit to the pattern, as is the neck. I noticed a lot of people had issues with the wideness of the neck, but it worked out fine for me. I had exact gauge as specified by the pattern (because I am awesome like that) and I think it looks pretty good :-)

Sweater craziness

2011-08-10T20:30:00.001-07:00

I finished my sweater! I actually finished it on Sunday and have worn it a couple of times since, but hadn't got around to the picture-taking. Deane stopped by home just before lunch today specifically to take photos. How nice, that he would take time out of his busy day just to do that for me...

Consequently, my sweater was all scrunchy from me sitting on the couch, and he didn't have much time so the 'photo session' was rather hurried (he had to get back to work) and we didn't get many good pics.

'Scrunchy from the couch' photo

'Explaining our odd behaviour to the building manager' photo

'What's with this crappy lighting?' photo

As it turned out, there were no good 'front-on' pictures, so I thought I'd take some myself. Unfortunately, our digital camera doesn't have a timer on it, so I tried putting it on the dresser, pressing the button and quickly striking a pose:

As you can see, its impossible to get a good picture of yourself with a camera that doesn't have a timer. I gave up.

I think you get the gist of it though - I like my new sweater, its cosy and warm. The yarn is nice, but holds quite well in whatever shape you've put it in, and the various creases worked into it from sitting tend to stay. Perhaps after many years' wear, this problem will resolve itself...

::imagine a big sigh:: I have a bit of a dilemma. I hate having my photo taken, but I'm beginning to feel that it is one of life's necessities. If I want to show off my fabulous knitting achievements, I have to have my photo taken. Plus, if I were to mysteriously go missing, the Police would need an up-to-date photo to put on the news. Seriously. You never know what will transpire over the course of a day. It could happen. And of course my bff always wants a picture of me to add to her other friends' pictures, and since she has so few to choose from, she invariably ends up picking one I don't like. I need to fix that.

Anyway, I'm trying to get used to the whole having-my-photo-taken thing, but hate 'posing'. So I try to not-pose, but then the photos come out looking awful. Which makes me think that perhaps I should pose, but then the photos come out looking all try-hard and posey.

How the hell do you look natural in a photo? Impossible I say!!!! And yet, there are always photos of other people looking natural and not-posey all the time. Thoughts? Suggestions? Or should I just stop being so self-critical and overly judgemental of my gappy, buck-toothed smile and crinkly face, and just go with it? I mean, that's what I look like every day, right? I pull the weirdest faces all the time during conversations so people already know I look crazy, why try to hide that in a photo? I just don't understand why you can look fine in the mirror, but as soon as the camera goes 'click', its like your head is the earth and there's been a mini earthquake. The tectonic plates have shifted under the surface, moving your top jaw out a few extra millimetres, creating a few extra wrinkles in the topsoil, and making the water(hair)line recede, which makes your ears seem that much larger.

Oh well, I think I'll just have to get over it. Immerse myself fully in the not-caring phase of life. I guess it happens eventually to all of us, just at different stages for everyone. I'm picturing a beach or public pool in the summer - big people, little people, hairy-backed people, elderly saggy-skinned people, all rocking their swimsuits with confidence, not giving a crap what anyone else thinks. Good for them. I need to be more like them. I'll just wrap myself in a towel and dip my toes in for now...

OMG, only two more weeks until KAN!!!! I can't wait!! Must remember to take my digital camera to that, and get lots of photos of everything and everyone (and yes, allow people to take photos of me too...) I have all the bits and pieces I need for my class, I think I can prevent myself from spending too much at the traders market (remember, yarn diet!!) - oh, its going to be so much fun!! You can probably sense my growing excitement from all the exclamation marks I am using!!! I think I may have used my quota for the week. Or maybe not quite - yay!!! Okay, now I'm done ;-)

Is polyester really that bad?

2011-08-07T17:11:00.000-07:00

I only ask because normally, I abhor it. Okay I admit, I do have clothing with a percentage of polyester or other man-made fibres since its kind of hard to avoid entirely, indeed sometimes its necessary (where would I be without sock yarn with 20% nylon I ask?) but as with many people, I prefer natural fibres. Cotton, wool, that sort of thing. Deane is big on the fancy-schmancy sheets - apparently sleeping comfort is high on his list of priorities. We have 1,000 thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets. They're not cheap, so we only have two sets.

Yesterday he picked me up from advanced spinning class with microfibre flannelette sheets. 100% polyester. I eyed him with suspicion, and voiced my concern over the fact that, since he was the one that was so anally-retentive about the type of sheets we should be sleeping on (he wouldn't even allow me to have 100% cotton flannelette sheets!! Said they weren't very comfortable. Pfft) was this really a good idea? He insisted they would be great. So I bit my lip and said no more, reserving judgement until we'd tried them out.

Deane was so enthusiastic about trying them, he stripped the bed and remade it last night, all by himself!!! A very rare occasion! I admit, when I first jumped into bed, it felt a little weird. I believe I described the sheets as... 'grabby'. Still, they weren't entirely un-comfortable, so I just went with it, and eventually nodded off. I have to admit, when I woke up this morning, dude, I was comfy!! Cosy, warm, the sheets just 'grabby' enough to make you feel all soft and melty, and not want to get out of bed. So I have to ask, is polyester really that bad? Perhaps I should stop being so hard on the ol' synthetic fibres after all. Still going to be a yarn snob though, just sayin' ;-)

Oh my...

2011-07-30T23:13:00.000-07:00

Have you seen the new All Blacks jerseys? Think I might be watching a little more rugby this year...

Confession time

2011-07-29T13:57:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone. My name is Jody, and I'm a knitaholic.

It all started back in February 2009, when I bought a ball of Regia sock yarn and some cheap metal 2.75mm dpns from Thimbles & Threads in Upper Hutt, with the encouragement of my friend Margaret, who then taught me how to knit socks. She was so helpful, she even gave me a ball of Opal sock yarn for my next pair. These were worked up in pretty short order, and from there I knew I was hooked. I started surfing the net for hand knitted socks and patterns, and stumbled across a website called Ravelry. This site sounded very intriguing, but needed an invitation to join. So I registered for this invitation and waited patiently for a little over a week, until my invitation to sign up arrived via email. The rest is history really. I was on the slippery slope into fibre oblivion.

I came to this realisation when I took stock of the situation I was currently in:

Three WIPs on the needles - my Pisqu socks, my Simplicity cardigan, and my handspun boot toppers. Not much really. But rather than working on these, I cast on for an Hourglass sweater. The book with the pattern (Last Minute Knitted Gifts) was due back at the library on the 8th August, and I wanted to try and get the sweater done before then so I didn't have to reissue the book. Easily achievable right? Somebody else on Ravelry had managed to knit the sweater in a week...

I happened to have 11 balls of Naturally Aran Tweed in a lovely mid-blue sitting in my stash, having bought it recently to make the Derry Raglan and Cowl from New England Knits (which had been mentioned on Kiwiyarns Knits' blog - I fell in love with it on the spot and decided I just had to knit it). After much hunting around through websites and email sending, I managed to track down an American company that stocked the Karabella Soft Tweed yarn that the original sweater from the book was knit in, who were willing to sell and send me the ten balls of light blue (shade #1310) I required for the sweater and cowl, which left the Aran Tweed available for another project. Fate, right? ;-) So with the boys occupied with XBox and having another official pyjama day (not me though, I'd already dressed), I sat down in front of the laptop, whacked in a Bones DVD, and got to knitting. As of 11pm last night, I had knit through two balls of yarn, and got 9" of the sweater body done:

I think I might've been on a high from finishing the Christchurch shawl for Deane's nana:

Who could say? All I know is, I need to put myself on a yarn diet. No more yarn purchases. Well, after I've paid for the fibre I ordered from maude & me. And of course, there's still three more instalments due from the Knitsch yarn club. But they're already paid for so it doesn't really count...

Speaking of which, here's last month's instalment - Zidler:

Can't decide what to make with it yet, but never fear, I'll come up with something!! For now though, its hanging out with all my other pretty skeins of sock yarn in a large shopping bag because I ran out of room in my oversized wrought iron fruit bowl. No, my stash is not yet unmanageable - almost every skein of yarn has a project attached to it. If I keep it that way, it will be fine. It will all be okay...

Does half a day in pjs mean I'm only half lazy?

2011-07-27T13:55:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I decided I was going to falumph around in my jammies just because. We'd spent all day Tuesday at Rainbow's End and tired ourselves out, so I thought a lazy day would be just the thing. Deane had left for Australia at a god-awfully early 4.30am and I hadn't managed to get back to sleep, so wasn't up for much in the way of energetic activity. I also decided that the housework can wait until the boys go back to school, since tidying up now would be a pointless exercise - there's still several days left of the holidays.

My plans were scuppered however, when I realised I would have to take the car to the panelbeaters - Deane had booked it in, and they expected it to be dropped off Wednesday. Poop. It took several hours, but I managed to extract the name and location of the panelbeaters from Deane (who had neglected to tell me before he left), got myself dressed (the kids had dressed themselves voluntarily that morning - guess it was just me being lazy...) and took the car in. Once home, the boys decided they wanted to go into town to get T some model painting gear (yep, I have the nerdiest boys in town).

They then proceeded to spend the rest of the afternoon with heads bent together, working industriously on their little Warhammer models:

X carrying out his big-brotherly duty and passing on pearls of wisdom to his younger, less experienced brother. It warmed my heart to sit back and observe this wonderful teamwork, and listen to the praise and encouragement flowing from big brother to little brother.

It also gave me time to finish my socks of Squidgy Blue Goodness:

I also have only six pattern repeats left to do on the border of the Christchurch shawl - I'm hoping to have this finished by the end of the day so I can block it. I'm really hanging out to see what it looks like all finished!! Not long to go now...

Mission: Accomplished

2011-07-24T18:05:00.000-07:00

I set out, during the Tour de Fleece, to spin 200g of laceweight merino silk yarn. It got very close to the wire (in fact, a little over, but we won't dwell on that) - and I made it!! We got back from Tauranga yesterday afternoon, got the kids sorted, had a really basic dinner, and sent them to bed. Then it was straight into plying the two bobbins of singles I'd managed to finish on Friday night. Six hours later (at a little after midnight, but who's going to check?) I came to the end of one bobbin. Time for bed!

This morning I got up and wound the yarn into skeins, and here is what they look like:

Sooo preeeeeeettyyyyyy!!!! (Picture comical batting eyelashes here). A total of 1,161 metres of merino silk goodness - 193g of two ply heavenly yarn. Beautifully balanced (for once!) and so, so lovely. What on earth am I going to knit with it??? Plenty of time for that though - they're so stunning I'm just going to have to leave them as they are for a while, and admire my handiwork. Yes, I'm that modest ;-)

So the Tour is officially over for another year, and our lone kiwi rider and his US team had a podium finish - hooray! Moving on...

I'm half way through the pair of thick DK socks in the VP Max yarn - unfortunately the heels aren't the flashest, because I was knitting them in the car and during the family barbeque the day after the wedding, and I kept losing count. Still, nobody's going to look too closely (right?) and they look mostly okay. Just the legs to go, and I'll have me a pair of cosy winter socks!! Next on the list, boot toppers!

The wedding in Tauranga was beautiful. The weather held out just long enough for the ceremony and family photos before it started to spit. The bride was gorgeous, the ceremony itself full of laughs, as was the reception, a perfect day. They had the best cake topper I've ever seen:

Hand crafted from photos of the bride and groom, they're a fairly accurate likeness (apart from the disproportionately large heads of course ;-P) Go check out this website if you're in the need for a clay figurine of yourself. You never know, might come in handy ;-)

On the subject of cool/cute, found these at a random cafe just out of Tauranga:

Only 90 cents each :-) I almost don't want to open them, they're so cute. I guess I could always get more...

Only a week left of school holidays (yay), and Deane will be away for about half of it (boo). He's off to Australia for work. More time for me to catch up on Supernatural and knit in peace I guess. Less cooking too! Speaking of cooking, better go sort out tonight's dinner. Have a good week people :-) And Happy Birthday mum!

Edited to add: Oops, nearly forgot to show you the finished pics of T's hoodie! He was a dear and posed nicely for photos:

I rather like the end result, as does he. Got plenty of compliments over the weekend for it too, so happy all around! W00t!!

I must be sick

2011-07-21T14:59:00.000-07:00

Last night, after having spun for most of the day in an attempt to get this red laceweight finished before the end of the Tour, I decided to sit down and knit something simple and relatively quick. What better than some DK weight plain socks?

I had some yummy new 'Max' yarn from Vintage Purls in a beautiful blue, and had been down to the LYS earlier in the day to buy some Addi Lace 3.25mm circulars. I wound the yarn cakes, cast on using Judy's Magic Cast On, and then...

Horror!!!!

I couldn't remember how to knit!!! Seriously! I was sitting on the couch, staring at my needles, and couldn't for the life of me remember which side the stitches were supposed to start on, and which direction I was supposed to knit. I was lost for words. I had to get Deane to hand me a WIP so I could study it and figure it out. Needless to say, it all came flooding back and I was able to continue on, but oh my, the fleeting terror was quite something.

I knit the toes, then went to bed.

I've had a head cold for the last couple of days, which is unusual for me. What normally happens in this household is the kids get it, and Deane gets it, and 99% of the time, I dodge the cold completely (I pride myself on having an excellent immune system). Not so this time around. The boys have had it, as has Deane, and now me. Its not fun. Apparently it melts your brain. At least I have plenty of mindless stuff to be getting on with - the plain socks (which are now just straight knitting until I get to the heels), and this seemingly-never-ending-but-almost-done-I-think-I-can-make-it laceweight:

This is a picture of bobbin #2 - I still have about 22g left to spin, which I may or may not manage today. Plying on Sunday I hope (the last day of the Tour).

I have a good excuse (well, sort of) for not doing the housework - I've just had my nails done (we're going to a family wedding on the weekend) so I think I'll be able to get away with general blobbiness today. I'm waiting patiently for T's hoodie to dry - its all finished, and blocking at the moment. He wore it for half a day as soon as I'd finished weaving in the ends - I knit the i-cord and threaded it through the hood casing while he was wearing it he was that keen - so I know it fits, and will probably fit better once blocked. So pictures to come, I promise :-)

I only have ten border repeats left to do on the Christchurch shawl, so that should be finished in the next week or so as well - pictures of that to come soon too! Ooh, how exciting...

We're nearly halfway through the school holidays, and so far, nothing eventful has happened. There was the trip down to Napier on the weekend, and I got to see Harry Potter with my bff. Will definitely be going again. Not just because the movie was so good I have to see it a second time, but also because during the first viewing, the copious amounts of teenagers in the theatre rustling their paper bags, giggling, and exclaiming loudly over plot-lines they clearly knew nothing about because they hadn't read the books kinda ruined the movie a bit. So of course I have to go again ;-) I asked X which movie he'd rather go see - Kung Fu Panda 2 or Harry Potter - sadly, he picked Kung Fu Panda, so I can't use him as an excuse. I'll have to find somebody else to go with. Or I could go by myself. Either way is fine by me :-)

I must dash now, and get stuck in to this spinning if I am to have any hope of finishing it in time - have a good weekend!!

I think Winter finally hit Auckland

2011-07-11T19:32:00.000-07:00

Its rather chilly today! Has been for a little while now, and we've had a few thunderstorms (yay!). I was actually starting to wonder if I'd have any use for all of my awesome knitted scarves, hats and mittens. Guess I do ;-)

The Tour de Fleece is chugging away, we're up to Day 11 now. I managed to finish my first 100g of laceweight singles, as evidenced by my super-cool daily collages:

Yesterday, Day 10, was a rest day for both the Tour de Fleece and the Tour de France, so I was busy with all sorts of other things. My friend Polly jinxed me on the weekend, talking about 'Spring cleaning'. Pfft, it isn't even Spring! But, I ended up getting stuck in myself. There's a story behind it though, and it goes a little like this:

On Saturday, the boys were playing building tag with their friend on the 8th floor - its much like normal tag, but they use the entire building (much to the annoyance of fellow residents I'm sure). So of course each of my boys wanted a set of keys so they could get around between floors. I was reluctant to hand over both sets, as Deane has the third set at work (apparently - I'm not holding my breath over that one), and X has a tendency to lose things - like his brand new Cotton On Kids sweatshirt that I'd bought for him, that he wore to school and lost on the first day (grrrr). Deane was all "it'll be fine, just give them the keys", so I handed X the set with the car key, my gym tag, and the mailbox key. "Don't lose them!!" I said. What did he do? Lost them.

He was adamant that he'd brought them home and put them on the dining table, but I searched the entire apartment and couldn't find them anywhere. On Sunday morning I sent him upstairs to his friend's place to look. He came back down with friend in tow, but no keys. I made him walk through all three parking levels with me, looking for them. No luck. I left for knitting group in a slightly non-cheerful mood, deciding to check with the Building Manager on Monday to see if anyone had handed them in.

Monday rolls around, and no, nobody's handed in any keys. The friend's parents had been in advising of the lost keys (before me!) so he said he'd keep an eye out for them.

I went back up to the apartment and literally turned the boys' bedroom into a toy wasteland looking for them again:

After creating this atrocious mess, I decided I'd better clean it up because I really didn't want to be looking at it all day, and there was no way the boys would clean it up if I helped make it. So I started in, and when I did, I found the keys.

See those Nintendo game cases sitting just inside the doorway, on the clear plastic container to the left? They were under one of the game cases. I was stunned. I'd turned the place upside-down and inside out all weekend, when all I had to do was pick up the games. Ridiculous. Anyway, a good hour or so, and the room looked much better:

So after I'd wasted half my day on the room and the keys, I managed to find a little bit of time to get stuck into a new project. This one feels like a mini triumph of sorts. T has always refused to wear knitted jerseys, because he can't stand the itch-factor. I think he may have changed his thinking on this slightly though, and I'm not sure how much has to do with X having knitted jerseys that I've made, and how much is just him growing up. About a week ago he asked me to knit him a jersey, "and I promise I'll wear it". I asked if he was sure, and he assured me he was. I was busy doing something at the time so wasn't paying much attention, and the gravity of the situation didn't quite sink in. A few days later, I started thinking about the conversation, and I really couldn't remember whether it was an actual occurrence, or all in my head (you know, wishful thinking...) so I asked him if he wanted me to knit him a jersey. He said "yes, and I promise I'll wear it". Well, I didn't need any more persuasion! Onto Ravelry I hopped, and I dug around a bit until I found a pattern for a hooded jumper. Next was to find the non-itchiest yarn I could think of - what better than Malabrigo Rios? On to Little Country Wools, where I ordered three skeins in T's favourite colour - green.

I have to laugh a bit when I'm knitting this hoodie - for the kid who hates vegetables so much, to have something knit in a yarn with the name 'Lettuce', I find it a little comical. I have therefore named this project 'Anti-Salad' ;-)

I only managed to get a little bit done before having to go pick up the boys from school:

I told T when I picked him up that I had started on his jersey. I'm not sure how fast he thinks knitting grows, but he asked if I'd done the sleeves yet. I had to disappoint him and say no, but I got stuck in last night and managed to get a bit further - enough for him to try it on for fit:

Hopefully I'll be able to get a fair bit more done this afternoon while X is at swimming, and again tonight at knitting group. I'd like for him to be able to wear it next week. If it weren't for the TdF, I might've had it finished by tomorrow night. But my spinning wheel calls, and today is not a rest day - for a change from the (very slow) laceweight, I decided to work on a worsted weight yarn (hopefully, my consistency isn't the best) in a maude & me. colourway, kentucky ave.

I've finished one bobbin, and I think that'll be it for today. Must work on T's hoodie before he forgets he wanted me to knit it. Next bobbin and plying tomorrow! Then back to the laceweight...

For now though, time to organise X's swimming bag before Deane arrives home with the boys. Have a good week!! And remember, Harry Potter starts on Thursday ;-)

Nearly a week of spinning. Still going strong.

2011-07-07T00:25:00.000-07:00

I believe I've already covered days one, two and three. On to days four, five and six.

Now I know how much y'all love my collages ;-P, so I've made some more!!!

Do you see a recurring theme here? I'm feeling a bit of déjà vu...

Still, I'm over halfway through the first 100g bump of this fibre, then I'll take a break from that and move on to something a little chunkier. I might go back to the second 100g bump before the end of the tour, depending on my sanity levels, and time left available during each day. Unfortunately, the second half of the tour will be during the school holidays, when my dear children will be at home driving me batty.

Next weekend we're heading down to Napier for a very special occasion, so I'll be spindle spinning for the weekend and my friends and family will think I'm even more crazy! Apart from it being the start of the school holidays, I will be going to watch Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two with my bff. OMG - the final movie!!!!! So much excitement!!!!! I can hardly contain myself - a little over a week to go! Note to self: stock up on tissues. Oh my. The end of an era. And sadly, I didn't craft anything special for this movie :-( Still, I have a fabulous Gryffindor scarf in my possession (well, X isn't using it!) - and being the middle of Winter, what better opportunity to wear it? And I have a bag of Sherbet Lemons to share with Tans at the movie. Perfect.

I had a lovely proud moment this afternoon, when X's teacher informed me that his reading had improved so significantly over the course of the year that he is now reading at an age 10-11 level!!! This, from the boy who was so far behind at age six he had to go to Reading Recovery! I had a huge idiotic grin on my face for a good hour or so after hearing that. My clever boy (^_^) Pretty good improvement for a two year period if you ask me. And Deane still insists that all the XBox gaming time has something to do with it. Perhaps... As far as I'm concerned, nothing quite beats a good old paperback or hardcover book. He's getting through the Beast Quest series slowly but steadily, so I'm happy. Maybe I should start working on T now, although his reading level is more than satisfactory anyway, he's just not much of a 'recreational reader'. Yet ;-)

Here's another collage for ya!

2011-07-04T01:16:00.000-07:00

My Shalom cardi :-)

That is all.

TdF Progress Update

2011-07-04T00:51:00.001-07:00

Hello hello hello!!! Day three of the TdF is drawing to a close. I've put the spinning away for the day ready to settle onto the couch, and shove my freezing cold feet under Deane's leg for him to warm up ;-) Just thought I'd let you know how I'm getting on with the spinning, and this year I've figured out how to make snazzy little collages, so by the end of the Tour, you'll probably be sick of them, but it saves space - you can post one picture instead of a whole bunch. Yay! So, without further ado:

For those who would like a little more detail, the first two days were taken up with the other half of the gradient-dyed maude & me. merino. I now have two matching skeins, all ready to make a pair of socks with:

You probably can't read the wee tags I've put on the skeins, but they say - Skein #1, 76g, 186m and Skein #2, 75g, 171.75m Not much difference between them, and I think they'll look awesome all knit up!

Day three saw me attempting my finest spinning yet, to create a lace weight two ply yarn. I have 200g of this scrumptious fibre, hand dyed by Lyn Walsh of fibre2go. I put a little more detail into the collage, as you can see, so its pretty self-explanatory. This fibre is going to take me quite some time to spin up, but if I get bored with it, I'll break it up with some other spinning (of which I have plenty to be getting on with!!)

You needn't fear for my family - they are still being well fed and looked after. Washing is being done, the kitchen is clean and tidy, I made roast chicken for dinner this evening, and I even managed to get the housework done! I find I need to take more breaks from spinning than I do knitting, to avoid getting a really sore back. I think perhaps a change of chair would help - I would love to get one of these, with the Rose motif to match my wheel, or maybe one of these. Maybe I should put it on the 'birthday/Christmas wish-list'?

And just a little random snippet - a fellow kiwi knitter/blogger posted this the other day. Well worth the read, and non-knitters may find it helpful ;-)

Have a good week!!

On your marks, get set, go!!!

2011-07-02T13:34:00.000-07:00

The Tour de Fleece is on!! Oh, happy day :-) I was spinning like a crazy lady yesterday, and managed about half a blob of fibre (excellent measuring skills and technical terms there):

There will of course be more of this today, but interrupted by the usual Sunday knitting group. I've started the Simplicity cardigan in Vintage Purls laceweight. It took me four starts to get the increases looking right, but I'm on track now:

I took a brief interlude while knitting this to knit another cardigan. In three days. Could've done it in two if I wasn't sick. Now, before you go all 'yeah right' on me, the cardigan is knit in bulky yarn, and it has no sleeves. So it wasn't really such a great feat after all ;-) Still cool though. How many people can say they knit a cardigan in three days? Hmmmmm??? I'm hoping to get some 'on my person' pics of it today at knitting group (or possibly by Deane this morning), which I will post, but for now here's a 2D pic:

Shalom, knit in Knit Picks Wool of the Andes Bulky, 'Coal'. Super easy to knit, absolutely no seaming at all, completely knit in one piece. Awesome.

Moving on from crafting... Deane arrived home earlier than expected - he buzzed the apartment just before midnight on Wednesday. Me, in my bleary-eyed half-asleep state said, "are you downstairs?". "No, I'm buzzing the apartment from China". So I went down and let him in...

He brought back lots of interesting stories, and plenty of goodies. The boys were spoiled with two new Nintendo games each, and a digital video camera that works underwater. I got an iPod nano, complete with accessories, all sorts of little bits and pieces (like a genuine silk cushion/quilt), and the coolest hand made clay tea pot and matching cups:

Here's a close-up of the tea pot, with its bamboo feature:

I got all sorts of different Chinese teas to go with, so I should be covered for the next few years...

Much to do today I have, so leave now I must. May the Force be with you.

More please

2011-06-27T22:20:00.000-07:00

Sitting here watching Harry Potter with the boys, and just heard the loudest thunder clap I've heard in years!!! Opened the balcony ranch-slider, and it is absolutely pelting down outside, and there's hail too. Ooh, I love a good storm!!

What do they say about best-laid plans?

2011-06-26T13:26:00.000-07:00

Mine have been dashed entirely - T was home on Friday with a high temperature, which meant no run, no supermarket shopping, nothing but sitting at home with tissues and paracetamol and pyjamas. Saturday was much the same, but with an extra kid. Sunday, thankfully, went a little better - we got out of the house and went to watch Cars 2, then did a bit of shopping. The boys got some new Star Wars Mighty Beanz, which they were rather pleased with.

Then along comes Monday... both boys are home from school today, T has an awful cough (continuing on from last week's illness that I thought was over and done with - how wrong I was) and X, having battled a headache all day Sunday, has declared himself unfit for school with headache and tummy ache and anything-else-he-can-think-of-to-get-off-school-like-his-brother ache. Food levels are running low, the need to go for a run is ever-increasing... I really hope they're feeling better tomorrow!!

I have managed to get plenty of knitting done though - I've been working on my Christchurch shawl (Rav link), and made fairly good progress. I'm nearly up to the border now:

I've also nearly finished another project, it just needs two buttons. Which, of course, will have to wait until I can get out and away from invalid children! Ugh. I am seriously resisting the urge to cast on for the Simplicity cardigan (Rav link), but I think I'll cave in the next couple of days. I'll soon be sick of the high levels of concentration required to knit the shawl, and I'll want something simple to knit, that's easy to cart around. My Pisqu socks do not fill that category, nor does spinning. What can one do, but cast on for a new project?

As predicted, my new handspun cardigan is getting lots of wear, and it will have to be washed soon. I'm going to miss it. I think I'll have to search for some more yarn to make another one...

How dare he??

2011-06-22T20:42:00.000-07:00

My husband of ten years has informed me he is leaving me for his new love. She is half Chinese, half Italian, and they met in Singapore. Her name is Pharo. Damn her and her side jets, and degree-monitored-adjustable-temperature-controls:

He did say there was a downside to this new relationship, in that he cannot spend every waking moment with her. (I'd imagine hypothermia might be an issue at some stage). Still, it appears they are very happy together. Personally, I think the relationship won't last. He'll leave her eventually (somewhere around hotel check-out time) and come back to me. Especially since I informed him that I have recently been on a lingerie purchasing expedition ;-) That, and I just finished his latest pair of socks:

A test knit pattern by Valerie Wagoner - Celtic Roots (link is to my Ravelry project page, so if you don't have an account, you probably won't be able to see it. Just sayin') knit in Vintage Purls 'Hathi'. The pattern will be available once the test stage is over, and Valerie is happy with it. An excellently well-written pattern in my opinion :-)

And of course he'll want to see me looking fantastic in my new cardigan, of which I now have pictures. I decided to cut my head out of the pictures because in one I had an awful dead-pan look on my face, and the other I was kind of smiling, but in a horrible way that made me look really weird and ugly (not hard to do) so you are spared the horror:

Yes, it has a weird band of lighter colour through the middle - it just kinda came out that way by accident, but I like it :-) So far this week I've worn the cardigan most days, and I'll be sad when I have to wash it. Still, it will dry and I will be able to wear it again, so something to look forward to I guess. I feel kind of like a kid separated from their favourite toy, hanging out in front of the dryer waiting for it to be clean again. I must grow up one day and start behaving like an adult...

Have you ever noticed...

2011-06-20T20:20:00.000-07:00

1. JayJays clothing tags have interesting nuggets of information on them. I've found three different ones on mine so far:

* Monkeys eat bananas
* Time heals all pain
* Shiloh is a pretty name

Wonder who comes up with these?

2. Tug-of-war sounds really stupid, and if you think about it, doesn't really make any sense. Wouldn't it be more like 'war of tugging'? Or just stick with 'tug war'. Either one.

3. There are some really gross-sounding words in the English language. One of them is moist. Ew.

Rainy weekend fun

2011-06-19T18:35:00.000-07:00

Saturday saw me at the cafe on my own, knitting happily away on Deane's second sock, then traipsing down to the library in time to pick up season one of Bones on DVD (again) so I can watch it while Deane's away. Sunday I was at spinning class all day. Fabulous!! It was quite nice to be inside with a bunch of beautiful wheels and fibre (not to mention the company) while it poured with rain outside. I learned a lot about how to prepare fleece for spinning, straight from the sheep. Don't know if I'll ever use this knowledge in the future (I'm a lazy spinner, preferring to work with prepared fibre) but you never know...

Speaking of prepared fibre, I bought some rather luscious merino silk roving from Lyn of fibre2go while I was there - a beautiful crimson red colour, 80% merino/20% silk blend. 200g of it!! The intention is to spin it into a 2 ply laceweight, and knit a scrumptious large wrap or shawl out of it. No hurry though, eh? ;-)

My cardigan was still damp from the blocking process on Sunday morning, so I couldn't wear it to spinning class to show off, but I took it with me anyway and received lots of praise. Just the right amount to boost my ego ;-) Still haven't got modelling pics yet - hopefully I'll be able to con somebody at Wednesday knitting to take a few for me. I've been wearing the cardi today, and I'm more in love with it than ever. Its cozy and warm, and very soft. Looks fabulous on too ;-) Sooooo glad I decided to block it, as it now fits even better than it did before blocking! Which I guess is kinda the point. I must confess, I am now fully converted to blocking and swatching. Well, swatching to a certain point anyway. Lets not go overboard here!!

Deane left this morning in a whirlwind of last minute packing and organising, with a brief and slightly disappointing kiss at the airport before dashing through the rain into the international departures terminal with his travelling companion, a work client (hence the business trip). We won't see him again until he arrives back in Auckland some time next Friday. 12 days on my own with the boys. Hurrah. Still, bedtimes should be a little smoother, as there will be no 'staying awake in expectation of dad arriving home and maybe reading a comic or playing a game even though its past bedtime already' scenarios to deal with. Although my children can be rather inventive, so I'm sure they'll be able to come up with plenty more lame excuses as to why they're still awake at 9pm on a school night. Horrors.

Still, I must look on the bright side - there's now one less person to clean up after! Less washing to pick up off the floor, less shoes in the middle of the lounge to trip over, less dishes lying around in stupid places to pick up and stack in the dishwasher, less cooking (hmm, how many times can I get away with spaghetti on toast for dinner, or poached eggs, or 2-minute noodles, or cheerios?? Probably don't want to push my luck...) More quiet time to watch what I want, knit when I want, read in peace (A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French at the moment, quite funny). Come to think of it, the next two weeks doesn't sound like it'll be so bad after all...

Hey crazy lady! You're crazy!!

2011-06-17T17:54:00.000-07:00

Um, yes, that would be me...

I just registered for the Auckland Quarter Marathon in October this year. A whole 10.55km, to be run on the 30th October, starting at 6.45am. Madness!! Madness I tell you!!! At least I didn't go completely off the edge and sign up for the half or full marathon. Maybe next year ;-) Ahahaha...

I guess now I'd better get serious about training. Don't want to make a dick of myself on the day, and collapse halfway round the track or something. That would just be embarrassing! At least I know that my first 10km run wasn't just a fluke, I did it again yesterday. I think the next step though, would be to run outside instead of on the treadmill. Perhaps I should try to find a decent route somewhere around Auckland that won't have too much traffic. Nothing worse than having to stop at a pedestrian crossing and wait for cars!

Queue abrupt change of subject

I finished my cardigan last night, buttons sewn on and everything! I was very sorely tempted to wear it today, but decided to block it instead - all the better to show it off at spinning class tomorrow! Provided its dry by then of course.

(Here's a pic of it blocking on a manky old dryer-warped towel - I should totally win an award for world's worst photography...)

I'm now working on the second sock of the pair I'm knitting for Deane. The test knit is going well - all the kinks have been worked out, and I'm pretty sure the pattern is very near completion.

Unfortunately its still not available on Ravelry, so I can't link to it for you. I'll post some pics in a few weeks - should have them well and truly finished by then. I can't post them any sooner, because Deane is off to China, Singapore and Malaysia for nearly two weeks for a business trip. I get all the joy of staying at home and looking after two boisterous boys. Hmmm, who got the raw end of the deal there? ;-)

On the up side, I get to watch what I want, when I want, and just think of all the knitting time!! And being able to wear pyjamas to bed... Every cloud has a silver lining indeed ;-)

And just a completely random item - saw this on the footpath on the way to school yesterday morning, and though it was really sweet:

How cool is that? Imagine walking to school one morning, and spotting an extra special message spray painted on the footpath just for you - 'daddy loves you'! Gorgeous :-)

I love craft markets!

2011-06-10T21:17:00.000-07:00

Just went this morning to the Auckland Art & Craft Fair. It's so fun to be able to wander slowly around and look at lovely crafty stuff. I don't like the crowds so much, but that's just something you can't really avoid. And I guess the crowds are a good thing, because that means people are interested, and willing to buy lovely hand made things. I bought a cool kiwi gift card from Cloud Nine Creative, and the most awesome tea cup and saucer set from a lovely girl who is just starting out in business:

Fabulous, isn't it? She has a blog and a shop on Felt (currently empty - I guess all her stock is reserved for the Craft Fair). She has tea pots too!! I couldn't afford to buy one today, but I fully intend to get one soon! One can never have too many tea pots :-) Plus, another tea pot means a good excuse to make another tea cosy ;-)

I also discovered that Happy Go Knitty are now stocking merino 4ply and 8ply yarn, and a squidgy soft merino/possum blend yarn. Yummy!!!

Hope you're having a good weekend - I'm off to cook some dinner, then get stuck into some serious knitting ;-)

So much for 10k...

2011-06-09T18:05:00.000-07:00

Went to the gym this morning, all psyched about doing my first 10km. Set up the treadmill, punched in all the data, and got running. Sadly, I had no music of my own - T had been fiddling around with my headphones this morning, and I hadn't noticed that one of the earbud pieces had gone. So I was stuck with barely audible crap. Oh well...

All was going well, and I got into a nice rhythym. I reached the 9km mark and was very pleased to know that I still had plenty of steam left for that last 1km when disaster struck! The treadmill went into cool down mode!!! I frantically started pressing buttons - increase the speed back to 9kmph, increase the cool down time from five minutes to the required six minutes 40 that it would take me to run the last kilometre, and the treadmill had a hernia and just stopped. It was almost like the machine was saying, "sorry lady, you've had enough time. Now get off!!"

Needless to say, I was quite gutted. I was looking forward to being able to say "I ran ten kilometres today!!". Now I can't. Sucky.

In other news, I finished a sock for Deane - no pics yet though, it was dark by the time I finished it yesterday, and now its raining so the lighting is really bad (apartments are a little like caves). I'll get some stylish modelling shots on the weekend ;-) Mwahahaha!! Deane. Modelling. The mind boggles...

My hanspun cardigan (Rav link) is going really well - I've finished the body, and am on to the sleeves. The body was worked in one piece up to the arms, then split off, and the fronts and back were worked separately, with a three needle bind off on the shoulders, thereby avoiding side seams and shoulder seams. I was going to attempt knitting the sleeves in the round from the top by picking up the stitches with the aim of avoiding seaming completely, but I couldn't get my head around how to work the shoulder caps. I gave up and started from the cuff in the round. Minimal seaming is better than heaps, right? And this problem of mine will hopefully be solved come August - I'll be attending a class called 'Getting Set From the Top Down' by Morag McKenzie of Vintage Purls fame, at Knit August Nights in Napier. Its all about how to construct a garment with top down set in seamless sleeves. Ooh, I can't wait!!! A whole weekend of knitting and spinning fun, with Ravelry friends from all over New Zealand in one place, which just happens to be my home town!! What could be better? Hmm, probably should let Deane know at some point...

I've fallen in love with this cardigan already - the yarn is incredibly soft, and it looks beautiful knit up (if I do say so myself ;-P). The cardigan could be a little bigger, but that was my own fault. I'm working on 3.25mm needles, when the pattern calls for 3.5mm. And the recommended yarn is sport weight, whereas my handspun is more like a fingering weight. I'm making the small size, but probably would have been better making the medium. Having said that, it will still fit nicely I think. I can't wait to be able to wear it!! Definitely going to be putting in some time on those sleeves this weekend!! Hopefully I'll have some finished pics for you next week ;-)

I have a feeling that I may just be making this cardigan again in the future - its a lovely simple knit, and the pattern wasn't nearly as difficult to follow as I thought it would be. Drops patterns seem to have a bit of a bad reputation for being hard to read. I've found it okay.

I couldn't resist casting on the Round Seven socks from SM5 - Pisqu. I haven't done much, since the cardigan and the test knit socks for Deane have been demanding my attention, but I like how its coming out so far:

Sitting flat (or rather, not-so-flat)

On my leg

Pretty, huh? I'm using white Shibui, and the last instalment of the Knitsch yarn club - Kelly.

And I couldn't help myself, I signed up for the next Knitsch yarn club the other day. I checked with Deane first, and he didn't (technically) say no, so I'm not entirely to blame... Next yarn club will have to be a Vintage Purls though - Morag writes the best sock patterns!! Of which, I still have one to knit - Leaflink. Its on my (ever-growing) to-do list.

Must be off - things to do before picking the boys up from school - I'm running out of time! Hope you have a happy (and somewhat dry) weekend.

Just a couple of things...

2011-06-01T16:28:00.000-07:00

1. I ran 8km today. Yay me!!

2. Dear person with crutches - you don't expect people to take your injury seriously when you're wearing platform heels, do you? They do not aid in recovery, and your doctor would be very disappointed in you.

That is all.

Will I ever learn?

2011-05-30T19:17:00.000-07:00

X, bless the little horror, has found a new way of irking me. He is one of those willful children, and he learned from a very early age how to 'press my buttons'.

One weekend morning several weeks ago, he was getting changed in his room, and was throwing his washing around. One of his socks happened to land on the wall light fitting. It stayed there for a while, until I asked him to get it for me, as I couldn't reach. The light fitting just happens to be about midway along the side of the bunk bed, and my arm is too short to reach without me climbing onto the top bunk. He thought this was quite hilarious, and proceeded the next day to hang his dirty socks on the light fitting for a bit of a joke. It went on for a few days until I told him to stop it because it was getting to be a little annoying.

It hadn't happened again, so I naturally assumed that he had forgotten about it. Silly me.

We had a bit of a disagreement this morning before heading off to school. I've just now walked into their room to make the beds, and guess what I found:

Socks, literally jammed into the side of the light fitting, quite out of my reach. You really have to laugh sometimes, don't you?

7km is the new 5km

2011-05-29T22:53:00.000-07:00

Running
Yep, still doing it. You thought I'd given up, didn't you? Go on, be honest...

I decided recently that since I was only getting to the gym once or twice a week, I needed to make the visits worthwhile. A 5km run had become 'easy', in that I could complete a run without any problem, and felt that I could have done more. So, I upped the kilometres, and have now run two lots of 7km, and I have a feeling its going to become 'easy' fairly soon. Perhaps I will increase the distance every now and then, building up to 10km. Yeah, 10km sounds like a nice round figure, doesn't it?

Its funny really - if somebody told me two years ago that I would be able to run 10km, I would've laughed in their face. Now? I think I may just be able to do it! Onwards and upwards!!

Spinning
So I went to the beginner spinning class on the weekend, and had a lot of fun! And yes, I did learn some stuff ;-) I learned a completely new method of spinning. The way I was spinning before wasn't necessarily 'wrong', and I will continue using that method, but I was shown a more efficient way of spinning, which makes it easier to keep track of things - eg: number of revolutions per length, which is good to know when you go to ply later. I won't get into too much detail because I'll just bore all the non-spinners who read this blog to death and back, but rest assured I did not waste my time going. I will be learning even more in a few weeks when I go to the second class! Looking forward to it :-)

I also managed to finish off the bobbin of gradient dyed fibre I was working on, and navajo-plied it today while watching Doctor Who. Its a nice 75g skein of fingering weight yarn, totalling 186m. Which is great, because that's plenty for one sock! My plan for this fibre is coming together nicely :-) I just have to spin the other half of the braid now...

Knitting
I finished my double knit bookscarf (Rav link):

Took me a little while to get the hang of double knitting, but I picked it up eventually. This was a slow project for such a small thing, but I'm happy with it all the same :-)

I also finished the Argus Panoptes socks (Rav link):

I've been wearing them today, and they're pretty comfy. Mind you, I say that about all my hand knit socks...

I'm back to having only three WIPs now, which is nice. I'm itching to cast on the Round 7 (Rav link) socks though - they're gorgeous! I have a good reason for avoiding casting on (aside from having other stuff to finish of course) - I have a little injury on the index finger of my left hand. A recurring knitting injury that I get when knitting too many socks ;-) A little split, that stings a lot when accidentally stabbed with a needle. So for now, it will have to be a small-scale project I've got on the needles which is a surprise for a friend, and my cardigan, which I really want to get done anyway. Alas, the socks will have to wait :-(

The tiny little mini surprise project had its big reveal the other day, so I can show you what it was now. I told you a little while ago about the unofficial song for Sock Madness, the llama llama duck song. And about the lady that posted a you tube video of it every time the word llama was mentioned in the treehouse. She's having a rough year, so to show our support for her, a whole bunch of Sock Madness members each knit a mini sock with two llamas and a duck on it, and all posted a pic of them on Ravelry in a special thread. We will all be posting our mini socks to the lady as well, so she will have a lasting reminder of how much we all appreciate her.

What we did on the weekend
On Saturday, we took a trip out to Mission Bay for lunch, then on to Kelly Tarlton's, which wasn't nearly as sucky as I was led to believe. The penguins were awesome, and the wide variety of fish were fascinating. Not much difference in the variety of species to the Napier Aquarium, but they're always so beautiful, I could watch them swim for hours. They do have a live octopus at the moment, something the Napier aquarium is currently lacking (their octopus died a little while ago, for unknown reasons). And their sting-rays are HUGE!! Horrifically expensive unfortunately, but worth the trip I guess, if you're only going once in a while. The penguins were definitely something I enjoyed, and not something you see every day!

The boys had fun, and it got them out of the house and away from the XBox for a good chunk of the day - a definite bonus ;-) They spent a large part of the rest of the weekend turning their room into a giant tip, so they weren't allowed back on today until the room was tidy. Not kid tidy, my tidy. Surprisingly, they managed it fairly well (or X did at least, T is not the best at tidying. Still plenty of time to work on that though).

All in all a busy weekend, but lots achieved - just the kind of weekend I like :-)

I just did the dumbest thing ever...

2011-05-25T21:57:00.001-07:00

Proof of lack of sleep - I've been cooking lamb shanks in the crock pot all day. The final step was to strain the liquid and remove all the bits and pieces from it (cloves, cinnamon stick, star anise etc etc), discard the crap, then return the liquid to the pot and thicken it for sauce to go with the shanks.

What did I just do??

I strained it alright, through the sieve, and into a COLANDER!!!! Thereby tipping all the 'sauce' down the sink! Stupid woman...

Guess I'd better go make some gravy or something :-/

Looking forward to the weekend...

2011-05-25T17:38:00.001-07:00

I've signed up for a beginner spinning class. Yes. A Beginner class. I only know how to spin one way, and I'm hoping to learn quite a bit. Got myself organised already! The requirements list:

Own lunch - I'm sure I can manage that
Spinning wheel - check
2 or 3 bobbins - check
Lazy Kate - check
Flick carder - ::digging around, digging around... aha!:: check
Pen and note pad - check
Apron - ... uuuummmm... hmm...

::scrape, plod, click, zzzzip, wwwiiirrr, ssshhhh, ouch!, wwwiiirrr, ssshhhh:: Ta daaaaa!! Apron!! And its got a pocket ;-)

Yes, it is sellotaped to the wall for the express purpose of taking this picture.
(fyi, those are my really cool sound effects up there, designed to represent the placement of the sewing machine, the cutting of the fabric, the sewing and the ironing. And yes, I stabbed myself with a pin. Okay? Okay.)

I used a neat, very easy to follow tutorial I found on a pretty blog. Ah, the internet is a wonderful thing... So anyway, there are two spinning classes - one this weekend, and another on the 19th June. Presumably there's a gap in between to allow you to get a bit of spinning done. They're being run by the Auckland Handweavers and Spinners Guild - should be a lot of fun! It goes all day though so it will mean missing out on knitting group again :-( Oh well, there's always next week!

::We interrupt your regular programming to bring you breaking news::

I'm a little all over the place today, due to broken sleep last night. A couple of drunk girls followed a car into one of the carpark levels in our building last night, then couldn't get out (Duh. Secure building.) So they decided to damage a car and set off the fire alarm, which meant a midnight traipse out into the rain for everyone in the building, until being given the go-ahead by the Fire Department to go back to bed. Stupid drunk people :-/

::And now, back to the scheduled program::

Sock Madness is officially over for me - Round Six started on Monday morning, just after midnight NZ time, and was done about mid morning on Tuesday. One person from each team made it through to Round Seven, which is due to start Friday morning, about 4am NZ time. I'm still knitting my 'elimination round' socks, because they're really cool, but I'm in absolutely no hurry to finish them. I am really looking forward to seeing the last pattern though - I'll knit it, but probably not right now. I have a cardigan to get on with!!

Meanwhile, a progress pic of the Round Six socks:

Here's my attempt at a close-up of the stitch pattern:

Argus Panoptes (Rav link) by Rachel Brown, knit in Fibre Alive Merino Mania, colourway 'Lunar' from JOY of Yarn. I really like the stitch pattern, but I'm finding it a little slow to knit. I think that's just me though, considering how fast Round Six went! Or it could have something to do with my now-distorted (thanks to Sock Madness) view of how long it takes me to knit a pair of socks. I've been busy with several projects, including a fair bit of spinning - I'm nearly at the end of the first single for my gradient-dyed sock yarn that I started back in March:

Looking good, huh? Still need to chain-ply it. Then spin the whole other single. Then ply that one. Then knit them into socks. Might be a while...

The vast majority of this was spun last week - at the monthly spinners and knitters get-together, and at the Guild Open Day on Saturday. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the Open Day was very popular, and we were really busy with lots of visitors. One of which was my friend Jane from Wellington (although she now lives up north, which is awesome!) - I got to hand over a completed quilt to her and her daughter:

And I got to meet Jane's mum, who was visiting from Canada :-)

I sold a knit item (yay me!!) which the person was very happy with, and it allowed me to buy some yummy new fibre:

100g merino from Fibre 2 Go, which is actually a really nice red, not the garish pink it looks like in the photo. And:

I know this doesn't look terribly exciting, but its 20g of hand dyed silk hankies from Tui Gardens Wool (who don't appear to have a website - bummer). Not sure what I'm going to do with these yet, but I'll have fun daydreaming about it ;-)

Straight after the Open Day, the family headed down to Napier for a birthday lunch on Sunday, and to pass on a couple of pairs of handknit socks to the 'sock vultures' (ahaha) my mum and my sister. They each got to pick a pair from the Sock Madness stash (after I'd narrowed it down for them), and I said goodbye to my (Can)tab. Madness (Rav link):

Which now belong to my sister, and my Maddeningly Dangerous Turns (Rav link):

Snagged by mum. Goodbye pretty socks, I'll miss you... Ahhh, sharing the sock love :-)

kreachr - keeping family feet warm since 2009 ;-)

A week of small triumphs

2011-05-19T20:48:00.000-07:00

Just a few little things that brightened my week:

1. I got X to wear his knitted sweater to school this morning. Even better, he was still wearing it when I picked him up this afternoon!! Score one for the nerdy knitting mum!

2. I got the hang of this double knitting palaver:

This is one side of a double sided (hence double knitting) book scarf (Rav link) - I've actually knit more since these pictures were taken. The other side is reverse, and looks like this:

3. I finally finished the quilt I was making for my friend Jane's new baby. No pics yet (because I'm still sewing down the binding - shh! Okay, so it's nearly finished...) but I'll get some tomorrow when I hand it over. She's popping in to the Auckland Handweavers & Spinners Guild Open Day, where I'll be doing a bit of a spinning demonstration (just to show those who are interested that spinners aren't all grannies with decrepit old spinning wheels!)

4. I also managed to start my handspun cardigan, and so far its going okay. The yarn is quite soft and nice to work with (except for the occasional bit of VM) - I'm hoping this will be a really nice, plain cardigan that will get a lot of wear (and fingers crossed it doesn't fall apart!!)

My gauge is off, but I think I can make it work. I'm using 3.25mm needles, although the pattern calls for 3.5mm. I don't have 3.5mm and can't be bothered getting any and starting again, so I'll adjust the pattern as I go. Hopefully it'll work out okay (famous last words!)

5. I had the opportunity to knit a bookscarf that I had once knit before, but gave away. It was for Quidditch in the HPKCHC:

Now I have one of my very own, and I love it!

6. I finished my Diamonds in the Fluff socks (Rav link):

This project was a little bittersweet - I love the socks, and love the colour, but it was one of the last few skeins of Needle Food yarn I have left :-( And then there were two...

7. Cecil(ia) was a hit with my niece - she loves it! Now both my niece and nephew have a special squishy toy to love :-) Its quite fun going to visit every now and then, and being able to walk into their bedrooms and see all the stuff I've made them. They each have a quilt, a cushion, and a soft toy. My nephew has a stripey knit teddy bear to match his crochet blanket I made when he was a baby, and my niece has a wee picture on her wall of her name, that I drew several years back for her birthday. They each got a pair of socks at one point, but I don't think those were quite as popular. Oh well, you can't win all the time, right?

In case you haven't guessed yet, I love making stuff ;-)

8. I managed to finish reading Tome of the Undergates by Sam Sykes. That book felt like it took f o r e v e r!!! It was an okay read, if a little over-descriptive. I've now moved on to Moab is My Washpot by Stephen Fry. Been looking forward to reading this one for a while :-) Next on the list is The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Steig Larsson.

9. It is now officially less than two months until Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two hits the cinemas. Oh-Em-Gee!!! CAN'T WAIT!!!

10. It is also now (unofficially) the weekend. Yay!!

How was your week?

Yay for wet weather!!

2011-05-10T22:42:00.000-07:00

I love rainy weather, there's just something about it that makes me smile. I think Autumn is my favourite season. The trees look absolutely gorgeous with their myriad of colours, you get the occasional foggy morning, rain is something I rather like (although not so much when I have to go out in it all the time). Its the perfect excuse to stay in and knit, and have a big ol' pot of soup simmering away on the stove. Oh, how I love soup!!

Today was especially wet, with thunder and lightning thrown in for good measure. So I decided to have my favourite soup - one I grew up with. Many New Zealanders will be familiar with it, and here's my hashed-together recipe (eg: what I made today).

Throw a bunch of bacon bones into a pot with a cup of soup mix (you know the stuff - lentils, split peas, barley, alphabet noodles etc) and a whole heap of water and bring to the boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 2 hours. Grate a stack of vegetables (today I used a carrot, a potato, a kumara, a small swede, a small chunk of crown pumpkin and a parsnip) and stir into the soup, adding more water if required). Simmer for another hour or so. If you're not a fan of picking bones out as you eat, fish out the bacon bones now and strip off the meat, returning it to the soup and discarding the bones. Taste, and if required season with a teaspoon of salt.

Really easy to make and oh so good!!! And there's always plenty of leftovers to either freeze for another day, or have for lunch/dinner tomorrow :-)

While the soup was simmering away, I finished Cecil(ia) for my niece:

Love it!! So cute :-)

Pressie will be sent on time! Hurrah! Now I can get back to work on my optional socks for SM5. Looks like there will be plenty of time before the Round 6 pattern is released - the illusion socks are creating havoc for a lot of the competitors. Not that I'm complaining...

Slowing down the crazy train

2011-05-09T18:42:00.000-07:00

I poured my heart into the Round 5 socks for Sock Madness, and made it into Round 6 - I took the second-to-last spot on the team (there were only six spots). It took a mammoth effort to get these socks knit - 80 stitches around, knit on 2mm needles. Over 39,000 stitches! Let Me Count the Ways, by Jenny Lee. Its an illusion knit - when you look straight at them, they just look like a weird bunch of stripes that may possibly be something more:

But when you look at them from the right angle, the 'picture' becomes apparent. These socks have lots of little mini socks all around them:

They look great on, too:

These were knit in Patons Patonyle 4ply sock yarn (black), and some more of my Kool Aid dyed yarn. To give you an idea of just how epic this project was, here's a little run down of how it went:

Bedtime Friday night: 8.30pm (although I didn't fall asleep until somewhere around 11ish)
Pattern Release: 12am Friday/Saturday, which is when I got up and started knitting
Nap: 6.30am - 8am, then back to knitting (1.5 hours)
First Sock Complete: 12am-ish Saturday/Sunday
Sleep: 12.30am - 7am, back to knitting again (6.5 hours)
Next sleep: 3am - 7am, even more knitting! (4 hours)
Second Sock Complete: around 7.20pm Monday evening

Aside from doing some washing, dishes, taking bathroom and meal breaks, the occasional rest to check on other team members' progress, walking to and from knitting group on Sunday and picking the boys up from school on Monday, my entire weekend was consumed by knitting. Amazingly, my hands felt fine at the end of it, and could have quite happily picked up another WIP if I wasn't so tired. It basically took me the entire first 24 hours of the round to knit just one sock. I took more breaks and had more sleep during the knitting of the second sock. But I made it through to the next round, which was my goal (obviously). Now that I have achieved this goal, and far surpassed my first goal set before the competition of reaching the third or fourth round, I can happily knit the Round 6 socks at my leisure. I haven't lost all my sanity, and am perfectly well aware that it would be physically impossible for me to beat the other competitors left in my team. Only one person goes through Round 6, and it certainly won't be me. I'm okay with that.

Now I just have to finish the 'optional' socks, and my 'elimination' socks (once the pattern is released) and the competition will be officially over for me. Its been a fun ride, and absolutely, completely mad, but oh so fun! I wonder if Deane will get upset if I decide to do it again next year? Maybe he'll have forgotten by then...

Round 8 of the Ron Weasley blanket swap is over now too - all the squares have been sent to their new homes, and are due to arrive within the next week or so (depending on the destination). I laid out all my squares the other day:

Pretty cool huh? I've decided to do just one more round, so I can add another column of squares down the side to make it just that little bit wider. I won't be running the next round, since this round turned out to be pretty expensive (international shipping is not cheap!!) but there's plenty of keen swappers ready to volunteer, so the next round will begin soon, I'm sure. Should have a finished blanket by the end of the year. Although that will require me sewing all the squares together - something I'm not looking forward to...

Today is better :-)

2011-05-04T14:27:00.000-07:00

The city was shrouded in fog this morning. I love fog. Maybe not the densely thick fog that you can't drive through, but the lovely light misty fog is really pretty. You don't really get dense fog in the city anyway.

I had the fun of looking at this cool new table decoration while eating breakfast:

I've been wanting to do this for a while, but couldn't be bothered hand winding all the yarn. Yesterday I was avoiding monster knitting, so pulled out all the leftover bits of sock yarn and got to it. Cool, huh? And the poor cake plate doesn't get used very often - nobody seems to want to eat baking in my house - I think I overdid the baking when I got the cake plate. I decided it had to be full of yummy goodies and sitting on the bench. Deane complained after a while and said it wasn't good for his diet. The kids, although they eat baked goods, seem to prefer commercial crap. Who am I to argue? At least this way, the plate gets put to good use :-)

The courier arrived before 9.30 this morning, bringing yarny goodness:

'Hathi' by Vintage Purls, which will eventually become socks for Deane. I bought this yarn, so I could also buy:

'Tilia', also by Vintage Purls. See, if you ask permission to buy something for the man, you don't necessarily need to mention that you're buying something for yourself as well. When the goods arrive, they make no comment ;-) Its a little trick I learned along the way...

Some more recent arrivals are:

'Dorian' by Knitsch - it was the 'surprise' instalment of the Flights of Fancy yarn club. Not only did it arrive unexpected, its also a new yarn base - 60% alpaca!! Yummy! Perfect timing too, since I'd just knit the Baudelaires with alpaca/merino yarn and decided I just had to have some for myself. However, Dorian will be knit into fingerless mitts. The pattern came with the yarn and I quite like it. Sorry I can't put in a link for you, it hasn't been uploaded yet :-( You'll get to see them eventually though, when I get around to knitting them :-)

Also, something I've wanted for a while now:

Know what that is? That, my dear friends, is M a l a b r i g o S o c k Y a r n. Oh. My. God. The softness, the colour, the squidginess... I think I may faint... Courtesy of Little Country Wools (bless that woman, she has the best yarns). This was my little reward to myself for getting to Round 5 of Sock Madness. At least that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!! Now, what to reward myself with if I get to Round Six... just kidding ;-)

One more lovely parcel arrived recently - my goodies from the New Zealand Fibre Swap:

This was so much fun to open - there's the most beautiful merino fibre in an awesomely rich, dark purple that looks super soft from Fibre Optic Yarns. That floofy looking stuff next to it is some gorgeous espresso coloured alpaca fibre from a little guy called Montezuma at Southern Alpacas Stud. The tea is perfect, the chocolate is my favourite, and that tea cup and saucer? How freakin' awesome is that?!?!? Loooove it!! This is definitely a swap I will participate in again - the people are great, and send the coolest stuff :-)

On to knitting now, and today I think I'll knit the legs for this little horror:

As you can see, I have the body, the arms and the weird little ears done, I just have to do the legs and sew it all together. Needs stuffing though, which will probably have to wait until next week. The yarn is from my favourite LYS - The Little Craft Store. Awesome colours, huh?

I started my Diamonds in the Fluff socks again, as I decided after having got this far:

They were just going to be too tight and not at all comfortable to wear :-( This time I'm knitting the medium size (instead of small) with a slightly looser tension. Hopefully it'll work out - I'll let you know.

Another courier just arrived, bringing the last of the blanket squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap!! Hooray!! Now I get the fun of swapping them all around, and repackaging them to go back to their new homes, where they'll join lots of other knitted squares and become little replica Ron Weasley blankets all over the world. Yay :-) I'm getting close to done with mine, so perhaps I'll have a completed blanket in the next few months to show you - how exciting!!

The boys have had a great first week back at school - T is enjoying his newly built, bigger classroom, and X has signed up for another term of Tuesday lunchtime soccer. He's also running for cross-country every day, and seems to be enjoying it quite a bit. Perhaps he's just a late bloomer when it comes to fitness. Maybe my concerns about him becoming a lazy couch potato in later life are going to be for nothing. Who can say? I'll reserve my judgement for now...

Well, today kinda sucked...

2011-05-03T19:16:00.000-07:00

I stayed home today, because I was expecting a courier package from Fastway. The last time I had a Fastway courier package arrive, I wasn't home. They left a card, and I had so much trouble trying to organise having it redelivered, I decided to just go and pick it up. Unfortunately, it was all the way over in South Auckland. I got lost. Horribly, horribly lost. What was supposed to be a 20 minute trip turned into an hour and a half, with the boys in the back seat fighting and screaming, and me yelling at them. Many of the street signs were missing, or pointed in the wrong direction, and I couldn't get proper directions from Deane over the phone because he couldn't figure out where I was. By the time we got there I was a blubbering mess! I vowed never to do that again, and for weeks afterward, was scared to drive anywhere outside of the immediate vicinity of school/supermarket/home.

Today, I missed out on going to knitting group. I guess there's no real surprise in the fact that the courier has not arrived, and it is now time for me to pick the kids up from school (fingers crossed they don't call while I'm out!) The danger of me staying at home all day means I do stupid things, like instead of having lunch I eat yoghurt, corn chips and dry cereal throughout the course of the day along with umpteen-million cups of tea while watching five episodes of Gilmore Girls and knitting one and a bit arms on a toy. Bad. Very bad.

Still, there is something to be happy about - we're having roast chicken for dinner, yay!! And I got to sit on the couch and watch five episodes of Gilmore Girls!

Wow, I really hope the courier parcel arrives early tomorrow morning, I need to get out of the house...

School is back!!

2011-05-01T15:33:00.000-07:00

The boys are out of my hair for the day, my house is clean and tidy again - all is right with my little world.

I finished the reknit of sock #1 for Round 4 of SM5, so I can now share them with you:

(Can)Tab. socks (Rav link) by Ros Clarke, knit in Grape Kool Aid dyed yarn, originally sourced from Skeinz. With the reknit, I was going to mirror the cable. But after casting on four times I decided the universe was trying to tell me something, and decided to just knit it the same as the other one. No further problems arose...

I also finished my Firenze socks, but forgot to mention them last post - so here they are now:

Look at my feet, posing on the balcony - try-hards...

Anyway, the socks were knit in Lorna's Laces Starry Night (which I believe was a special edition colourway for Yarnmarket) - the yarn was bought for me by my good yarn-mule buddy Jill in the US, prior to her trip here last year. It was gorgeous to knit with, and I have enough left for a pair of fingerless mitts I think.

I also started and finished a little mini project yesterday, but its super secret for now, and I'd hate for it to leak out and accidentally be seen by the intended recipient, so I'll have to tell you about it when we've been given the go-ahead. Its really cute though!

I finally managed to cast on the Optional Round socks for SM5 - Diamonds in the Fluff (Rav link) by Leslie Comstock, aka chewyknits. She also designed these socks, which have been in my favourites for, like, ever. I'm definitely going to knit them one day!!

Another must-finish project is this little guy here - he's being made for my niece. Her birthday is coming up soon, and I think he'll be perfect! Knit in pink of course ;-) And a yummy green.

Well, it's nearly 11am here, so I still have plenty of time to knit before I have to pick the boys up from school. Oh, how I love school!! And rainy days :-) Have a good Monday everyone!

Don't Panic!

2011-04-27T23:29:00.000-07:00

No, this is not the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. You do not need to pack your towel. Although the old brain was going a little loopy last night. Let me explain why:

As mentioned in my last post, the pattern specs for Round 4 of Sock Madness were released on Monday. By Tuesday 5pm the pattern hadn't yet been released, and I figured that since it was the middle of the night over in mod-land, I'd be safe. So off I went with some friends to a weird little play about vodka. Just before it was about to start, I checked my phone, and horror of horrors, the pattern was out!!! Sent a hurried text to Deane requesting that he please reconnect the printer to the network, log in to my email and print the pattern for me, so it was ready when I got home. I was stuck watching the play (which was actually pretty funny) until 9.30pm. I walked very briskly back home and sat straight down to knit. Bless the man, he'd even checked out youtube for the instructions I'd need for the cast on! (Although he told me I wouldn't need them until row number 40. At least he'd tried to sound informed...)

We watched an episode of Chuck, then Deane wandered off to bed. I carried on knitting, and somewhere around 12.30am put on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt 1 for a little background noise (and some distraction). By 6am I decided I would benefit from a couple of hours sleep, so begrudingly dragged myself off to bed. By 8.30am I was up and back at the needles again. The first sock was done by that afternoon, but sadly was too small. I'd figured that out by about the heel, but decided to knit on, and reknit the sock after I'd made it through the round. Unfortunately, the reason why it was so small is because I was knitting to the recommended gauge on the pattern. Next time I'll just knit how I want to and be damned the gauge! Almost as useless as a gauge swatch ;-) Sock #2 was cast on with a bigger needle, and knit with a looser tension. By 11pm I had to admit defeat. I still had four inches of the foot to knit before I could start the toe. It occurred to me at this time that I had absolutely no idea why I was even in the competition. Why was I busting my ass trying to knit a pair of socks as fast as I possibly could, knowing full well that there are many, many knitters halfway round the world that can knit twice as fast as I can? There's absolutely no way I can win this! So why bother? In fact, why do I even knit at all?? Heck, why do we do anything??? The weirdest things were funny to me, and I discovered that the fabric of my pants felt really nice and soft. Definitely bedtime!

8am this morning, straight back into it. I finished just before lunch, and came in about seventh in my team, eighth overall. It's starting to get a little trickier now. Only 11 people make it through this round, six in the next. I don't hold out much hope for getting through Round 5. If by some freak occurrence I do get through, I'm going to take my time knitting that sixth round pair. No point being in a hurry when there's no chance of beating the speed knitters on my team. If they were all knocked out of the sixth round for some strange reason I'm fairly sure I'd have a sporting chance of winning, but we all know that's not going to happn, so best stop daydreaming now. Would be nice to get that far though...

Anyway, after all that babbling, I'm holding off posting a picture of the finished socks on here, because I've already frogged the first sock. I did of course take a picture and email it through to declare myself 'finished' for the purposes of the competition, but the first sock was not only too tight, I had screwed up the rib pattern and wasn't happy with it at all. So sock #1 is now a small ball of hand wound yarn. I cast on again, and knit one round before deciding that I really couldn't be bothered knitting any more today. When I do finish the sock (again) I'll take a (not blurry) pic of the proper finished pair. The pattern is really neat, and I knit the socks in my Grape Kool Aid dyed yarn. I really like how it turned out! So keep your eyes peeled for the reveal next week!

But for now, it's an early night for me :-) Sleep well, people. I know I will!

Where did April go??

2011-04-24T17:02:00.001-07:00

It's drawing to a close already. This year is zooming by so quickly you really have to pay attention!! We're halfway through the school holidays, and its Easter Monday and ANZAC day here. MIL left for home this morning after staying for the long weekend (and pilfering a pair of handknit socks while she was here ;-P). The boys have chomped through a third of their Easter eggs (but oddly enough, have not requested any today yet). Deane is officially 32 years old, which means I will be 32 in about six months time. Scary.

I finished the pair of demo socks for The Little Craft Store (btw, did you notice the shop now has its own website??? Yay!!):

Baudelaire socks by my fave designer, Cookie A. Knit in Misti Alpaca Tonos Carnival in Rosemary Garden. Soooo soft and comfy on your feet! Lovely to knit with too, and warm! I think I may have to invest in some of this for myself...

I've got 4 1/2 repeats left on the feet of my Firenze socks, before starting on the toes. I'm trying to get these finished today - the pattern specs for Round 4 of Sock Madness have been released!! And I haven't even started knitting the optional round socks!! Poop :-( The pattern looks awesome - Diamonds in the Fluff (Ravelry link). They were designed by a fellow Needles of Fire team member, so I'm definitely going to knit them, just not yet. I have the perfect Needle Food yarn to knit them in too. Can't wait!

There are a couple of parcels eagerly awaiting me at the Post depot - I think they'll be more squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap. Everyone's finished their squares and posted them, so I just have to wait for them all to arrive so I can mix them all up and send them out again. So much fun! I have well over 40 squares myself now, so I guess I should start thinking about sewing them all together...

The HPKCHC is about to start a new term, so its time to start thinking about another OWL project. Although I'm seriously starting to run out of options. Maybe two cardigans for Transfiguration - the Featherweight and the Simplicity (both Ravelry links). Too much of a challenge perhaps?? Or maybe a shawl for Ancient Runes using my handspun. Remember this?

I'm thinking either a Swallowtail, Holden or an Echo Flower (all Rav links, again). Decisions, decisions.

The weather here is starting to get cooler and wetter. Perfect for cosying up on the couch and knitting. Just the type of weather I like!! Hope you're enjoying whatever weather you have - make the most of it! Have a great day :-)

PS: Almost forgot to mention, I finished the Sackboy I was making for my nephew!

Isn't he cute? He was very well received, and I got an awesome hand made card in return. Sweet :-)

It's over already

2011-04-15T16:46:00.001-07:00

T was sick a few times this morning, but now he's had McDonalds for lunch and we're all good. Kids are amazing, aren't they?

What a great start to the school holidays

2011-04-15T13:33:00.000-07:00

Its the first official day of the school holidays, and T starts the morning by throwing up on the couch :-( He was sitting on one side, and the vomit ran down between the cushion and the arm. Thank God for leather!! I would've been tempted to just throw the couch away if it was fabric. Cleaning between the gaps of a couch is difficult at the best of times, especially when the cushions aren't detachable! He's now sitting back on the couch after having a shower, wrapped in his towel. He refuses to get dressed. I think it may take a little prompting on our part, before he gets cold. Maybe it'll help if I hand him some odd socks...

He's taken to wearing mis-matched socks lately. Grabs out two pairs, and pulls out one of each. I've no idea where that came from, but he's happy with the arrangement. Me? Not so much. It means my odd-sock pile is growing unusually large. On the plus side, once he runs out of clean pairs, he'll turn to the odd-sock pile ;-)

We have no solid plans for the holidays yet, although I'm hoping to get down to Napier to visit friends and family. The boys would love to go spend some time with their cousins and see the grandparents. I'm trying to work up the courage to drive the long distance from Auckland to Napier. My main issue is that I'm likely to get lost. Deane always drives the back roads, and I would have no hope of remembering the route. I assume the main route is signposted all the way through, but I've never really paid attention. There's usually a book or some knitting in my hands to keep me occupied on long trips, so bascially the drive between Auckland and Taupo is pretty much a mystery to me. I know Hamilton's in there somewhere. Unless Deane's driving. If you haven't figured it out yet, yes, I'm a wuss. I worried over driving from Wellington to Napier until I actually did it once and found it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Perhaps its just time to harden up and stop being such a girl.

The trip would require me taking a small suitcase full of sock yarn and needles, just in case the Round 4 pattern is released while we're away. There are only ten spots left on the slowest team, which should (in theory) be taken up in the next couple of days, which would leave plenty of time for another pattern release. Although the mods always steer clear of releasing patterns around Easter, because so many people are 'unavailable' for the competition which would make things unfair, and skew the results. I'm kinda hoping the slow team takes a bit longer, so the pattern gets released after Easter. Either way, at least one pattern is coming out during the school holidays, and I have no idea how the knitting's going to go with the boys home. Only time will tell I guess...

My original goal was to get to Round 3 or 4. I'm now officially in Round 4, and my goal has changed. I'd love to make it all the way to Round 6 (knowing full well that I won't beat the fastest person in the team. Only one person per team gets to Round 7, therefore it is impossible) - fingers crossed!!! Either way, I did achieve my original goal, so I should be happy with my progress considering this is my first Sock Madness.

Wow, this post has turned into a pile of ramble, I think it's time to go. Quick update - T is dressed, minus the odd socks. No more vomit for now - lets hope it stays that way ;-)

Have a good weekend!! It's raining here, perfect weather for a bit spinning I think...

Don't blink, you might miss it

2011-04-09T23:57:00.000-07:00

Yep. Knit a pair of socks this weekend. Did you catch it? Didn't think so, I'm not sure I did either...

Just kidding ;-) Of course I didn't miss it! It took me 30 hours, which did include a six hour sleep and several meals, not to mention lots of bathroom breaks, child interruptions, husband whinges etc etc. But seriously? That's the fastest I've ever knit a pair of socks!! Sock Madness indeed! And the first person to finish knit the pair in about 12 hours. Crazy...

I had a goal in mind, of trying to beat the person who keeps winning each round. Unfortunately, she scraped in before me. But I came third, which is pretty darn good if you ask me. Anyway, enough blabbering, here's a wee pic:

Pretty snazzy, huh? Dangerous Turns (Rav link), knit in Knitsch 'Peacock in the Parlour'. The colourway was one of the limited edition sock club skeins.

My hands aren't nearly as sore this time around as they were after round two (the Nornirs), but I don't feel like knitting any more today all the same. We'll just have to see how tomorrow goes...

The boys only have one more week of school before the Easter holidays - I must prepare myself. Perhaps knitting should take a break - gotta have some knitting saved for the holidays, to keep me sane while the boys tear the house apart!

Random update post

2011-04-06T16:09:00.000-07:00

I have no idea where this is going just yet, so it's probably going to be all higgeldy-piggeldy, but still mildly interesting (I hope).

First up - I finished my quilt top!! Ta da!!!

Full credit to Film in the Fridge for the idea, and the handy block tutorial, found here. I think it came out looking pretty darn awesome, even though the Thai fabrics are bright and crazy and totally in-your-face. The white helps to balance it out. Now, if I can figure out what colour thread to quilt it in...

The intended recipient arrived a whole four weeks early, so she'll just have to wait a bit for her surprise pressie. Having said that, I don't think a newborn is going to notice a late delivery. Her mum might though - don't worry Jane, it's on the way!!!

Crazy Jays are done too:

Another of what I like to call 'Ravelry Classics' done and dusted - Jaywalkers by Grumperina (Rav link).

I've knit all the body pieces for the Sackboy (Rav link) I'm making for my nephew, but can't go any further until I get a zip and some eyes for him, and stuffing (although I may end up using some non-descript fibre I have lying around. Mmmmm, woolliness...). No point taking pics of the body pieces, they just look like weird curled-up pieces of knitting.

Cast on another pair of socks, as I needed something I could do at knitting group on Wednesday - Firenze the Centaur, which we're doing as a knit-along in one of the Harry Potter groups on Ravelry. Don't think I'll get far on them though - the Round Three specs have been posted for SM5!!! This pair has cables - ooooooh, exciting!! Should have the pattern in the next day or two, I must prepare.

Received a parcel in the mail yesterday from my good buddy Jill over in Virginia, USA.

Look at all that teeth-rotting goodness!! Peeps, and Cookies, and S'mores! Oh my! Don't worry though - I sent her a large box full of chocolatey goodness too. We'll all have huge dental bills!! Nobody misses out ;-) And she was very sweet to send me Knit. Sock. Love by Cookie A - one of my all-time favourite sock designers. I am pleased beyond words - so many gorgeous socks to knit!!!

Wow, looking back through this post, I think I have more than used up my quota of exclamation marks today. Too much excitement. I must sign off and relax a bit before heading out to buy quilt batting, zips and eyes.

Have a good day! (oops, another one snuck in there...)

Another one bites the dust

2011-03-30T18:14:00.000-07:00

I finished my Jaden sweater!!! It looks really pretty :-) I don't though, especially in this photo, which is why I cut off the head, and the photo is slightly elongated:

On the plus side, it makes me look taller :-) Oh, and this photo of the back - because you have to see the back, and my ass looks really good ;-P

Whaddaya think? I love it! (The sweater, not my ass). Already wore it out on a mini excursion to the library and back, but sadly, had to take it off because it really isn't sweater weather here yet. Still, I look forward to wearing it again soon! In order to finish the sweater, I had to get extra yarn, which I found via Ravelry (See? Best website in the world!!!) A girl in Canada had a skein and a half left, and was willing to part with it. I sent her some yarn and yummy kiwi goodies, and she sent me the Knit Picks yarn and this:

T has adopted the squishy red maple leaf, and keeps pressing it so it will play the Canadian national anthem, which by the way, is really long. I've devoured about half the maple candy already, with a little help from Deane and Shahn. I'm saving the red lobster lollipop and the chocolate hockey puck for now, and I'm waiting for the right time to try the salt water taffy (read: a bit of a wuss, and scared it'll taste nasty). The boys are working their way through the chocolate coins. I love swaps!

I've been working a bit more on my Christchurch shawl, but haven't got too far - it requires concentration, and is definitely not something I can work on while watching TV so only gets picked up occasionally. Plus its at the point now where it takes a while to do a row because they're quite long. I'm loving how its looking though, and the yarn is gooooooorgeous!!!! Merino, silk and cashmere - mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I finished a Jaywalker, and I'm a little over halfway done on the leg of the other - they'll be fraternal socks because the yarn skeins were quite different, such is the nature of hand painted yarns:

I'm cool with it. If you're ballsy enough to wear ridiculously bright socks, a little difference in pattern isn't going to matter, right? Not sure I mentioned the yarn previously - it's Knitsch in a limited edition colourway, 'Van Gogh'. Kinda reminds me of Perky Nanas though...

Also finished all my squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap:

I received the first lot of squares from overseas, along with more goodies:

The Reece's Pieces I'm happily fobbing off onto other people (like the Wednesday knitting group at The Little Craft Store) - I'm not really a fan of peanut butter. But the other two are teeth-pulling, jaw-breaking, cavity-inducing delights, that I'm more than happy to munch my way through. Although I will reluctantly share these too ;-) There's about 11 more people left to send their squares in, so I'm starting to wonder just how much junk food I'm going to end up with - perhaps I should try spreading it out a bit, so they last the better part of a year, instead of scoffing it all within a month. I've managed to avoid the dentist quite well so far, don't want to put that in jeopardy...

SM5 is going well - our team finished Round Two a few days ago, and now get to patiently wait for all the other teams to finish so we can move on to Round Three. I'm excited to see what pair of socks will be next - this competition is so much fun!! It may possibly result in an excess of hand knit socks though, perhaps I should find worthy recipients. Of course, they'd all have to have feet that are the same size as mine. My feet are the 'minimum size requirement' for the competition, and there's no way I'm going to knit socks bigger than I have to, especially when the people I'm competing against can knit faster than me!! It's all about speed - that's not to say that quality gets neglected of course. They're still awesomely well made, decent socks (if I do say so myself ;-P). My gift knitting pile is ever increasing - I just have to match gifts made to people in need of one. Now that's the challenging part...

I made it!!!

2011-03-25T02:22:00.000-07:00

I'm officially through to Round Three of SM5! I think I finished somewhere around 7th, but I'm not too sure about that. Definitely in the top ten though. Most of the top ten finishers were from my team (because they lumped all the fast knitters together) so that doesn't bode well for the later stages of the competition, but boy howdy, it sure makes things exciting!!

Here are my socks:

The pattern is Nornir (Ravelry link) by Caoua Coffee. It is incredibly well written and easy to follow. The results are stunning, but it is a slow knit. Yes, I knit them in three days, but the progress of the sock as you are knitting it is very slow. It basically takes two rows to grow the length of one, due to the stitch pattern (every second row you knit a stitch below on every fourth stitch - am I making sense? It's getting late...) And when you finally get to the foot and think 'yay, this will go heaps faster now!', it kinda doesn't, because the stitch pattern on the top of the foot is still the same, and the bottom of the foot is knit like this:

Every second stitch on every second row is slipped, thereby slowing the growth of the socks row by row, so it doesn't overtake the length of the top of the foot. I'm probably talking complete gibberish now... I apologise.

The yarn is the latest instalment of the Flights of Fancy Yarn Club from Knitsch - the colourway is Hansel. Ooooh, pretty! Wish I had more :-( He's all gone now.

I've been resting my hands today - the only thing I knit was half a blanket square, so I could finish all the squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap:

All done now, with plenty of time to spare - yay!

I had plans to sew up my Jaden sweater, but it just hasn't happened today for various reasons:

a) I ran out of time
b) My hands are still a little sore, recovering from the monster effort of knitting a simple yet challenging pair of socks in record time (for me anyway)
c) ... oh wait, there's only two reasons...

I hope my hands are feeling better tomorrow - I'm already staring longingly at the pile of yarn sitting in the giant fruit bowl in my lounge, dreaming of all the lovely things I want to make with it ::sigh::

Of course, I already have my Crazy Jays (Rav link):

And my Christchurch shawl (yes, another Rav link. Have you signed up yet? Hmmmmmm??):

Sitting on the needles, ready to go. Perhaps a little spinning tomorrow instead - gotta rest those hands, ready for Round Three!!

No time for fancy shmancy updates

2011-03-21T12:02:00.001-07:00

The pattern was released for round two of SM5. Must fob the kids off to school, and knit! Knit like the wind!!!

It was fun while it lasted...

2011-03-19T21:43:00.000-07:00

I have a feeling I won't be advancing very far in SM5 - I've been put in the 'Needles of Fire' team with the Norwegians and the Swedish. I'll get knocked out in the next round, for sure. Oh well. At least I'll get a bunch of cool sock patterns ;-)

Just as I predicted, I suffered a bout of 'startitis', and have cast on my Christchurch shawl, and a pair of Jaywalkers (please note, these are both Ravelry links. If you don't have a Ravelry account by now, for God's sake go and get one! Hurry up!!)

The Christchurch shawl pattern and (absolutely gorgeous) MadelineTosh Pashmina yarn was bought as part of a fundraiser for the Christchurch earthquake relief, run my the lovely Miss Polly of Little Country Wools, and the pattern designer Bristol Ivy. I've only knit 52 rows so far, but I'm loving it. I'll post progress pics when I've actually knit enough to warrant them.

The Jaywalkers were the perfect little project to take on a trip to Te Awamutu for a family gathering today, and great for knitting while watching a little Buffy last night (and probably again tonight).

I only have half a square left to knit for the Ron Weasley blanket swap, but I couldn't be bothered digging out enough scraps to finish it last night, so it'll probably stay that way for several days, until I get sick of looking at it unfinished.

All these projects will of course be put on hold the moment the Round Two pattern for SM5 is released. The pattern specs have been put up already - they were there this morning when I woke up. The pattern itself should be released in the next couple of days now that all the teams have been announced (why I couldn't have been put in 'Team Minnow' or 'Team Socks of Secret' I don't know) - it's going to take a fair bit of effort to keep up with these Norwegians!! I think I've decided on the yarn and needles already, so I think I'm as prepared as I'll ever be...

I do so enjoy finishing things

2011-03-17T19:56:00.000-07:00

Don't you? It's been a fairly productive year so far, and I'm rather enjoying that feeling. I hope it continues for some time. I have plenty of projects to be getting on with!!

But for now, to be added to the finished list:

This 'Fear of Commitment' cowl - knit with my green Valentine's Day bouquet yarn. The button can easily be moved to different positions, so the cowl can be worn different ways (see pattern website).

This crazy funky Capucine hat, which will be awesome for winter!

fyi - I have pictures of me wearing both the cowl and the hat (although not together) but I'm not putting them on here, because I look awful and don't want to scare you away ;-)

(And the almost finished list...)
I also knit half a dozen squares for the Ron Weasley blanket swap - only two more to go!!

And I finally got around to blocking my Jaden sweater. I've still got a week left to sew it together and finish the neckline (and possibly the ties). I've had an update on the extra yarn coming from Canada - apparently it got sent back to the sender, because the box was damaged. It has been re-shipped express, and hopefully should arrive soon - fingers crossed!!

I dragged out my poor neglected sewing machine the earlier this week, and whipped up 35 blocks for a cot-sized quilt top:

Just the sashing and border to go, and the top will be done. Hopefully next week...

Got some cool mail this week too - the second shipment of the Knitsch yarn club arrived in the mail on Wednesday, and I looooooooove it:

His name is Hansel, and I shall love him, and squish him, and pet him, and stare at him all day. Isn't he preeeeeetty?!?!?

Going by how much Knitsch yarn I have in my stash, it would definitely have to be one of my favourite local yarns, and even better, Tash has opened a shop in Wellington!! The Holland Road Yarn Company. Oh, how I wish we still lived in Wellington... Maybe I could just move into Tash's shop and sleep on the couch there - I know she has one. Do you think she'd mind? Yeah, you're right, she probably would :-( That, and I think the children would start to notice a lack of nutritious meals. Well, at least X would... At best, all I can do is try and find an excuse to organise a trip to Wellington so I can go and visit the shop. And even better, she's stocking a bunch of New Zealand dyers' yarns and fibres, including Maude & Me. Oh dear, I think I may faint...

Speaking of Maude & Me - I got this lovely squishy fibre, for absolutely no reason, completely by surprise in the mail the other week:

It's gradient dyed, from white through purple and into blue. I know exactly what I'm going to (attempt to) do with it - spin two bobbins, and chain ply them, so I have two skeins of gradient dyed yarn to knit a pair of socks with. The question though is - white toes, blue cuff? Or blue toes, white cuff? Decisions, decisions!

Miss Tracee has organised another one of her spin-alongs, which runs until May. So hopefully I'll be able to get it done before then. Maybe one skein, if not both. Ooh, I love -alongs! Read-alongs, knit-alongs, spin-alongs... any -along will do ;-)

Round One of SM5 is drawing to a close - I believe it finishes some time tomorrow. Hopefully Round Two will start fairly soon afterward - I'm itching to knit some socks! Otherwise, I may be forced to cast on a cardigan, or a shawl...

Have a good weekend everyone!!

The Noise of Boys

2011-03-11T18:41:00.000-08:00

It is echoing throughout the tiny apartment as I type this update - X has a friend over for the night. They're very boisterous, so I will soon be shoving headphones in my ears and watching a DVD on the laptop, leaving them to play XBox and exclaim loudly to their hearts' content. T has headed off for a sleepover of a different kind, with his Nanny and Poppy in Napier. Deane has a few things to do down there, so decided to take T for a wee trip just because. That suits me just fine, as it gives me time to finish watching season one of The Vampire Diaries. Deane refused to watch it, so I can happily drool over the hotties without receiving filthy sideways looks ;-)

While I watch, I'm knitting a very simple cowl with the green Valentine's Day bouquet yarn Deane got me. Certainly not my first choice of yarn (acrylic and tencel) and not my favourite colour, but I think it'll look pretty good once finished, with a lovely wooden button to hold it together. I must admit, when I got the yarn, I was at a bit of a loss as to what I could do with it. But thanks to the magic of Ravelry, a projects search under the yarn type brought up all sorts of ideas (things people have made with the yarn previously) - and this cowl was made by somebody using the same yarn in a charcoal colour. I thought it looked pretty good, and decided to copy. I'm knitting it doubled, on 6.5mm needles. It's probably going to end up a little shorter than the 33" stated in the pattern, but not by much, and I think it'll still work well. The perfect way to use up all four skeins! I'm well over halfway now, so should have it finished pretty quickly. I'll take a wee trip over to Wild & Woolly Yarns and Cushla's Village Fabrics in Devonport to look for the perfect button next week, and post finished pics. (I would've added a link for W&W, but they don't appear to have a website. Seriously? In this day and age?!? Really...)

Speaking of finished pics, here's one now:

Munch Munch - aka Day of the Dead Arm Warmers (Ravelry link)

I didn't realise until I'd nearly finished the first mitt that the black yarn I was knitting with was actually a DK weight, not fingering weight. Duh! How'd I miss that?!? Still, they came out perfectly alright, and pretty cosy. In fact, had I knit them in fingering weight, they'd probably be a little too tight. I posted them to my sister yesterday morning, so hopefully she should have them by Monday - only a little over a week late...

Next on the knitting 'to do' list is the hat I was planning on making with my juicy handspun (from last week). Another small project I can get out of the way relatively quickly (hooray for instant gratification!) that I can also hand in for a class assignment for HPKCHC. I think I've pretty much sorted projects for six classes...

There's only a week left of the first round of Sock Madness, after which everyone with a completed pair of socks will be sorted into teams. Then the real competition begins!! I'm trying to find small projects to cram into the space, as I don't want to cast on anything too big. At least not until I've finished my Jaden sweater - which I still have to block and sew together. I'm waiting on the extra yarn to arrive from Canada still (hopefully it'll be here soon) to finish off the neck, and maybe do the ties as well. Other than the socks for SM5, next on the knitting list is either my handspun cardigan (which I still haven't decided on a pattern for), or a cardigan with the navy blue laceweight yarn I got super cheap from Skeinz. A scarf and some fingerless gloves for Deane need to be done before winter, but there's still plenty of time for that, right? I've been daydreaming about some long fingerless mitts for me, I think maybe black and white striped... Oh, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to need a black hat...

Oops, wait, I still have eight squares to knit for the Ron Weasley blanket swap! And a quilt to sew!! Better get cracking ;-)

You may proceed

2011-03-07T20:48:00.000-08:00

I made it into the top 25 finishers for Round One of SM5!! W00t! Having said that, Round One isn't a real indication of what the competition is like, because people have a full two weeks to complete their socks, so it's not a major rush. However, it's still fun. The pattern was fairly well written, and the socks themselves are quite nice. I am rather glad we got the rib socks done and out of the way already though, I'm ridiculously slow at knitting rib, and I'm sure it would've hindered me in later rounds.

Anyway, pair of completed socks:

They fit perfectly - unlike many other SM5 participants. Some are just knitting as fast as possible, and pay no attention to the fit of the socks - they just want to get them done and move on. Seems a bit silly to me - why knit a pair of socks that isn't going to fit either yourself or the person you intend to give them to? But, to each their own... I'm guessing gauge is not really a factor in this competition, as long as you have a finished pair.

Anyway, now I have the better part of two weeks to work on other projects (like my sister's fingerless mitts) and I can relax a bit before the panic of Round Two sets in ;-)

The race continues

2011-03-05T19:32:00.000-08:00

Well, its been a day and a half since the pattern was released, and so far there are three people on the list that have completed a pair of socks. And this is the slow round!! This round of SM5 goes for up to two weeks, so people generally aren't in too much of a rush - 160 knitters will make it through to the next round to be split into teams. Earlier this afternoon I cast off sock #1:

Yes, the photo is a bit crappy, but it was overcast earlier and our apartment is all gloomy at the best of times, so it'll just have to do. I'll get a better FO picture when I've finished the pair. There'll be no rush at all - I'm well on the way to being in the top 50 finishers at this stage. Then I'll have some time to chill out and work on other projects before the next round starts. It'll be all on then - that's when the true madness begins!!

My latest skein of yarn finished drying yesterday - 124g/154 metres bulky two ply 100% perendale:

The colour is 'juicy' from maude & me.

Should be plenty to knit this hat with. I'll add it to the 'to do' list :-)

Earlier in the week I cast on (a little late unfortunately) a pair of mitts (Ravelry link) for my younger sister for her birthday (which is today. Oops). I'm pretty sure she's going to like them. Progress pic:

Lookee!! Little mini skulls!! The pattern calls them 'Day of the Dead Arm Warmers'. I'm calling them Munch Munch (^_^) Zombie skulls anyone? Mwaaahahahahahaaaa!!!

Hope y'all had a good weekend, see you next week :-)

Game On!!!

2011-03-04T11:55:00.000-08:00

I woke up this morning at about 7am. Of course, the first thing I did after getting T a milo was log on to the computer and into Ravelry. Ta da!! Pattern!! (Ravelry link)

Not surprisingly, the teaser pictures did exactly what they were designed to do, and tricked people into thinking they knew what sock was coming up first. Of course, the first sock isn't anything like what everyone thought it was, it's something entirely different. So the colours I had out and ready (and harrassed Polly all week to get in my hot little hands so I had it before the pattern release) aren't quite right. I feel a little less guilty about annoying Polly because the yarn I thought I needed, I do actually need. But I still need a different colour that I don't have, so now I have to wait patiently for the yarn store to open so I can go and get it and start knitting.

Naturally, I will be knitting these socks in black and white - good ol' kiwi colours ;-) I'll save the Knitsch Grape (Ravelry link) I had out for the other colourwork sock once it's released (if I make it that far), and I'll just have to get another skein of Shibui Natural White off Polly at a later date. Phew!! Roll on 10am, I'm itching to get knitting!!

The Madness is setting in

2011-03-02T11:28:00.000-08:00

The Round One pattern specs have been released - the first sock is a two colour pattern. I've chosen my yarn, I'm pretty sure of the needle size (although I may obsess a little more and actually knit a swatch today). Now the game starts - waiting for the pattern release!! Checking over and over and over again to see if the post is up on the board - the all-important link to the pattern. Of course, after the first round, all patterns are sent via email, so I think then I'll be setting up my phone to receive all new emails so I know instantly when it arrives, but for now its just the obsessive checking of the SM5 board.

Over the last few days I knit a total of 12 blanket squares for Christchurch, and handed them over at knitting yesterday morning. I forgot to take a picture of them, but don't worry - they weren't all that exciting anyway.

I finished my handspun - 132g/474m two ply lace/light fingering weight yarn in 'waking up the wolves' by maude & me.

Ahhh, just look at that beautiful, squidgy 100% merino goodness :-) Yummy! Of course, I have no idea what I'm going to make with it, but for now I'm just happy to leave it sitting with my other yarn, looking all gorgeous and smooshy.

I've started spinning another braid of m&m fibre - 'juicy' on 100% perendale. I'm spinning it bulky, with the hopes of getting enough yardage to make this hat. Pics to come later - I'm already halfway done with spinning the single. Bulky is soooooo much faster to spin than laceweight!!

New classes are up for the House Cup, and I keep thinking of ways to fit socks into the classes. I've already figured out how to fit the first sock into Defence Against the Dark Arts - but then, I have to wait for the pattern release to be sure it'll work. Still, I could always make it fit somewhere else...

My brain is otherwise occupied with the unofficial theme song for Sock Madness (I tried to embed it in this post, but couldn't get it to work). Every time I hear it, I start bouncing around in my seat, clapping my hands and grinning like the village idiot. Its just so funny!! The lyrics make absolutely no sense. Perfect for when you're going crazy over knitting socks ;-) Maybe thats the point - a little mindless entertainment to give your brain a rest. Either way, I find it funny, and I'm sure the boys will love it when I play it for them later.

We have goal setting interviews at school today, so they're home for the day. We'll head in to school this afternoon for their 10 minute time slots with their teachers. Meanwhile, we get to blob, and this gives me more time to keep checking the SM5 board for the pattern release...

Just another day in the life of a mother

2011-02-27T14:22:00.001-08:00

Monday morning dawns, and with it, a sick child. Poor wee T is right at this moment fast asleep on the couch, having spent a good part of the morning with his head in a bucket. He did request muffins before he conked out though, so they're waiting patiently on the bench, cooling, ready for when he wakes up hungry. Well, one can hope. I'd far prefer that to him waking up because he needs to vomit again...

The weekend was rather uneventful, but I did manage to finish the second sleeve of my Jaden sweater. I have, however, run out of yarn :-( I contacted a lovely young lady in Canada who happens to have 1.5 skeins in her stash, and is willing to do a trade with me. I'm going to send her some lovely NZ yarn and goodies, and in exchange she will send me the yarn I need to finish my sweater, and some Canadian yummies just because. Win/win!!

I also finished spinning my fibre and plying it, but no pictures as yet because I am waiting for it to dry. I'll put them up next post. I was rather impressed with myself, as I managed to get a laceweight/light fingering weight two ply - a whole 474 metres of it!! Now to decide what to make...

I have a few days to fill in while waiting for SM5 to start, so I've started knitting squares for the Christchurch Earthquake appeal - Helen from The Little Craft Store is making blankets and soft toys to send to the earthquake victims. So far I've managed four, and should have plenty more by the time the first sock pattern is released.

Oh, and just thought I'd mention that this is my 100th post. Yay!! Now I'm going to go have some lunch...