Oh yes, I did it!

Not dead yet!

Phew, just in time to have a single post in June.

No I've not been knitting, alhtough I have spent many a happy minute thinking about knitting and even longer trawling through ravelry about things I might never knit and people I'm glad I don't knit with...

However I'm not willing to give up this ghost yet so while there's now a June post we can cross our fingers together and hope for a better show in July.

Kxx

We're going to see the Yarn Harlot!

Karen and I (and Seth, obviously) are going to see the Yarn Harlot at iknit 6th September! How cool is that!???

I think this site may be dying, owing entirely to Ravelry.

No knitting

It's just 11 pm on Sunday and I'm having a nightmare with Hali-f'ing-crapsters-fax Bank and needed to get that off my chest. What a bunch of crap. They suck big time. I wish I had more clout as a consumer and this is my only mode of publicising my views - even if it is just to you, Ella.

Halifax Bank is pissing me off. AND I have enough money in there. I'd love to take it all out and put it under my bed for the use they've been.

Ta-Dah!

I've only gone and done it!So there are a few errors - an extra row on the front, armholes that don't match up because I didn't take into account the extra cables on the back, a few holey bits where I picked up stitches on the armholes, but on the whole, I like it!
Now I just need Seth to fit into it perfectly when we go to watch Andrew playing cricket this summer.
Did I mention that the colours are Andrew's team's colours?

Cricket

The cricket pullover is nearing completion - my first knitting project in three months! Look out for photos soon ...

Spring Lobster

From this site.

Knitting? What's knitting?

I've just knitted three rows of Seth's cricket pullover, the first knitting I have done for nearly a month.

Whoops!

Hmmm, I just sewed up the Mini Donkey of Glory and realised it looked a bit odd. Yeah, they do when you give them only TWO legs. What a plonker.

Luckily I have two very good reasons not to care.

1. I passed the January progress test. (Phew!)
2. And the second is a secret. (STC)

I hate sewing but I hate un-sewing more. In fact, it's enough to drive a girl to blog.

Stripy socks!

They're a bit big, but that might change when I wash them. Very satisfying to finish them and I am wearing them now!

Ooh get me!

SO I have found a pattern for a baby v-necked tank top that can be adjusted to make it cable. At the moment it has a pattern repeat that uses K and P to make something that looks vaguely interesting from a distance. Using a reader's digest stitches directory, I have worked out a cable pattern. BUT you have to allow for a different width as cable narrows a piece of knitting. A sensible knitter would say 'knit a tension square to check for adjustments'. But not me, oh no. Instead, I have decided that where the original pattern has gaps of 6 stitches with the patterny bit taking 4 stitches with selvedges of 4 stitches over 62 stitches, I am going to replace the patterny 4 stitches with a cable pattern that takes 7 stitches, all over 80 sts. And that should take care of the width.

(So instead of 4,4,6,4,6,4,6,4,6,4,6,4,4, I am going to do 4,7,6,7,6,7,6,7,6,7,6,7,4, with the bold numbers representing the interesting bits)

Fingers crossed. And if it doesn't work, I'll block it aggressively. Or make it for a size up or something.

The second stripy sock is almost finished.

New Year's Resolutions

So, I may not be a fan of these but I'm enjoying having some SMART goals for the year. I've even made sure that I've been cycling, swimming and running since writing my post. I'm also pleased to announce that I've cast on my first sweater! OK, it's a vest (sleeves scare me. As does the inevitable amount of wool commitment they ensue) but it's adult sized. Since there's aphoto I posted below I'm keeping up with that too.

I invented a few more:
n + 1) Smile more.
n + 2) Spend no money on yarn this year. I nearly wrote wool and quickly predicted hwo to subvert it. No this will be the Year of the Stash.
n + 3) Don't depend on multiples of three... Ach, so I forgot what it was.

Mini Donkey of Glory without seams

It's not going anywhere very fast

So, still no photos huh? Terrible. Loving the modelling action going on below (and obviously what he is modelling).

I have just completed my first draft of my Portfolio Analysis which I am getting proof read tomorrow so could do some revision or could not. I'm not. I could do some knitting and I am very tempted. However I would then have to decide to continue with the slightly squiffy but already frogged once Mini Donkey of Glory OR cast on the vest sweater thing which I have lined up. Decisions, decisions.

Alternatively I could write my other ooh, four reports which I need to put in my portfolio. (Only one is original, the other three I've written but lost when I lost my unbackedup memory key.)

It's a dilemma.

Finished the socks!

As modelled by Andrew:
Showing off the heel (and can you see how a neater tension on the second sock gave a more regular pattern? Interesting!):
Also, I washed all my baby woollens in preparation for the Big Arrival. Our house is so cold that they are still not dry, but I can't put them directly on a radiator because they are meant to be dried flat so they don't stretch.