Tangelled angel knits

New site and goodbye to the old

2007-03-23T17:28:00.000Z

I've finally moved properly!

You can catch me over here: http://tangelledangel.com

Please make sure that you update your bloglines and your links to me, I'd be ever so grateful (cheesy grin :-D)

Hope to see you there!

Treat a Fellow Knitter

2007-03-07T10:59:00.001Z

So, how are you feeling after the last swap you signed up for?

Ready to do it again?

Our plotting and scheming has led to the Knitters Treat Exchange

Its a one off exchange, where you treat your pal with lovely treaty type things.
This includes some mandatory treats and then some ideas for other loverly things.

Such as:

Treats you MUST send:
1. Enough yarn for a one skein/small project
2. Magazine
3. Pampering treat - e.g. Hand cream, bath fizzer etc
4. Delicious treat - e.g. chocolate/candy/tea/coffee
5. Your blog address, so your pal can say hello

Other treats you could include:
1. Your favourite recipe
2. A pattern to go with the yarn (please respect copyright)
3. Candles
4. Knitting notions
5. Anything else you'd like to treat your pal with

I mean, what could be nicer than curling up with a nice cup of rosy lea that your pal sent, while simultaneously sniffing new yarn, leafing through that crafty magazine that you've always wanted to get your hands on, and trying to cast on at the same time, chocolate melting on your lap as you juggle all the above??

All the information you need is on Knitters Treat Exchange and Tea and Cakes and I would love to have you join us!!!

Treat a Fellow Knitter

2007-03-07T10:59:00.000Z

Short and Treat

2007-03-06T12:00:00.000Z

Oh la la, such goings on.

Firstly, I should be moving my blog to another site fairly soon....watch this space.....
and if you fancy popping over and saying hello before I even move the bones of this one, here it is:
www.tangelledangel.com

Secondly, Isobel and I have been doing a bit of Plotting and Scheming, and eating of rock cakes in the midst of it all. Great cakes by the way Isobel!

So, you'll have to watch this space again.....for a little Treat ala Tea and Cakes and Tangelled Angel.
I'm excited, I love surprises...don't you????
Hope you like this one!!!!

Capelet love

2007-02-28T11:00:00.000Z

I stashed up on some lovely Debbie Bliss Maya some time ago, and its been sitting there ever since, wondering what I will be making it into.
So, I found the most perfect pattern for it, wound up 2 skeins, and off I went.

Presenting, my version of the Anthropologie inspired capelet

I didn't make any changes as such, just knit the body a slight bit longer before I went into the rib and cast off.

This was a very very easy knit, for anyone out there who wants to try knitting something larger than a hat its a very good one to start with.

I had planned on wearing this at a function I was at on Friday last but it didn't happen. I did wear it over the weekend however, with a long sleeve top underneath, and a red flower pin to close the top.

It needs proper blocking, I only dry blocked it, as in I didn't wash it first.

I was in a hurry at the time.

I even had some Maya left from the second skein!

A diet perhaps?

2007-02-22T22:20:00.000Z

Remember this?

Well the doggy coat was for Baby, who has perhaps doubled in size since the last time I saw her?!

She wasn't too impressed I think!

My friend loved it.

Her other dog Eskie was also having a private snigger

Tee hee

Secret Socks, not a secret no more

2007-02-20T10:54:00.000Z

This is a tale of two socks.
In a moment of madness some days ago, I decided that it would be a good idea to knit a pair of socks IN SECRET for my boyfriend for Valentines Day. Yeah, very romantic I know.
So as if that wasn't madness enough, I decided to knit them both at once, on one circular needle at the same time, doing the magic loop method, toe up.
I also had to tackle a short row heel which I'd never done before.
I worked out the amount of knitting time I would have, going on the fact that my boyfriend is at my place most of the time, and generally if he's not at mine, I'm at his.
It helped that he had to go to the UK for work on the Friday before Valentines day, it didn't help that I got itchy fingers and decided that I really needed to cast on for this project, in order to wear it to a do this Friday coming.
It didn't help that I had plans that I'd forgotten about for Monday evening, which involved a group of friends playing Balderdash at a friends house (excellent game!!)
It also didn't help that I was counting on having Tuesday evening to myself in order to finish off the socks, and my boyfriend felt he really needed to see me so came over (I'm not complaining that much!)

So where did that leave me?

It left me arriving first at my friends house, and being brave enough to take out my knitting while waiting for the others arrive (mostly non-knitters, with one who does a tiny bit but doesnt have the bug).

It left me knitting in my lunchbreak at work 3 days in a row, including Valentines day

On Valentines Day, I thought I would have an hour, just to finish off that last inch at the cuff. My boyfriend decided that he couldn't do without me, and got an earlier train. I had about 10 minutes to pack up the unfinished socks before he arrived.

The verdict?

He loved them.

"Oh great...... socks!!" was his comment, and not in a sarcastic way!

Phew! *wipes sweat off her brow*

Specs:

I used this great pattern and the great Elizabeth Zimmermans sewn cast off, which I had used previously for Knucks.

Jaegar Matchmaker 4 ply yarn which is 100%merino and 3.25 circular needle.

Now, off to finish my capelet....whilst balancing pancakes and maple syrup....hmm, maybe not such a good idea....

Avoca yumminess

2007-02-18T22:04:00.000Z

How time flies when you are having fun!

Its a few days since Cheryl and I went off galivanting to Avoca, in order to immerse ourselves in fibre goodiness. We lost Holly early on in our plans, and unfortunately lost Isobel that very morning, mere minutes before we were due to leave, so it was up to myself and Cheryl to try and save the woolen day.

It was my first venture into the sale that Avoca holds every year, and I wasn't disappointed!

I gave myself a budget and I'm pleased to say I didn't go over it, even had money left over for some lovely soup and brown bread in their cafe afterwards, although I won't say anything about the awful coffee that followed...

Anyway, here is a sample of what we were met with at the sale-

Do you notice anything funny about the above picture?

Notice a hand sneaking in with some purple yarn in it on the right hand side?

Thats Cheryl's, as she was on the phone to Isobel, trying to describe what was on offer.

An in-action shot!

There was a lot of these types of baskets dotted about, and the prices? To die for!

So, what did I come away with-->

Yes, its a large amount of yarn! I know, I know.

But could you help it if you are faced with delectable yarn, at prices that just can't be ignored?

Oh okay then, here are some individual shots

So what happens when you have a car-trunk full of yarn (as we bought some for Isobel too) and the rest of the afternoon free?

You ring Isobel and tell her to put the kettle on, we're coming round!

See previous post for clarification!!

Oh, and guess what the total weight of the yarn I bought came to (along with the cones of course)

8 kg and 450g approx! Thats a lot of yarn!

Muffins

2007-02-16T09:48:00.000Z

Tea and home-made vegan apricoty/spicy/yummy muffins at Isobel's.
Just like they say on the tin!
Oh, whats peeking out from underneath the plate?
Its a muffin napkin!!
How cool is that!!
(Please note the half eaten muffin before I even noticed that there was a muffin napkin available)
(Oh yeah, there is a bit of knitting in the corner, more about that later)

Happy Valentines Day

2007-02-15T08:59:00.000Z

Belated Happy Valentines to everyone. I was too busy being loved up yesterday to blog.

Sorry, but you understand!

Leaving you here with a photo of some of the flowers being delivered at my work. the lady in reception said I should have come down earlier, there were a lot more there earlier. Meanwhile, she was busy ringing up people saying there was a delivery in reception for them to come and collect...

Dublin Woolen Mills

2007-02-08T12:12:00.000Z

Proof that Dublin Woolen Mills are stocking alternatives to acrylic!
Do you think there's any chance that they'll expand further?
Check out the colours of the kidsilk haze on top!!!! Yummmmy indeed.

Mason Dixon Washcloth

2007-02-08T11:50:00.000Z

I didn't post about this yesterday because its actually a finished object. I finished it last week and have been meaning to post about it.

Unlike Sharon, I haven't blocked it, because I reasoned that it would be used straight away almost.

I would have blocked it if it was going as a present however, honest!

Oh...and guess what?

Its SNOWING outside yyaaaaaaaayyyyyyy

doubt if it will stick though, its been sleeting beforehand and is too wet.... booooooo

WIP Wednesday

2007-02-07T11:48:00.000Z

I'm trying to get things in order in my head lately.

This is a very lengthy process, let me tell you!
One of the things I have done is create a spreadsheet with all the items that I'm planning on doing in the next year, including baby items for friends (which are a bit vague in detail, but at least I have them marked down).
I also keep a note of the items I'm working on in a notebook that I bring around with me all the time, and sometimes other things that I want to make, which don't get to the spreadsheet on the PC.
There are also always things that I want to do in my head that never get written down or done. Not forgotten though, I have a special chamber in my brain for knitting you know!
So, here is a little catalogue of all my current WIPs.
Ahem.
First up is a little something Im working on, which I can't quite talk about at the moment.
All you need to know is that I am also doing 3 new to me methods whilst doing it, and have a very short timeframe in which to get it done.
All I'll mention are these words: toe up, 2 on one, whilst doing magic. Ive done magic before, just not in this manor.
Here's a sneek preview -->

Onto other WIP's, this is a tea cosy for my sister, as requested....oh was it last summer.....and may have been promised for her birthday in August.....oops....

This is using a combination of luxery aran tweed by Tivoli and RYC Cashcotton 4ply, and the combination of both of them is producing a really yummy soft but thick stitch.

Then I am working on a pot holder for myself, its a test one, as I had had it in my head that I wanted to test out some stitches into knitted squares and then put some material on the back of them and use them as pot holders, then I discovered that Magknits in December had the very things I was thinking of! (unfortunately magknits archive is down for maintenance, but you can check back there later for the pattern)
So I'm using the honeycomb stitch from that, and its very nice indeed. The only thing is, I should have gone up a needle size as its a very tight fit with the cable and its leaving my fingers sore, so I can only do a few rows at a time.
Next time I'll go up a needle size, we learn from our mistakes dont we?

Depending on how my sewing turns out (yikes) I'm planning on making a few more of these.
Then there are the alpaca wristwarmers that I spoke about previously. These have been languishing somewhat due to the completion of my fetchings, as I'm wearing them constantly. Sorry about the poor lit photo, I grabbed it this morning to take pictures and didn't have the time to search for some light!

I have been asked by a friend of mine to make a dog coat for her small little dog that she thought was a Jack Russell but isn't. I thought she would forget about it....but she didn't...and has asked me a couple of times not to forget that I'm going to make her a coat.

So I've given in.

I am using recycled yarn for the majority of this, apart from the orangy neck part, and I plan to use the orange to highlight the legs also, when I do them. My friend asked for bright colours.

I'm using the pattern from the stitch and bitch nation book, but to tell you the truth, its not very good so Im winging it. It doesn't really explain things so you are left wondering what you should be doing with this bit and that bit. So its a makey upy pattern based on the one in the book really.

The good thing is that this can be thrown into the machine when it gets dirty, as it will inevitably do, with it being worn by a dog and all.

And last but not least is my Bridie cardigan.

This is my large project. I'm working on this mainly when I'm at Micheals and am progressing slowly with it.

I love the yarn and loving the way its turning out (so far....) and it knits really nicely on the bamboo needles.

Here's a close up of the stitch pattern

I am actually working on a lace scarf pattern using cotton, but at the moment it just looks like a jumble of stitches and wouldn't look like anything, which is why I haven't shown you!

So there you go. What are you knitting?

The adventure in Kittyland

2007-02-05T21:41:00.000Z

You know how cats love cardboard boxes, in fact boxes of any shape and size?
Well Reggie especially likes boxes.
This is his adventures in his new box.....until Ronnie decided to come along and sit on his head....

Has he gone yet?
Is it safe to come out yet?

Okay, thats enough of that box....now...onto the next one.

Oh and I found this link on Krafty1's blog, thought it would be a useful excercise, if only to try and keep it all in order in ma little head!

Secret Pals

2007-02-02T16:17:00.000Z

This is what I was greeted with first thing this morning. a really impressive sunrise.

In Ireland we say red sky at night, shepherds delight, red sky in the morning, shepherds warning. Fortunately, it was a good day today weather wise,and there is the start now of a red sky at night.

So, thats what I was greeted with first thing this morning, and when I got home, this is what I was greeted with:

Ya hoo, a parcel for me, delivered to next door 'cos I wasn't there yesterday.(Thanks next door neighbours!)
Look at the size of the box!

I've been really spoiled this time. There are numerous edible items, all of which have been sampled by the time I started typing this, there is a pack of glow in the dark sheep (just what every knitter secretly wants!)

a back scratcher/massager which is really cool, and not one, not two, but THREE balls of yarn!There was a little post it note on a few items, which was really sweet,

the Austermann Aloe Vera sock yarn was something that I almost bought when at the knitting and stitching show in Birmingham, and subsequently have almost done it a couple of times since online, the other 2 balls of yarn are from Bendingo Woolen Mills in Australia, the harmony ocean blue one is a wool/cotton with lycra blend, and the burnt orange one is 100% wool.

Both of these are 200g each and I can only imagine what I could make with them!

I'm thinking a lacy wrap with the burnt orange one at the moment....I can't help but likening the two of them in my hands to the items that fill bra's....though they are way bigger than my ones!

Along with the goodies that were already filling the package, there was this lovely card and note, with a crocheted butterfly. Did you make this Karyn? Its really nice!

So....who is this amazing person who has really really spoiled me?

Its Karyn from Hooked on Yarn and she hails from Singapore! Go over and say hello!

Oh, and do you want the container containing the (very yummy) lemon bicsuits back?

The person that I was spoiling is Kelly from Adventures of a Purly Girl. Its her birthday on the 11th, go and wish her a happy birthday!

Many thanks for hosting this Shelby!

Fulled Lopi Tote

2007-02-01T13:45:00.000Z

Finally I can show you my fulled lopi tote from hello yarn pattern.
I had finished this waaaay back in oh, was it October? Decided to keep it hidden to give as a present at Christmas, and then decided to keep for myself.
I hadn't blogged about it because I couldn't find the before felting pictures.
Then I did.
So...Ta Da, here we are.
Before pictures, measuring a lovely 12 1/2 inches at the waist, and reaching 17 inches in height, we have Miss Lopi, from Ireland.

I really like the bottom of this bag, the way the shaping turned out.

Once felted, once through the washing machine cycle (front loader, as are all our washing machines here in Ireland), Miss Lopi now measures 8 inches at her waist and 9 inches in height.

I love the stitch definition that you can still see, even though it has been felted, and it really is a sturdy bag!

The shaping on the bottom of the bag has turned out perfectly, with the bag looking quite "round" at the bottom. No offense, Miss Lopi.

Although its called a Lopi Tote, the only Lopi involved is the lighter stripe of green above the handles, I used lopi Light for this. The rest of the wool was a purchase from ebay that I got months and months ago, I think it was a Wendy label, but can't quite remember!

If I got the chance again to buy some of the wool though, I definately would, its lovely to knit with and as you can see, felts like a dream.

I brought this bag along to a friends house for New Years eve and her sister drooled over it big time. Ive had a few comments about it since then too. Currently, its being used as my lunch bag at work, as there is enough room for sandwiches, a bottle of water and even a book, plus my keys, purse, mobile phone and sometimes chocolate

Lion Travelling Scarf

2007-01-30T09:57:00.000Z

A while back, Lauren from stitch and bitch London contacted me to see if we would join in with their campaign to knit a scarf for the 4 Lions in Trafalgar Square, which will then be auctioned off for charity.
You can see more and read more about that here.
So, I brought it to our group, and we decided to tackle it differently, we suggested a travelling scarf would be the best, instead of us all knitting squares and sewing them together.
So with a bit of too-ing and fro-ing, we decided on the best route for the scarf, so that all the groups in Dublin and hopefully surrounding area's could have a knit on the scarf. Lauren wanted photos also, so a few were taken and sent to her, she will be putting them up on the website soon.
In the meantime, here are the photos of the scarf!

Close ups of some of the stitches that were used:

The scarf packed, and ready to go to its destination.

And there we are on the map!

Its not too late to send your piece in to them, they won't be wrapping the scarves round the Lions til 20th or so of February I think....get their details from the site here

Of course its for a good cause, as if you need to even ask!

Its for Cancer Research , which is a great cause, doncha think?

Lets design a camera case

2007-01-30T09:46:00.000Z

So my Mum asked me to knit a holder for their new camera, to protect it from scrapes and such like.
I started with some Lambs Pride and felted it, but decided that it would be better on my mini disc:
Oh okay, the folks preferred the other cover I knit instead. And who wouldn't?
Its knit using the remnants of the artyarns yarn that I used for
Le Slouch....... and I still have some left over!

I actually started out trying to knit up a toy from it, but it didnt want to be a toy, it wanted to be a cover for my folks camera.

They like it, phew!

Talking of toys, I have just updated my shop
Check it out and let me know what you think!

Here's a sneak preview

Coincidently.....

2007-01-23T19:02:00.000Z

Remember these?
I bought the pattern for them along with the wool at the knitting and stitching show in Birmingham last September.
I got them from UK Alpaca, and thought that the pattern was their own one, loved them!
I knit them up and again loved the end result.
I ended up giving them to my friend Jenny, who admired them. She had just had baby No.2 and I had gone visiting. Jenny thought they were lovely and would be great to wear when driving, in the cold mornings (they were!).
Is it because these items get praised that I end up giving them away to the person prasing them?
It was the same with my first pair of fetchings that I made, Isabelle tried them on, and then declared that they would be great to wear when she goes running, which she does daily, in the cold air of Switzerland.
I gave both of these wristwarmers away gladly, as I know that they will be worn and loved.

So, I still had over 50g of the alpaca yarn that I bought in Birmingham left, and decided to make myself another pair of the wristwarmers.
Could I find the pattern?
No.
Not to be seen anywhere.
I thought I had the pattern living with the yarn, but it was nowhere to be seen.
So I decided to put it aside and wait until I came across it. I rarely lose anything.

So a couple of days later, I got one of my regular emails from Lion Brand, with their stitch pattern of the month, and decided to go into their site to find a nice stitch pattern to make a dishcloth from (forgetting that I have a fantastic book of stitch patterns that I was reminded about when I saw Isobel's treasure trove last Saturday at SnB)
What did I come across?
The same Stitch Pattern that was used in my wristlets.

I wondered then did my UK Alpaca suppliers take the same stitch pattern to make their wristlets, or did they make it up?

Imagine my surprise then when I got my Simply Knitting magazine through the door (which I subscribed to last year and not going to subscribe to again as I don't usually knit from it).

I sat down with a cup of tea to have a flick through it...........and .......what?

Where did they come from?! There were my wristlets, staring up at me.

For this issue, the designer was apparently set a challenge to make a pair of practical fingerless gloves with 100g of UK Alpaca and this is what she came up with....is this a coincidence or is it a copy cat case....hmmm....wish I could find my pattern to compare notes!

Oh, and I know that she would be able to make not one but 2 pairs of fingerless gloves from that ball of alpaca!

Fetch

2007-01-22T21:45:00.000Z

Okay, this is the 4th pair of wristlets that I've made in the last year and hear this folks, these are MINE

all mine.

Fetching from Knitty, using Debbie Bliss cashmerino DK, size 4 circular needles using magic loop method, I knit one extra row of cableing on the wrist and did an i-cord bind off, thanks to Cheryl's great tutoring at the SnB on Saturday, cos I forgot how to do it oops! Thanks Cheryl!

Love the pattern, but wearing them for the first time this morning into work, I thought that I should probably have done one full cable round at the top before binding off, the pattern asks you to do a cable round, then knit 45 rows then bind off.

I think I should have done 2 cable rounds, knit a couple of rows before binding off, this would have brought the top of the wristlet in a little tighter.

Ah well, maybe next time.....

Drop spindle

2007-01-20T14:38:00.000Z

Diane spinning with her drop spindle. Cool!

Knitting in the pub on Thursady night

2007-01-20T13:42:00.000Z

Knitting in the pub on Thurs night. Just proving that I can send a photo from my phone...yay!!!

Its a wrap

2007-01-19T19:21:00.000Z

calorimetry- do you ever see a pattern and can't rest until you have knit it and got it out of your head?
This was one of them.
I have been carrying a ball of Rowan Yorkshire Tweed Aran around with me for ages, in my knitting bag (One of my many knitting bags!)just waiting until I got the Christmas knitting out of the way.

I've come to the conclusion that I'm a slow knitter.
Yes, I know that many of my knitting friends think I'm a fast knitter as I get a lot of projects done, Elaina thinks that I have a new project with me every time I meet her at our knitting group,but I'm not a fast knitter.
I knit small items that are fairly easy to finish quickly enough.
In saying that, I estimate that calorimetry took me about 4 hours in total to finish, knit over 2 days.

Thats not fast knitting, is it? Its a very small item.
It is not without its problems, its very wide, probably too wide for me, although I love it.

My head isn't exactly the smallest heads either, so I think if I reknit this I would have to juggle with some maths and decrease my stitches and reduce the amount of rows I knit etc etc.

Idid reduce needle size as was advised by posts I read in Craftster, but I was eager to get it knit so didn't pay toooooo much attention..oops.

In anticipation of a challenge, cast on for Bridie Sunday night.
This is the first cardigan that I will have knit since I was.. oooh, about 19 maybe?
So I'm a little nervous that I can actually do it, really.
I think the last large item I did was a shapeless jumper that I never wore after I finished it.
Oh, I did a cardigan for my Dad also.
Think he never wore it either.
So, Bridie will be a marker for me, a start (I hope) into knitting larger items.
I'm hoping not to bore you with the details as I knit it, not too much anyway, as I will be knitting other things also.
I may however, flash a bit of it if I'm feeling happy with the way its turning out ;-)
Here's hoping.

Hummf

2007-01-17T21:06:00.000Z

I have a post all composed and ready to put up (for the last 2 hours) and blogger is just not co -operating with my pictures. And I really want to show you!
So, we will have to wait until it gets over its hissy fit, and gets back to normal.
Hummf

I have been expanding my blogging reportoire to check out some bloggers that do other crafts.
One of my new favourites (and just happens to be Irish too) is the Irish Craftworker.
You must read her blog, I mean, check out this and then have a look at this, I love this idea

So, in the meantime, thanks to The Skirt who pointed me in the right direction with what I thought was mother of pearl in the last post.
Check this out instead -->New Zealand Paua

Sheep galore

2007-01-16T17:00:00.000Z

An Aussi friend from work was leaving to head over to work in Galway, and the day she left she gave these to me. Yes, they are coasters....with sheep on them! The mother of pearl is on a different animal on each coaster.

(Bad close up, and an attempt at enhancing it with photoshop)

I know, they are from New Zealand, not Australia (aren't some of you quick today!), but she was given them by another friend and didn't want to be weighed down with things, as she is travelling about.....and she didn't have a clue about my yarn/sheep fibrey goodness obsession...so a complete fluke!

I like the sheep in the last photo, looks a bit demented with the white of its eyes showing up like that!

Releasing more sheeps!!

2007-01-15T16:43:00.000Z

Not just one sheep....

But two sheep!

Lovely boiled egg and toast on sunday morning,courtesy of 2 lovely sheeps.

Knucks to you mate!

2007-01-15T16:40:00.000Z

Knucks from Winter Knitty.

Used size 3.5mm circs, magic loop method and Debbie Bliss cashmerino DK.

Cuff knit longer than was stated in the pattern.

I also knit a 3 row 1x1 rib at the start of each fingerless finger

These were my 3rd and 4th attempt at making the fingerless gloves.

The first attempt, I made as a prototype almost, but I found that the stocking stitch was rolling a bit on the fingers, and I didn't make the cuff long enough for my dad.

The second one I made, I had forgotten what needle size I had used for the first one and somehow got it into my head it was a larger needle size, and of course the gadge was way off.

I didn't actually notice this until I got just past the thumb...

So for the third attempt, I knit a swatch, and measured it against the first glove I did, and finally got started on the pair!

These were, ahem... er... supposed to be a Christmas present for my Dad.

I was stern with myself at the weekend and wouldn't let myself cast on for anything else, or work on anything else until I had them finished.

That said, I finished them on Saturday night, then couldn't sew in the ends (which I am Crap at!) until Sunday as the light wasn't very good.

So I cast on for Calorimetry instead :-D

Cast off Sunday and then sewed in the ends of the knucks.

Couldn't wear the calorimetry as didn't have a button to hand, so have to wait and find a suitable one from my button stash today.

Pictures on next post!

Thanks friends!

2007-01-10T11:13:00.000Z

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has dropped by my blog in the last year, left a comment or emailed me in relation to my blog.

I have made some lovely friends through this blog, and hope to continue those friendships and hopefully make some more in the next year.

So thanks from me, Ronnie and Reggie.

One Year today!

2007-01-09T14:04:00.000Z

It is a milestone.

It is a marking of the passage of time.

It was a year ago today that I stumbled into the blog world, taking ever decreasing faltering steps, and finding new ways to express myself, through my knitting, photo's and the web.

During that year I have had 356 comments, and since I started counting my traffic, I have had 7,928 visitors.

I started looking back to see how many items of knitting I had blogged about (there have been several unblogged items), and when I got to 7 Hats, 1 cafetiere cozy, 2 curly wurleys, 2 bags, 2 tea-cozy's, 1 winter muff, 4 scarves, 1 wrist warmers, 1 pair gloves, 2 facecloths, 1 pair socks, 1 pair fuzzy feet, 1 pair bootees, 2 pairs of baby socks, and 1 shackle cuff...... .......I stopped.

I had only reached April 06 at this stage, from January 06.

That's 29 items in 4 months.

Wow.

I must take some time to really go through and see what Ive done in the full year.

This year, I'm going to be a bit more selective in what I knit.

I'm going to knit for ME, that's my goal this year.

There are several patterns in the offing that I'm just dying to cast on for.

Some of them are larger items, like the Bridie cardigan from Anna Bell that I have swatched for and have sitting waiting for me to start with.

I probably should swatch for that again to make sure my tension is still the same.

(The pattern is not available at the moment on her site, but I have heard that it will be added at some stage soon.)

Some of them are smaller items, from books like Mason Dixon Knitting, Knit 2 Together, and many magazines that I have earmarked patterns as to do's.

Of course, there are always the baby knits, which I will be doing this year again....2 more coming up...and there are items also that I've wanted to knit for people that I will be doing, but I will be focusing on challenging myself a bit more.

If you look at the items I've listed above, they are almost all fast knits, almost instant gratification. I need to start something that I know I'm not going to get finished in a week, or less, that I know that I'll be a bit more challenged to commit myself to.

Of course, this will lead to more boring posts...like- look here's the start of a sleeve...a week later- look here's another part of a sleeve, or if I'm getting it- here's a complete sleeve!

I'm sure that I won't fall back on just having one item on the needles at the one time though, I probably will have that quick knit(s) ongoing at the same time.

Can't see one item only on the needles now, can you?!

Oh, can't forget that I've also learned to spin in that year, bought my spinning wheel and have sold some of my homespun on ebay!

Woohoo!

To celebrate, I'm now going to have a cup of rooibus cirtus tea, from Suki Tea and then tonight I'm going to join Holly at her knitting group. See a bit of the world!

Hat for my BIL

2007-01-04T17:35:00.000Z

Again, another request for a hat, from my BIL.

This time done in Sublime Extra fine Merino wool dk.

Despite the bad photos and bad light, its not in fact navy blue, its actually a chocolate brown colour!

The piece of yarn coming out of the top of the hat on the pic on the right is actually to show you how much was left out of a 50g/ 127yards ball.

I was sooo disappointed in this yarn.

Why?

Well, it was a dream to knit with, really soft and spongy and no problems knitting it, very warm when I finished it, no problems with gadge. Loved it.

Then I washed it.

In warm water, not hot, with eucalon.

And it stretched.

Noticably so.

It went from a nice stretchy but tight enough fit, to a loose fit.

On me, I'd have been worried about wearing it in windy weather as I could see it flying off, but my BIL's head is a little bigger than mine so I thought it wouldn't be too much of a problem.

When he tried it on, it didnt look too bad actually, it was much bigger on me, so fingers crossed its what he wanted.

I haven't heard any complaints from him about it...yet...I was disappointed about the stretching, it was a real let-down from an otherwise seemingly perfect yarn.

I have another ball of it but am reluctant to try anything else with it really at the moment!

Hat for me Da

2007-01-04T17:26:00.000Z

This hat was made for my father.

Request came from him, colour also.

Its made in Alpaca and is wonderfully soft yet light and warm.

Fits him like a dream.

I'm also making him some fingerless gloves at the moment, have had a few false starts with them, but currently running as planned.

OOmpa Loompa

2007-01-03T18:42:00.000Z

Another Elf cap!
I knit this for my sister Ruth, not as a revenge thing (honest Ruth, I thought you'd like it!)-because she likes hat as much as I do.
We were all in the pub just before Christmas and when we were leaving I took out my elf hat and put it on (it was cold outside!!) and Ruth started laughing and started singing oompa loompa from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I turned to my other sister and said, little does she know but she'll be an oompa loompa soon too!

I used size 10mm circular needles using the magic loop method, and you can see the difference in both the size of it and the way the colours fall. The picture on the left is a bit brighter as I used a flash, but it shows the colouring better than the others. The last picture is my first hat on top of the second one, to show the differences. the one on top is also washed and the one below isn't so Im wondering if this is the cause of the colour difference as they are from the same batch.

I left the cast off yarn at the top as I wasn't sure if Ruth would like a pom pom on it or not, she hasnt gotten bak to me yet....

The end of the journey for Budd and mate

2007-01-03T18:37:00.000Z

Wooohooooo

Managed to get the socks finally finally done, only about 7 months too late eh?

Problems included running out of yarn and not being able to obtain more without actually having to get it ordered in (and yes, springwools had no problem in ordering me in ONE ball of yarn!), and castonitis.

Em, yeah, castonitis, where I get such a thrill of casting on for new projects that everything else is put aside.

Until I find another project to cast on for.

OOps.

well, its done now, and FITS and has been worn, that very day

Slouching

2007-01-03T18:34:00.000Z

A hurried photo taken of the present I made for myself whilst on a flying visit to Clare.

Its the Le'Slouch pattern from Knit and Tonic.

Can you tell that I used the yarn that my secret pal sent me from Artyarns.?
Its 100% superwash merino wool, 50g=104yards and I probably used about 75g.
Size 6mm and 5.5mm circular needles using magic loop all the way.

No wearing photos, but I love it.

Photographed on a wall beside a very stormy sea in Doonbeg, Co. Clare

Micheal has started calling me the mad hatter....

Nollaig Shona from Baile Atha Cliath

2006-12-24T16:35:00.000Z

Happy Christmas to one and all!
I hope you have a fantastic few days and don't indulge toooo much of the egg nog and mulled wine.
Here are a few Dublin Christmas tree's and decorations.

Be good and have some lovely days with family and friends

Talk to you soon ;-D

Weird or what?

2006-12-19T14:41:00.000Z

I've been tagged along with The Other 4.

Hmm interesting. 6 weird things about me.

This should be good.
How honest should I be??

Well, like Holly and Isobel, I don't really like tagging people or passing on those emails that say you have to pass on to 5 million people or else your feet will fall off. As my friend Christina knows, i never do it, yet bless her heart, she still passes them on to me.
My feet haven't fallen off yet.

In saying that,I think I did do a meme before and tagged a few people.
Sorry.

I've only managed to do this a couple of days after being tagged, and have only had the chance to catch up on some of my bloglines reading also, and noticed that chocolate trudi not only has the same weird thing about her as her number one, but she went and used it as her number one. What the hell, I'll go with it, just in case you guys are too lazy to go and check out what her number one is.

Ahem

1. I can move my eyebrows independantly of each other. Very Spock-like, or 007-like. Used to cause hours of fun. It still helps with entertaining occasionally.

2. When I type, no matter how much I concentrate on it, I always leave the I in lower letters. This means I usually have to go back and correct it before I finish documents/send emails or post to my blog etc.

3. My brother and I were born in Zambia and Zimbabwe, respectively, of Irish parents, and we lived in Zambia until I was 3.

4. My banana bread tastes exactly like the avoca banana bread (which it should because its from the avoca cookbook no.1). I know, because i finally bought some from avoca yesterday.

5. Dyslexia runs in my family, I have a number of cousins who have various degrees of it. I think I have a form of it when it comes to typing because I regularly type words backwards, or all mixed up, but with all the correct letters in it. I usually know I have typed it incorrectly 'cos it doesn't feel right when im typing, but its only when I see it on the screen that I realise. As I have never been taught how to type, I usually only check the screen after every few words.Is this even possible??

6. I love to dance. I have had both salsa and tango lessons and danced salsa for about 3 years. I was never a whizz kid salsa dancer, I danced because I loved it. There were a lot of people where I danced that took it so seriously that you would wonder if they got any fun out of it at all. Not me, I laughed if I tripped over myself and felt like a child then when my dance partner frowned at me for laughing and giggling.

An additional no.7 from my boyfriend: I love to buy teapots. I have a bit of a fetish for them. I use them all, I choose whichever one I'm in the mood for using at that time! I have 5 at the moment, all rotated, (and 3 coffee pts)and would have a whole lot more if I had room for them! Micheal thinks this is very weird when one teapot would do...however, he brought me home a teapot from Holland so he's only fueling my fetish...if thats an appropriate word to use for a teapot from Amsterdam....

There you go, thats it. You are tagged if you're reading this!

Note: While every attempt has been made to correct the "i"'s in this posting, I cannot guarantee that this is 100% completed

Some Christmas Knitting done and dusted

2006-12-15T11:31:00.000Z

2 finished objects, neither recipient reads this, so.....
(excuse the dodgy flaking windowsill, the only way to get a good picture in the light is to bring it into work with me)
This is a hat in alpaca for my Dad, this alpaca is lovely to knit with, especially on the addi turbo's, it just slides through it.

The finished hat. Its nice and stretchy, which is good as my Dads head will (hopefully) fill it.
This aplaca is both warm and light, which I really like.
Here's a close up of the top of it, showing the decreases, a simple knit 2 tog. I'm going to do a ssk on my next hat, similar to the elf hat, as I like the effect of it on the top of a hat.

The next FO is a scarf for Micheal's sister, if you remember I showed you previously.
Its been finished for a few days, just getting round to showing you here.

I love love love these colours. So pretty.

I have to block this still, as its still got that just finished look to it.

Its short enough, as I only had the one skein of Noro Silver Thaw in this colourway, but I think its a nice length, and may be just right for the recipient.

Wanna see another close up?

Course you do!
(This is my favourite colour bit)

A few of my favourite things

2006-12-14T14:58:00.000Z

Okay, here's a bit of a different post from me.

I've been reading a lot of crafty blogs recently, and can't get over the amount of cool decorations that are being made in blog world!I must be totally void of imagination, because a lot of them look so easy and I keep thinking, why didn't I think of something like that!
Here are a few of them, my favourites so far:

Thimble who has a shop with her handmade goods

jezzeblog does some amazing ink cartoons and knits fab small dolls

Tania is the source of lots of inspiration for me. Just look at her latest WIP!
julieree -more inspiration, along with her sister’s book blog booklog where she has a great thing going on for the Christmas season, namely the advent blog tour!
shimandsons has some cool paper globe decorations plus other great ideas

Tiny Happy makes some beautiful childrens cloths. Oh to be able to sew!

Little Birdshas the most amazing amazingly easy (looking) Christmas tree pattern that seems to be springing up all over the blog world. Go make some and show me on your blog!!

So, what are your favourite crafty blogs this time of the year?

Spin In

2006-12-13T15:06:00.000Z

So Holly and I were invited to a spin in at our spinning teacher Juliet's house, where we would meet up with several other spinners, all there for the same purposes. We were supposed to bring along some food items, and I had great plans, which were foiled by my bf getting some urgent calls into work as we stepped foot inside my door after coming down from his place.
It takes 45 mins approx to get from his place to mine, so it meant a quick grab of spinning wheel and some fibre, and a stop in at a local shop for supplies.
Holly brought some great grub though, including a yummy cinnamony oaty apple dessert.

So, Juliet had asked us to have some single ply ready, in order to learn how to navajo ply.
I used some koolaid dyed galway cross, love these colours.
My spinning wheel is doing a great job of posing outside on my bf's balcony eh? vain thing.

Juliet showed us how to navajo ply almost as soon as we sat down and got ourselves comfy.

Mary in the meantime, showed us how to use long draw to spin.

I had tried this with Juliet when learning to spin, but I'm rather lacking in the hand-carder front, and these are needed in order to make the rolages which are used for the long draw, so I havent been able to practice this method since.

These spinning wheels are gorgeous, aren't they? Mary and Peter had been using them until the long draw teaching session.

Juliet had some fabulous silk blend roving that she was preparing to spin. The photos don't do the colours justice.There was a carding and rolage making factory going on here!

While a bit of handspindling was also going on

Holly tries out the navajo plying on my single ply, as there was a difference in thickness betweek both our spinning, mine was finer. I wasn't too sure that I liked the navajo ply to begin with, it was like learning to spin again, bulky and uneven, but I think that I was treadelling way too fast and this impacted on it big time. When I slowed down, I stopped treadelling and then remembered to treadle and went fast again. I got home that night and tried it again, and produced a nicer result and tried it again the next night, just using up ends on the bobbins. I'm a lot more confident with it now and it does give a nice finish.

I'll have to take a photo of the finished product and post it here again. Its like my first attempt at spinning, a bit all over the place. The pointy outy bits in the photo above are mine, not Holly's! She was very good at it.

Meanwhile, we have another photo of my elfy pointy hat, just cos I like it so much!

You can see the shaping at the top in this one, and the amount of yarn left over from the skein.

Before you ask, yes I have worn it, when and where I can, and yes people have stared at me.

Some people can be so rude, tee hee hee

;-00

Imperialism at its best

2006-12-12T09:32:00.001Z

Oh I just had to watch this over and over again!

Stolen from Cheryl's blog, have a look at this, and I dare ya not to like it!!

Baa Baa Imperial Sheep

What to do when you are under pressure to finish Christmas presents

2006-12-11T11:00:00.000Z

What to do when you are under pressure to finish Christmas presents
Cast on and knit myself something.

Pattern: Elven Pointy Hat

From: Handknit-Holidays by Melanie Falick

Yarn: Homespun varigated yarn from Craftspun. remember this post?

You can also get it here:This is Knit

Sticks: Size 6.5 circulars

Method: Totally magic loop

Time: Ahem clears throat about 5 hours
Satisfaction?: Guaranteed!

Leading to lots of references to elves and pointy heads by my dearest boyfriend and leading me to thinking that maybe he should be calling me (at times) --->

Your Elf Name Is...

Grumpy Cartwheels

What's" Your Elf Name?

Shocking post, please look away now if you are of a sensitive nature

2006-12-07T15:39:00.000Z

Can you believe it, I've made a sale!!

Getting there with a colourful scarf

2006-12-07T14:44:00.000Z

The colours in this ball of Noro Silver Thaw are lovely. Really lively and warm.
Unfortunately, it has angora in it, which is going up my nose and into my eyes and down my throat, so luckily its a quick knit for my bf's sister for Christmas.
Here's a close up.
Its an easy pattern of ssk,*yo,K1,to end stitch then increase one st in last st, next row knit across dropping all the yo's.

Excuse this final photo, its a bit blurry, but it kind of shows you the way it knits up.

Got this yarn in London a while back. Local shops in Ireland don't seem to have this colourway, which is unfortunate.

Going Down Under

2006-12-06T13:35:00.000Z

I think that Cheryl got here before me, but what the hell.

Sharon left us on Monday to go down under to New Zealand, stopping first in Hong Kong for a week. Lucky lucky her!

Before she left though, she managed to squeeze some quality time in with the SnB'ers.
I figured that she could do with a little Christmas cheer to get her going, and Cheryl reckoned she needed help with her row counting...

Managed to get a few pics of the WIP's around the table.

This is Brid's WIP, didn't get what she was making though-->

Holly was making a beautiful pair of socks from Hello Yarn, using I think Sundara yarn? Gorgeous.

Eileen was making a cardigan in lovely soft mohair, nice vivid colours.

Cheryl was showing us her recently mastered knitting 2 fetchings on one circular needle, magic loop (I'll probably be needing a coaching session whenever I attempt that!)

And Cheryls daughter Kate was making a fabulous (darling) hat using circular needles, without a whimper of fear. Aged 10. Isn't she great?

Our new friend Chic with stix Diane was making socks, sticking to the tried and tested dpn's (yay for dpn's)

and then showed us what she could do with the scarf on tour

and last but not least, its Sharon again. She's managed to finish all of her WIP's in preparation for leaving, except for this one, and thats doing really well, isn't it? She's bringing this one with her, for airport knitting etc...

Here's the progress she's done so far on it. Just one more to go! The jaywalker pattern looks great in that yarn.

Me? Well I did a bit of work on my Buddy, and have a ball of yarn lined up so i can actually finish it this side of Christmas....yayyyy.

Of course, Sharon had to contribute to the scarf on tour also.

What's the scarf on tour I hear you ask?

Check this out: click on the lion scarf link and then check out the map showing us!

I was contacted by Lauren to ask if we would participate as the Irish contingent, so we are bringing the scarf around to all the knitting groups in or around Dublin and we are all knitting a few rows. Hence the scarf on tour title! Its a-touring around between all the groups. Wonder what length its at now? I should get it back next week sometime hopefully.

Etsy

2006-12-03T19:56:00.000Z

Well. I discovered this fantastic site a while back and have since grown to love it. I've bought a couple of items only recently from it for Christmas presents, and today took the massive leap of creating my own shop!
2 hour it took me to list some items on it but here we go....here's the link and I'll be adding to it as I can...wish me luck!
Ok, blogger is behaving strangely tonight, but here is the actual link which will get you to my shop...-->
http://www.sweensie.etsy.com
Tangelled Angel

The Cat has got the Cream

2006-12-01T10:11:00.000Z

Blocking.

Insert is a cat feeder which has a timer on it.

Haven't figured out how to use it yet...It makes a great blocker though!

Yes, the cats approve.

Although seeing as Reggie had taken over the shop bought cat bed, you would think he would let Ronnie have the kitty pi.....

No, he had to have it. He'd tested it out before it was felted, and reckoned it passed muster.

Ronnie thinks that this gives him great scope for getting more cuddles though, and he's right.

Please note that the photos containing the most cuddling were not included as were not deemed appropriate to this post.

The Kitty Pi turned out well I thought.

In hindsight (and I did actually think about it when I was knitting it) I should have continued knitting a little longer so that the sides were a bit taller. I didn't because it was a bit of a pain to knit the yarn on the smaller needles that I used , as I said in the previous post. I was a bit relieved to be able to cast off. In saying that, this Homespun is great to knit with on larger needles. If you don't believe me, go and check out my post on the electric picnic and check out how many people chose this yarn over the rest.

Also in hindsight, I shouldn't have used the pink so close to the top of the kitty pi, its very visible there. I started off with 3 skeins of Homespun, in autumnal colours, green, dark wine and aubergine, and I planned on just sticking to these. then I managed to get my hands on some "scraps" of the homespun in other colours and went a bit mad. Its not a bad combination, but pink...., for boys?

You can also get this yarn here, if you fancy going to have a look. Craftspun also have a new range with multicolours, I have a couple of skeins but haven't used them yet. Too busy petting them. I was going to make something for one of my sisters with it bt have decided that I'm going to treat myself instead! And next year is all about me. Totally selfish, but I'm going to knit ME some items.

Kitty Pi but no cream...

2006-11-27T18:48:00.000Z

Yes I do have a couple of finished items to show...finally eh?
First up we have the Kitty Pi. Started back in June, on the excitement of getting 2 new kitties, and then left aside for more exciting things as they came up.
The yarn I used is beautiful, if you have any sense you would get yourself some of it, for your own sanity's sake, but I was knitting it on size 6 mm needles and it needs larger, at least 10mm I would say, so I found it a little difficult to knit it in long stretches.
Hard on the fingers.
In saying that, I finished it off over 2 nights, which was probably about half of the total Kitty Pi. Micheal kept asking me when it would be finished so I kind of was under a bit of pressure, but mainly because the cats are too big now to fit into their bed together and Reggie has claimed it for himself, so I felt that Ronnie needed a bed too.
So here is the first of many pictures of the finished article, pre-felting.
I have felted it last night and its in the drying out phase now. More pics to come of that when its ready to rock and roll.
This is a good one to show you the Kitty Pi hot off the needles, ends not weaved in yet.

Then, ta-da.....ends weaved in and an idea of what it will be like when felted.
But whats this? Reggie has discovered the Kitty Pi.
Yep, it fits, so far.

Lets see what it can do if he stretchs out a bit

Yes, this will do me, tell Ronnie he can have that old shop bought cat bed, this is MINE.

Ronnie: Does it look like I care, hmm?

I've got a Mason Dixon washcloth to lean on, so there!

Dublin in the rare ole times

2006-11-25T11:23:00.000Z

Its been a busy week for me.

I've started a new job and I've also been mysteriously struck with Isobel's cold, even though I haven't seen her for a while. Hmm, do you think these things can be passed on over the internet?? So I haven't really be on form for blogging much.

I have been knitting though, but not a lot, haven't really felt like it much lately can you believe. I think a lot of it is due to starting new projects (despite trying to finish WIP's before doing this) and trying to get gadge several times and then giving up and moving onto something else. Not giving up exactly, just not having the patience to do it there and then.
There are also certain projects that my cats have a field day with, for example if I knit with straights they go mad for the end of the knitting needle, take it as a personal attack.

Looking all innocent cuddled up together

Its easier to knit with dpn's or circulars as a result, although I do confess to preferring knitting with dpns and circ's anyways.

I think the lack of knitting is also down to wanting to knit so many items at the moment, the list I have in my (forgetful) head is just getting longer and longer at the moment. Some of the items I'm wanting to knit are small quick items like Christmas decorations, and some are a little larger and some again are larger still. I recently became the proud owner of the Mason Dixon Knitting book and also Handknit Holidays and I think I want to knit almost every item in both of them (slight exaggeration going on there, can you tell?)

I have been doing a little bit of spinning though

I am very happy to be able to tell you that I have listed and sold a couple of my skeins on ebay recently! That'll go towards starting to pay off the credit card debt.....or maybe just the knitting related credit card debt even......what I'm I saying, its all knitting related practically!!

I have just started spinning a batch of the Blue faced Leicester fibre that I got from Jenny and Warren at Craftspun, and apart from the fact that I have to lock the cats out when I'm doing it,(they like it too) and the fact that its so fine that it leaves little particles all over my trousers, I'm really liking it. Its so much softer than the fibre I usually use which is lovely to work with, not that the other fibre isn't nice, its just different and a different experience to spin. Its similar in feel to merino but much easier to spin. I'm spinning it up in its raw colour and will then dye it I think. I'm going to ply the first batch together (I like plyed) but may try another batch and not ply it
Oh, what are these photo's all about? This is the River Liffey in all its glory. To the right you can see the Ha'Penny Bridge and the the left is O'Connell Bridge. Just thought they were nice sunny wintery pictures. Jim Bob up above there is one of the seagulls that frequent the boardwalk. His name isn't really Jim Bob, you know, I'm only kidding... ;-)

The Elegance of Swans

2006-11-21T23:35:00.000Z

I drafted this post a few days ago, and its perfect for dropping in here now.
I've started a new job this week so have other things on my mind.
Normal blogging will resume shortly!
Driving along the canal on Friday, saw these swans preening themselves. I was trying to get a picture of a couple of swans who were in the water that looked like they were peering over the side of the bank at passers by, all you could see were their heads and necks, but the traffic was moving at that stage and I didnt want to be the cause of an accident!
When the traffic stopped at lights I quickly whipped out the camera and took these shots.
Bit blurry, but you get the picture!
There are always a lot of swans along the Grand Canal in Dublin, they are a nice sight to see. The canal itself is a lovely walk, I used to go walking there when I lived in Rathmines many years ago, a place that is one of the hubs of student-land, great places to go out and eat and drink and make merry.
Of course, now it is also home to Holly's knitting group, who meet every Tuesday.

The forgotten sock

2006-11-18T10:04:00.000Z

You know, I haven't really forgotten this sock, the companion to Budd.
I've been picking it up and workng on it occasionally, its always a good one to fall back on if I am in a hurry and want to bring something with me to knit.
I brought it on our trip to Birmingham and did a bit at the airport before we checked in our bags

I brought it down to Clare with me and did a little bit of work on it here while chilling out

And last night I turned the heel on it.

My main problem is that I'm going to run out of yarn before the end of the sock and I can't get my hands on another ball of Rowan Calmer in black in Ireland! Can you believe that!

I've checked out all the online stores in Ireland and asked Lisa from This is Knit at the knitting and stitching show. Mainly, I'm trying my best not to order online at the moment as my knitty conscious will be telling me that I need to order more than one ball of yarn to make the order worthwhile....and my credit card is screaming at the moment. I may make a plea to SnB to see if anyone has a ball of black calmer in their stash that they'd be willing to swap..if not, then its to the evils of my credit card habit..

Oh and I'm not allowed to cast on for another sock until I finish this. Like Sharon, I'm in a bit of a fever of trying to finish items that I've cast on for for ages. I've been doing other knitting also but can't blog about it here, like a lot of people!! Oh, and go and check out Sharon's blog, she's got a bit of news...

General ramblings

2006-11-17T08:12:00.000Z

Check out this Funny knitting story that I found in a blog I was perusing. I would give that woman a clap on the back, I would!

I received my Winter Interweave Knits during the week, surprised because I thought it wouldn't get to me until late. I have only had a flick through it so far but at the start of the magazine is an article that caught my interest:
The Victoria and Albert Museum in London is a fantastic place to visit if you are ever in the vacinity.
Meanwhile, for those of us who don't have the means to get down there this weekend, check this out!
Yes, your very own knitting section of the V&A, online. Including some free knitting patterns of old. Its amazing what is still in fashion these days!

THE actual goodies!

2006-11-15T18:11:00.000Z

Yes, I found my cable. Finally.

Even looked under the bed.

Where was it?

In another room.

I have no recollection of bringing it into this other room.

So here we are.

Guess where the first of the 2 packages came from?

What was in this package?

And what was in this package?

Some tea bag makers (i.e. the means to make your own teabags from loose tea). Very handy indeed especially after my purchases of tea at Whittards in Birmingham!

A lovely little note pad with a note from my SP inside it (which leads me to believe she is living in Singapore)
Some lovely fragrent oil which smells light, floraly and fresh

Some ocean smelling incense sticks and burner, of which I have used already

Chocolate. Couldn't miss out on the chocolate!

The second parcel, yes second parcel boys and girls, contained this lovely soft merino yarn in the most lovely of colours, and when I smelt it, as I have to do, it smells of lavendar, yummy.
Here's a close up, just so you can see it better, not to make you jealous or anything...

It came with some samples of all the yarns that this store deals with, and I was there salivating for a little while. The kitties couldn't understand what was going on with me.

Oh and of course I had to try both of the bars of chocolate, just to work out which one I preferred best! They are both lovely, the milk chocolate is smooth and cocoa tasting (funnily enough) and the dark chocolate is not bitter at all, tastes like a darker version of the milk, if you know what I mean!

So thank you Secret Pal, whoever and wherever you are. You went to a lot of trouble and I love both packages!

Ronnie couldn't get over the excitement of it all.

Look at that lovely brown paw pad he's showing you. He's giving you a high five SP! Kitty style.

Secret Pal goodies

2006-11-15T09:10:00.000Z

Well I arrived home on friday to find a note in the door from my postie saying that I had 2 parcels waiting for me in my post office. Talk about frustrating! This post office that holds onto parcels for people who are not in when they call are manned from something like 10-15.00 hours (well my local one is anyway) which totally rules it out for people that actually work during these hours. I think I posted about this before, its a total pain.
So I gave it to my Mum and pleaded with her to pick them up for me on Monday, as she was flying out to Arizona the next morning to visit my brother and sister-in-law, and you know what its like trying to get last minute things done before holidays. Luckily, she was persuaded, and I called in to see them (not just to collect the parcels!) that evening. Anyway, had a lovely dinner there with them also, and came home that night to open up the parcels.
Unfortunately, I can't blog about them as I can't find my cable to transfer the photos from my digital camera to my laptop so all I can say here at the moment (until I turn the house upside down tonight looking for it) is that they are fantastic goodies and my SP has gone to a lot of trouble to get them to me! Thanks SP and pics hopefully tonight.....

Myla's Happy Head Scarf

2006-11-12T19:19:00.000Z

I made this headscarf for Myla, daughter of a friend of mine Angela, back in June/ July.

Do you remember it??

Looks like she likes it anyways! Its a perfect fit.

Glad I put on 3 buttons so that Angela can vary the positioning on her, especially as she grows bigger. Isn't she cute?

Myla isn't too bad either har har!

You know, I may even make one of these for myself....hmmmmm

Stolen moments

2006-11-12T19:00:00.000Z

This is what happens when you are out with 4 other knitting bloggers for a meal and you go to the ladies and leave your camera behind you on the table.

Mysterious artistic pictures appear in your camera.....

Wonder who was the instigator this time.......

Bridie

2006-11-09T18:30:00.000Z

This is the most lovely Bridie pattern , which is currently unavailable from Amelia but luckily I got in there when it was. It will be available again next year, I think there were a couple of adjustements that she wanted to make.

I swatched for this using Jaegar Luxery Tweed that I got at the Knitting and Stitching show in Birmingham, wasn't too sure about it before I swatched, but love it now. It will be both light and warm. I haven't started knitting this yet, despite the swatch, but will do in the run up to Christmas.

Yoga Socks, finished eventually!

2006-11-07T18:34:00.000Z

Pattern: Get a Grip!

Yarn: Yarn swap with Cheryl, unsure exactly what it is but a superwash Donegal Tweed blend.
Pins: Size 5 circ's/dpn's

Time: Not very long, can't remember exactly. Frogged the first pair I attempted to make in Noro and retried with this yarn.

How Overdue: Got the first done on time for my sisters birthday, the second shortly after but didnt give the second one to her for almost a month after! OOps. This was back in August....

Post posting comment: Forgot to say well done to my model, the lovely Ruth, who posed magnificently in some typical yoga poses for me. Just as well they fit her then....

Sheep Challange in months

2006-11-06T18:57:00.000Z

Here we have the Sheep that I call Bob. He is advertising his own calendar, from Borders in Birmingham.
This was taken when we visited Birmingham for the knitting and stitching show, obviously, you can see the corner of a Birmingham calendar behind Bob below.

A Strange knitting experience whilst out walking by the canal

2006-11-06T18:33:00.000Z

Out walking by the canal on a lovely crisp Saturday morning, what did we come across?

A strange blue shrub?

On closer inspection, its a knitted item torn apart!

How strange.

Lovely walk though.

Knitting and Stitching in Dublin city

2006-11-05T21:35:00.000Z

I was stuck in work until 4.30 on Thursdayy and the other girls were living it up in the Knitting and Stitching Show in the RDS.
4.30 came and out the door I flew, battled the traffic across the city, got a very handy parking space around the corner from the RDS and then I was in.

Phew. Made it!

Met up with the knitty girls upstairs outside the Weavers Spinners and Dyers Guild (of which I am a member!) where Juliet my spinning teacher, was also giving a spinning wheel a test run.
First off was Cheryl's hair, which is lovely, second of all came the news that Sharon is moving to the other side of the world for a year! To New Zealand, land of the finest wool!
We caught up for a while, then came the slow process of trying to move towards the door, as Isobel had to get to dinner with friends, and Cheryl and Holly were on the way home, after being all day at the show with the guilds.

Holly's drool worthy yarn

Myself and Sharon stayed for a while, perusing the fine yarn at the show.
Then Sharon left me to the evils of my demon mind, telling me that I just HAD to buy this and HAD to buy that....and that all of it would be put to good use.
Okay, I did buy yarn, I admit it.
BUT all of it was towards an intended (victim) person.

Some of the yarn I bought, of which only the Rowan tapestry is actually for me,and no SP stuff here neither!

Okay, the blue faced leicester roving I got isn't actually classed as yarn...yet, but I had to have it. Demon mind.
I got yarn for my secret pal
I got yarn to make wristwarmers for my Dad, as he thought mine were a great invention and actually requested a pair!
I got yarn to make some items for some members of my family and of course I can't really say at the moment...
I got a couple of other items that are destined as presents also.
So there you go, more stash enhancement, but NO, they will all be used by chrimbo!!
Jenny and Warren from Craftspun didn't mind me stopping by for a chat and then coming back to have another drool over their yarn
Lisa from This is Knit was having a great time meeting up with all us bloggers also. Can you see the fantastic Clapotis hanging up? Lovely and soft, this was done by knit-wit herself who was too shy to get into the photo.

Have yourself a bit of cake

2006-10-31T18:52:00.000Z

Cake ala Avoca Handweavers.

Machine knit, and not as nice as these!!

Only a knitter can understand

2006-10-30T17:19:00.001Z

We were at the Knitting and Stitching show in Birmingham, of which I never blogged about because it seemed a little pointless so far after the event, especially after subjecting everyone to endless posts about the Electric picnic so far after the event again, (take a breath..) and one of the items that myself Isobel and Sharon were keeping an eye out for was one of those nifty gadge/ruler/needle sizer things that Cheryl had with her, as she had whipped it out to check her gadge on her fetchings in the hotel bar as we sat and knit earlier.
We were disappointed. There wasn't so much as a hint of anything that looked anyway like this, not to mention any other little item we were desperately (well not really) searching for.
I was at Stitch N Bitch last weekend, and it was winding up and people were getting themselves and their knitting together to go, when Cheryl pulled these out of her bag and said she had a friend coming over from the States and she asked him to get his hands on one of the gadge sizer thingy's for us. She threw in the T blocking pins also as he had brought over more of these than she had asked for. I was very touched. Wasn't that nice of her?? Thanks Cheryl!

Spinning like a mad woman

2006-10-30T17:19:00.000Z

Its been quite a while since I posted about my spinning on this blog.
August to be precise. Can you believe that?

Its not that I havent been doing any, I have, just havent been posting.

This will rectify that!

If you remember, I posted about the Madder and Safflower dyed Galway Cross that I carded together, to get this lovely combination of colours.

This is what it looks like spun up

I love this combination.

I got great yardage from this lot, which was half of the original seperate colours that I dyed. Now I will have to card together the other half and spin that up too as the more I have of it the better!

This is one of the koolaid dyed Jacobs fleece that I spun

I took a part of the fleece that had a lot of the black in it and only a small amount of white, and carded it together so that it was blended together, then dyed it. I loved the way the colour turned out in it. unfortunately I only dyed a small amount of this so I only have the one skein of it, and I spun it so thinly that I used all of the roving in order to get a good yardage on it.

I think it really needs to be plyed with something, so I may have to see if I can dye up another lot of Jacobs to match it.

What else, well I have been doing a lot of trials and testing with other roving that I've either dyed, or using straight from the fleece after carding. As I'm still a leaner spinner, and dyer, all of this is good practice for me.

70/30 combination of Jacobs and Galway Cross dyed with koolaide

I certainly have a lot of fleece to be practicing with, and I want to get my hands on some blue faced leicester after seeing what Holly did with hers.

She is bringing it to the knitting and stitching show in the RDS and I'm a bit jealous of how good she is (hear that Holly?!).

I have a very small amount of blue faced leicester that I got on ebay one time, so I may have a go at that before making the decision to buy more as I have tons of fleece to spin with as it is! I know who can supply me with some also....which makes it even more tempting..yikes!

Inspiration?

2006-10-29T21:12:00.000Z

I have been a very bad girl.
I've let my heart get ahead of myself, and the head is now telling it how bold it is.

I've been busy buying magazines all round me.
First up is 2 magazines from Phildar.
I ordered the english version, which means I got the french full version, plus a seperate english version minus all the pictures and adds etc.

I love love love several items from each of these. Its going to be hard not to want to knit them all.

Next up is the new Yarn Forwardmagazine.
Its not bad, its the first magazine and has some good articles in it about shaping your knits to suit your body shape, how to spin using a drop spindle (Isobel?) and has a good selection of knits in it. There are a couple of patterns I may try.

Next is Knitscene Fall issue.
I loved the previous issue of this, it had several items that I would make, none of which I have made (yet) but this one didnt capture my attention the same way, in fact it looked as if there were less items in it than the previous one. Actually, I've just checked and there are only 30 in this issue compared to 44 in the last
Still, there are a couple of items that I have marked to try out and I will be doing so (I'll just add them to the list!)

Finally is the Interweave Knits Holiday Gifts
I haven't really had a good look through this yet, but on first glance through it, I like the Spiral Hat, the Larkspur Hat and Scarf and the Ooh La Loopy Hats for kids. Nothing else really took my attention and there looked like there were one or two items in it that I've seen before.
I ordered this before I read about and commented on the issues that Donni was having with receiving issues of Interweave press, these last 2 magazines were ordered together and luckily only took a week to get to me, which was surprising given all the problems with Interweave.
I still havent received my winter issue of Interweave, although I'm not expecting it for another while, seeing as I live on a different planet, being in Ireland and all!

Okay, I drafted this post a couple of days ago and didnt get to post it until now, and since then I have received another, yes another magazine through the post.
This is from one of my subscriptions, and I was very happy about getting it as it came with a knitting calender for next year,

until I went to Borders yesterday and discovered that they hadn't sent me the Rowan magazine that was supposed to come with it also......

Yum to wristwarmers

2006-10-28T20:05:00.000+01:00

Now I know that everyone is in love with Fetching, and I am too, I plan on knocking a few more of these babies out for friends/family/myself.

I am however, a bit swayed by these:

I bought the pattern when I was at the Knitting and Stitching show in Birmingham, along with one 100g ball of their 100% Alpaca. I got it from UK Alpaca. I should be able to get 2 pairs out of the ball of wool.

I really like this pattern, it took me approx one day to knit and was easy peasy, although I felt a bit nervous initially at dropping stitches as per the pattern. I think it could progress into a nice scarf to match.
I think I will pick up some stitches along the selvedge edge i.e. the top of the wristwarmer, and knit an i-cord bind off though, as I can see the tops streching fairly soon.
Its not been cold enough really here to wear them much, although I'm sure that I've just jinxed the whole country into a bitter winter by saying that!

beta blogger

2006-10-27T13:32:00.000+01:00

Just in response to Cheryl's comment on the last post:

Pro's of Beta:
I have a gmail account already and when I want to moderate comments from there it brings me straight into my blog without having to log in again. Like now.
You can apparently change your template/or customise the way you want it to look. the jury is out on this one, I havent attempted it yet....but plan to. I'll update when I try!
No difference in leaving comments on peoples blogs if they have other provider like wordpress etc or if they have also upgraded to beta
I can add labels for each post I create, similar to wordpress.

Cons:
It won't allow me to post as me on bloggers blogs who havent upgraded to beta yet.
Oh yes, Ive just found another one when I tried to post this post. When signing in directly to blogger (as I can't remeber the beta blogger address) I have to sign in to blogger and then am asked to sign in again using my gmail account address, although it does default into my username. An extra step.
Thats the only con I've found so far, but it is a pain.

I will have to test drive the knitting bag soon, I have been feeling strange about bringing it outside so far, its as if I want attention to the fact I'm a knitter or something!
Maybe I should walk down the road knitting, with the bag over my arm or something ala subway knitter person on the 1st of Sept post.

Oh, and check out the retro fabrics at Yarn.ie, they will be at the knitting and stitching show in the RDS next week....yummy fabrics...

E-bay purchase

2006-10-26T20:17:00.000+01:00

An impulse buy on ebay.
Its not bad, it will probably house a lot of yarn very soon, and I think it may be a good one to bring to SnB and my own knitting group that I've recently set up in my home town. It has a lot of room in it actually, and plenty of room for long needles.
I'm pretty excited about 2 new store opening up fairly nearby, but both in opposite directions to where I live.
First of all, we have a shop called Borders, which I know a lot of you people out there in blog land have right around the corner from you, but here in Ireland it is the first one to open. Can you believe that? Well the main reason I'm excited is actually because it is going to incorporate a Paperchase, which again is the first in Ireland, and again I know a lot of you are scratching your heads in amazement that we don't have one of these wonderful AMAZING STORES IN OUR LAND.
Well, now we do!
I know where I'm spending part of my weekend.....
The other part of my weekend may just have to be spent here, in Avoca. They have just opened a new flagship store in Rathcoole, which isnt that far from me. This is the store that I have regularly taken my Canadian friend Sherri to, in Dublin and in Wicklow, and she loves it. I do too, they have the most amazing food, and clothing, and throws, afgans, shawls, scarves.
Sharon posted previously about the handweaving part of Avoca in Kilmacanogue in Wicklow, they even let her have a go. Go and find the post about it on her blog!
Anyway, I plan on stopping by for a coffee at least....and maybe a bit of a fondle of their throws....

Sheep Challange

2006-10-22T19:03:00.000+01:00

Black Sheep Ale bottle, found at Biddy Early's Brewery in Co. Clare.

Photo taken through the window of a cabinet.

I don't think they are making this anymore.

This pub does the best food ever in its restuarant, and is very reasonable too. A pot of tea for one euro?? Where would you get that?

Unfortunately they have closed the restuarant part for the winter now, and will reopen it St Patricks weekend. Pity, its one of our favourite places to eat in Clare and we actually detour to stop there if we are heading home.

Don't worry, the pub itself is still open!

Homespun Mouse

2006-10-19T23:39:00.001+01:00

Remember I showed you the baby shoes I made with my homespun?

Here it is before I started knitting with it

Reggie was impatient with me taking photo's of the yarn, he wanted to be the Star attraction!

And here it is. The finished mouse. Squeek squeek

Little does it know what fate has in store for it

Oh yes Reggie, get in there, you big mouser you! Look at him licking his lips!

Needless to say, the mouse is a HUGE hit with both Ronnie and Reggie, and is now minus its tail, but still going strong. Reggie picks it up and carries it over to a corner to play with it himself. A pure Ratter.

Lists of favourites as requested....

2006-10-18T12:06:00.000+01:00

I was asked by our Secret Pal 9 Hostess Shelby to list my favorite:

Actor -Aidan Quinn, hands down
Actress -Jane Horrocks (think Absolutely Fabulous for those non Irish/UK people reading this....or Little Voice)
Animal - The Kitty Cat of course!
Band - Juliet Turner (at the moment) or Damien Rice
Book -The Time Travellors Wife
Bubble Bath - Lush bath bombs
Candy - Green and Blacks organic chocolate or Cadbury's Flake "Only the crumliest flakiest chocolate..."
Color -Orange
Drink- good old ordinary Tea! With only a drop of milk please.
Flower - Fresia, or daiseys
Food - Chocolate!!!Or okay then, Lasagne as chocolate wouldnt really be classed as food really...love Lasagne
Lip Balm - Boots Spearmint Lipsalve, tastes as if you could eat it, or else Clinique nude balm or good old vaseline
Lotion - The Sanctuary products
Movie - Amelie
Place-Co. Clare, Ireland
Song - Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen
TV Show - Coronation Street(!) or Strictly Come Dancing
Yarn- Noro yarns, but love all of them, can't get enough!!
Vacation Spot - Rome or Paris....or Australia, or Scotland...or...or...or

Blogging pains

2006-10-16T22:49:00.000+01:00

I've just been attempting to blog with uploading more than 2 photos and its absolutely painful.
Its slow, and its painful. Its even more painful when you wait for the picture to upload forever, being slow and painful as it is, and then it says its done, and you go to check it out or to move it to where you want it to go and discover its not there at all. 3 attempts later, you give up and save the post as a draft.
I have 3 drafts in the past week and a half just waiting to be posted, but the pictures are just not cooperating. AArrrggggghhghghghgh!
Over and out for the night. I've had enough.

Baby boys

2006-10-16T22:06:00.000+01:00

What do you do when you make some tiny shoes?

You find a tiny baby to put them on!

In my case I found 2.

2 babies that is.
I had 2 friends have their baby boys over the course of a week.

So Micheál and I went a-visiting.

I made this Matinee Jacket also from Sublime yarn by Sirdar that I bought at the Knitting and Stitching show in Birmingham. Its a blend of cashmere, silk, merino and its also called Baby Cashmerino. It was nice to knit with, though I found it split quite a lot while knitting with it.

The pattern is from Baby Cashmerino 2 by Debbie Bliss, which I also picked up at the knitting and stitching show. I reckon I have enough left out of the 4 balls of yarn I bought to make a pair of socks to match the jacket.
I wanted to use green ribbon but I was in a rush to find some before handing it over to the Mum so I found this purple ribbon instead, which is just as well as the Mum loves purple!

This Mum also got a baby feet washcloth for baba, its her first one.

The Other Mum will be getting some bootees and a hat for baba also, and big sister will be getting a hat and some slippers (she asked where were her shoes when she spotted them!! And she wants red hearts on hers too)
The yarn I used for the wee shoes is my own handspun, one of my earlier efforts. I have used it for another little project also, more on that to come.

Thanks to woollywormhead for the advice on getting blogger to cooperate, its definately helped as you can see!!!

Very Fetching Indeed

2006-10-13T20:09:00.000+01:00

I knit myself a pair of Fetching Wristwarmers in time for the Electric Picnic (see the many posts before this on it!) and I wore them both days I was there, got a lot of people commenting on them.
I brought them out with me last night when meeting friends, among them Isabelle who I used to work with, and who has been jetsetting ever since, she's lived in New Zealand, Australia, the Isle of Man, and is now in Switzerland. And is originally from France. Did I mention she lived here in Ireland also for a time? She comes back to haunt us regularly (sorry Isa!!)
Anyway, Isabelle runs, and thought that my wristwarmers would be great for keeping her handies warm in the Swiss winter-time.
So Isabelle now is the proud owner of a pair of very fetching wristwarmers.

A very proud Fetching pose.

The Last Knit

2006-10-09T23:01:00.000+01:00

I saw this in my previous Secret Pal Trudi's blog a little while ago, and then my cousin Siobhan in Australia emailed me with a link to it, so thought you all may like a look.

Its really good, I have watched it a few times now, with the odd chuckle escaping at times from me....

So here we are: The Last Knit

(don't worry, its not MY last knit.....)

Secret Pal 9 Questionnaire

2006-10-09T18:45:00.000+01:00

Yep its that time again. Here follows my Secret Pal 9 questionnaire....

1. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? What fibers do you absolutely *not* like?I like a lot of different yarns really. I like handspun and hand-dyed yarn, I like Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Lornas Laces, Koigu, alpaca, almost anything really. I don’t like fun yarns, acrylic yarns, mohair or angora (gets into every facial orifce and I can’t breathe with it!, love the feel of it though… but the need to breathe is probably more important? ;-))

2. What do you use to store your needles/hooks in?I have a couple of straight needle holders that I use for my straights, one came with a set I bought and the second came free with a magazine. My dpn’s and circulars are just dumped into a box at the moment, although a nice box it is, and both this box and the straights are then housed in another larger wooden box. Every now and then I have to go searching for needles as the box gets depleted and needs reorganising.

3. How long have you been knitting & how did you learn? Would you consider your skill level to be beginner, intermediate or advanced?I have been knitting as long as I remember, but in reality it was probably since I was in primary school, like a lot of Irish girls. I think my Mum or my Gran started me off and I remember doing some knitting in school. A red scarf comes to mind.I would probably be an advanced intermediate. I haven’t got a problem in doing most stitches/methods, I’m just usually too lazy to do any big projects requiring them! I’m going to remedy that this year.

4. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list?
Yes I have an amazon one, see my blog for details

5. What's your favorite scent? (for candles, bath products, etc.)
Vanilla, clean smelling scents. Have discovered the Yankee tarts a while ago (through a friend) and have introduced them to most of my family at this stage. I usually have one burning if someone comes around to dinner and they always ask what the lovely smell is

6. Do you have a sweet tooth? Favorite candy?
Yes I have a sweet tooth unfortunately. As I’m Irish, I always lean towards the Cadbury’s chocolate taste, though I have been known to try other things and like them! I love Green and Blacks Organic chocolate, white chocolate and like things with nuts in them. I like marzipan too. I am not very fond of nestle’s, or pralines.

7. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? Do you spin?
Well apart from the knitting, I do spin a bit, but not as much as I would like as knitting always seems to get in the way! I have been doing a lot of preparatory work for spinning, having gotten a few fleeces during the summer, so have been washing them and carding them and dyeing them. Now all I need is time to spin them!I also do mosaics and some beading, and would like to learn how to crochet at some point, and be able to sew.

8. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD)
Love 80’s music (obviously the good stuff, not some of the bad that was also around at the time). Depeche Mode, Thompson Twins, Abba, The Cure, Wham, Franz Ferdinand, Damien Rice, BellX1, Kaisers Cheifs, Gorillaz, David Bowie, Katie Melua, The Frames

9. What's your favorite color(s)? Any colors you just can't stand?
Like a lot of different colours really, depends on mood. Green, red, orange, brown, pink, blue. Not fond of yellow really, but again in depends on circumstance.

10. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets?
Single, with boyfriend of 2 and half years. Live in my own home with 2 terrors of kittens called Ronnie and Reggie

11. Do you wear scarves, hats, mittens or ponchos?
Scarves: yes
Hats: yes
Mittens: occasionally, but prefer gloves
Ponchos: No

12. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit?
Baby boottees are great for me, they are quick and look so cute!Also like making hats and quick items, although this winter Im determined to knit myself a cardigan (have swatched for it last night!!)

13. What are you knitting right now?
A friend of mine had her second baby 2 days ago so I am knitting bootees and hat for him, and another friend is due today, with her first and I’m making a matinee jacket for her baby- thought I’d do something special for her as she’s the only girl in a family of 4 boys, and her mum is very sick at the moment so she deserves something very special.Im also in the middle of doing a doll for the babies (from Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino2 book).
Swatched last night for the cardigan (from My Fashionable Life- the Bridie)
Have lots of WIP’s also-
Socks for my beau
Kitty Pi for my boys
Lopi tote from Hello Yarn
Do you want me to go on?

14. Do you like to receive handmade gifts?
Oh yes!

15. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? Bamboo, aluminum, plastic?
Circular over straight, and probably circular on a par with dpns.Bamboo over aluminium and don’t really like plastic usually, though see answer 20

16. Do you own a yarn winder and/or swift?
Yes to both, and they are both a godsend

17. How old is your oldest UFO?
Oh God. Eh, probably the tote from Hello Yarn as far as I can remember

18. What is your favorite holiday?
Christmas

19. Is there anything that you collect?
Stash!!And knitting booksAnd knitting magazines

20. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have?
Books- see my amazon wishlist. At the moment, my biggest book wish is for the Handknitted holidays one, but I think I may just go ahead and buy that myself.
Yarns- well, anything that is hard to get in Ireland (which is a lot!!)
Needles- Pony Pearl dpn's

21. Are there any new techniques you'd like to learn?
Knitting with 2 circulars

22. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
Yes, but I try not to have more than one on the go at a time which is why havent cast on yet for the pomotomous socks….
Size (UK)4 or 37 shoes,
8.5in/21cm around ball of foot
9in/23cm long

23. When is your birthday? (mm/dd)
09/29. I won’t say what year as I’m trying to deny it myself.

oh yes, we have come to a conclusion

2006-10-05T12:23:00.000+01:00

Okay, this is really really the last post about the Electric Picnic. And yes, it really is Paul from Bellx1 and Tomo who is the drummer with Damien Rice.
They look like great knitters don't they??!! ;-)

So there are a couple of wordless posts following on from this, and yes that is me in the silly hat, Isobel thought I looked like the cat in the hat with it on. I was going to buy it....but thought again....

oh yes here's another one!

2006-10-05T12:05:00.000+01:00

more proud knitters

2006-10-05T11:45:00.000+01:00

postless picture post re electric picnic

2006-10-05T11:17:00.000+01:00

Knitted Picnic again, belatedly

2006-10-05T00:50:00.000+01:00

Okay well I think that a lot of the photos from the Electric Picnic really speak for themselves.
I must admit, I had ONE pint of beer the whole 2 days we were there and that was last thing on Saturday night, in between Belle and Sebastian and The Frames.It was lovely too!
The rest of the time I became very acquainted with the very yummy Rooibus citrus tea from suki-tea, and creamy vegan Chai tea. I ate very well also, no stodge for me thank you very much! Veggie Falafal, pasta and peso, goats cheese rocket and red pesto crepes. Yummy yummy. I'm not vegetarian, but a lot of the time at these type of festivals etc, I am just drawn to this type of food

A lot of people came to our knitting tent and everyone seemed to have a great time.
We got comments like, this is JUST what I need today, if I knew you were here I would have been here earlier, a lot of people said that they hadn't knit since school and that they had been taught by their mums or their grans or teachers.
Some people were reluctant to start off saying they had bad memories of knitting in school, but once they started it was almost a wrestle them away from the knitting experience! And it was soo surprising the amount of guys who came to knit!!Honestly, I never thought we would have the response we got from the guys. The first day I would say we had majority guys knitting, the second day it was probably about even male/female.
I know that Isobel and Sharon have both blogged about the electric picnic and we all probably have some similar pictures, so I wont bore you with too many details.So, here are a few of my favourite:
Okay I seem to be having problems in uploading more than these pictures so I will have to continue with just plain picture posts....

Back to the blogging world I go!!

2006-10-03T15:54:00.000+01:00

You know this is typical me, as soon as I get access to the internet, I hightail it off to Clare for the weekend, where we dont even have a phone line, let alone wireless access!Every time we go to Clare we are greeted with something new in the garden or along the lane way. This time round, its Blackberry time. Don't these look yummy?Along with some cooking apples from the garden (there are at least 2 cooking apple trees and one eating apple tree) these will make a lovely apple and blackberry tart, or jam. Must get into some cooking inspiration.
Thank you every one for the birthday greetings. I usually go out for a few drinks with friends and combine it with my sisters birthday who's is on the 20th Oct, but this year I just wasn't into doing that. So Micheál and I went out for dinner and we met my sister and brother in law in the local pub for a couple of drinks. Then up and off to Clare the next day.My other sister, who's birthday is coming up, came back from Thailand on Saturday so I popped in home to say hello to her on the way down. Sounds like she had a fantastic time. Another place I haven't been to and would love to go to.I'll have to add it to the list!
Anyway, back to the present, I have tons and tons to blog about, I don't know where to start with it all!Okay I'll start with saying a huge THANK YOU to Trudi, who was my spoilee in the SP8 which has now finished (sob).I received a birthday card from her, made out of a collage of photo's from my blog! It really touched me, thank you so much!Over and above the call of duty I think!

Right. I'm going to compose another entry devoted to the Electric Picnic (I know, its old news by now, but I have so many photos I want to show yououououo)
addendum: I don't think I've spelt that right! I actually composed this post while in Clare, and have since gotten what looks to be a very scrummy recipe from my sister for apple sponge....and you can add blackberries to it also.....watch this space....I promise that if I end up with blackberry juice all around my mouth I'll take a photo....

HB2me

2006-09-29T19:28:00.000+01:00

Great birthday present this. And I have a great boyfriend. He's going to have to re-wrap it again for me for Christmas. He got me a laptop! I think he could see me pining for internet access.....
And its soo faaast!
Going out to dinner now, so will have to drag myself away from blogging for the moment.....

Yes I'm still alive!

2006-09-21T21:38:00.000+01:00

....I'm still here, I haven't quite left the planet yet.....normal blogging will resume shortly....promise!!

The Electric Knitted Picnic

2006-09-05T18:50:00.000+01:00

Wow, what a weekend!
It was truely amazing, and I kept on saying it until I'm sure my co-knitters were sick of it, but I couldn't believe the response we had to our little knitting tee-pee.
Right from the start there was interest, we had no sooner placed out our knitted picnic and our knitted blanket in the tee-pee when people started coming over.

We hardly had time to take a swig of water and we were away teaching people how to knit, how to hold the needles, how to work the wool, baby!(didn't get any wool smellers though).
Interestingly enough, the majority of interest on Saturday came from guys!
We had lots of guys coming over and saying give me a go, I can do that....em....its a bit tricky....this is HARD!
And finally, it gave way to, just wait until I finish this row.....

Belfast boy of an unknown name....did really well

This guy came back the next day to collect his work of art from us, well done Conor!!

Caroline from Longford will be dropping into our meetings whenever she comes to Dublin again. Check out the big needles!

and we even had ballgowns!!

Sharon and Isobel both have great accounts of the knitted picnic on their blogs so go and check them out!

I will be back with more though, you havent gotten away that lightly......

Yarn for Electric Picnic

2006-09-01T16:13:00.000+01:00

Ok the time of the Electric Picnic is approaching fast and I finally have some photos to show you of the yarn we have bought from Craftspun to use at it.
Sorry if they take a bit of time to open, I'm using my sisters PC and cant find a way of changing the properties on it!
Here they are after being wound into cakes.

Delicious!!

We met up last Saturday to do the normal Stitch n Bitch things, but also to discuss the Electric Picnic and our contributions to it. The group were asked to make squares, 15x15 for a blanket which we will display at the picnic and then donate to charity.

It was amazing the amount of talent and time that was put into all the squares!

Here is a picture of some of them, trying to match it up to see what way it would work. At this stage we were still expecting some more squares to arrive in the post.

And the food that was layed on for the knitted picnic was just divine! Yum yum.

I've since done some tomatoes and strawberries that look good enough to eat....nice a ripe they are. All I need now is some cream for the strawberries....

Sorry for being a bit absent

2006-08-31T16:08:00.000+01:00

A number of things have happened lately, I've moved jobs (temporarily I hope), my great uncle on my Mums side passed away a couple of weeks ago, and last week my great aunt on my Dads side passed away. Both of them the last of their generation.
I also have gall stones and have been plagued with pains and aches since last saturday which resulted in me finally going to my GP on tuesday evening (and those of you who know me would know that I don't go to my GP if I can at all help it).
So I have been off from work since then, feeling a bit in the doldrums, and hoping that I will feel okay for this weekend.
Whats happening this weekend I hear you ask?
Have you not been reading my blog? Shame on you!
Go now and read through the previous entries and I'll hold on for you.

Okay, now that you are up to speed.
The Knitted, sorry,Electric picnic is on this weekend and we are going a-knitting at it. What a great combination that will be! knitting and music, and a bit of the nattering too.
Anyway, I'm down at the library using the PC there, as I had to get out for some fresh air, and can't link to it or upload photos, but you will get the drift if you read my previous ravings about it.
I'll post properly soon, I promise, and you will be inundated with lots of photos then....

Knitted Picnic

2006-08-26T10:19:00.000+01:00

Fancy joining me for tea?

I have managed 2 muffins (aka cupcakes from the One Skein book) and one cupcake ala my own adaption of the One skein pattern. I decided on using a lot of food colouring in the recipe, hence the wierd and wonderful colours......
Sprinkles include silver beads and buttons of varying sizes....

And Ronnie decided that he wanted tea....but ignored the knitted food for some reason...

Tractor Convention

2006-08-22T22:15:00.000+01:00

We went down to Clare at the weekend, unexpectantly.
My Great Uncle Michael passed away late last week, he was 89 and a great man. RIP.
I was only really getting to know him.

Anyway, on the way down, we got diverted via Monesterevin, and came across a Tractor Convention!!!

It was a pretty impressive sight.
A row of tractors passing us by, as we crawled along for a change.
I must admit, some of the tractors looked pretty good, even for someone like me who couldn't tell a good tractor from a digger.

I would say that a lot of them were pretty old.

This is my favourite photo. Blurred because I was trying to get a picture as he went by and the car had started moving.
He saw me and waved!!

32MB Ram

2006-08-22T21:51:00.000+01:00

You know, the best thing about combining knitting and computers, is that you can see the humour in this sort of picture.

I love this mug!

Releasing sheeps

2006-08-17T12:08:00.000+01:00

Okay, I'm Releasing my Inner Sheep with this sheep money box that I bought while in Clare, specifically to save money for yarn in.
So I think its almost appropriate, doncha think?

Its a start anyway, until I hit the shops with my hidden camera.

I'll wear a wide brimmed hat that covers part of my face, a cloak to hide the camera under....and um, maybe an umbrella to ward off anyone trying to come wrestle the camera off me...like management or other inner sheep releasers who saw the products first....

Secret Pal ending.... ;,,-(

2006-08-17T11:30:00.000+01:00

You know that out there in the world wide web, people are posting about their secret pal's and the parcels they have received from them, and how thrilled they are with their secret pal's gifts and how amazing they have been.
Nothing compares to my secret pal. Just letting you know, don't be tooo envious now or anything, she may be yours the next time round if you are very very good...
I arrived home to a very unusually shaped package yesterday.
After I wrestled with all the sellotape holding it together, I gave in and went and found a sissors. (Thats fairly normal for me, hate to have to give in to using sissors when I'm convinced that I can sort it out myself!)
It was wrapped up so well, I couldnt get over the care you took in wrapping it SP!
Inside was this lovely box, all soft and cushiony on top
Here's a close up of the flower on top

Inside was this brilliant note, and she swapped colours when talking about different items in the box. Brilliant.
Underneath this was a packet of Haighs chocolate, containing 4 chocolate bunnies (of which there are only 3 now....)
Very yumm indeed.
Then there was a packet of scented soap paper which you can use when camping, or at festivals or somewhere similare.
I know somewhere that this will come in very useful in the near future! (Check This out if you wonder what on earth I'm talking about!)
Is my SP psyhcic? I'm sure that I only blogged about that this week....although we (Sharon, Isobel, Holly, Cheryl) have been talking about it now between us for a couple of weeks now.

Anyway, there was also some lovely beads and some earring holders. For some reason I couldn't get a good picture of these so they are a bit blurry
The most amazing silk scarf that my SP handpainted herself, its gorgeous, lovely colours too.
But wait!
Leaving the best until last, here is a skein of a lucious silk and wool mix called Ocean Spray. It is truelt the nicest feeling yarn I have ever had the pleasure to own, or smell!

Here's a close up

Oh, what to knit with it......

Of course the boys wanted in on the action also.
After playing with the bag that came wrapped around the box inside the packaging, I gave in and let them have it.........and the box too.....

Oh okay, I didnt play with it, they did.

Ronnie gave us a lovely view of his bum as he tried to fit the whole of him inside the box.
As soon as he got distracted by something else (easily done at the moment) Reggie also tried to get in on the fun.

Secret Pal.....thank you so much! I think I know who you are but let me know...just in case I'm wrong....

Release your Inner Sheep!

2006-08-16T10:27:00.000+01:00

Wooly Wormhead has put up a sheep challenge, for all you sheepish people out there!
Check out all the info on her blog.
The challenge is to take as many photos of sheep, not real life sheep out in the fields (damn it, there are so many around!) but to take photo's of sheep on products or on programmes etc.
I think I can do this!!

Basically the guidelines are as follows:

* No normal, grass munchin' real life sheep shots.
* To throw caution to the wind and be tutted at whilst taking photographs.
* The more obscure, the better. Even if they're on a packet of tampons, they're snapped.
* Photos clearly showing the Sheep and their (if appropriate) product.
* Update as and when the moment occurs. No pressure, no deadline.
* Bare in mind animal welfare at all times (love that sheep!)

Secret Parcel

2006-08-16T09:10:00.000+01:00

Secret Pal 8 is coming to an end, and this is the final parcel all bundled up ready to send to the person I'm spoiling.
Obviously it is the back of it cos I don't want to show the world her address!I will be getting to the post office this lunchtime to send it.
So I hope she gets it soon, and I hope she likes what I have put in it. Its definately the best of the 3 and I had to cellotape the box shut as it was so full.

So here is some of the roving I'm spinning on my NEW spinning wheel.
Its spinning up nicely, my main issue is trying to keep the roving away from kitties paws, as they are very interested in it!
Ronnie has actually sat on my treadling leg while I've been spinning, watching everything with interest. Made the spinning a bit harder, but a nice spinning memory.

I have been doing a lot of experimenting with dyeing the roving using Kool-aid, trying to find out combinations that I like.

Some of the kool-aid comes out with better colours than others. I will be mixing colours the next time and see what combinations I come up with.

At the moment, its hard to do any more as my bathroom is chocablock with roving hanging from every available hanging space!
Its been raining here the last few days so I can't hang it outside at the moment.

I think at this stage that I will wait and see how some of this spins up first before I go ahead and dye some more, just in case I decide I don't like the way I'm doing it!

The Knitted Picnic

2006-08-15T12:27:00.000+01:00

OOh, so excited!!!

Remember the post where I mentioned we had an Agenda to discuss, not just knitting and chat?

Well, the silence has been broken and we can now disclose what it is.

We have been invited to the Electric Picnic in order to teach people to knit at it.
Can you believe that?
There are a core few of us that will be there over the weekend, and a few other volunteers (hopefully) from SnB who will come down on Saturday and Sunday.
Im sure its not too much of a hardship for us!
We are anticipating between 60-100 people a day and it will be a great way to promote knitting, our SNB group, and knitting in Ireland.

We have a theme- The Knitted Picnic. What you think, cool eh?

Anyway, coming down to details, we are planning a knitted blanket, and some of us are knitting food items for the picnic (I'm on cupcakes!).
We are asking people in the SnB group to join us in some way,even if they can't make the electric picnic themselves, we need help to make a picnic blanket.
The picnic blanket will be donated to charity after the event.

So if you feel like joining us in spirit, we are asking for knitted square donations.
Just one 10" square in yarn from your stash, weight, colour, pattern etc doesn't matter – the most important part is that it's a square of 10 inches that you'd be proud to display in our blanket.
Email me if you feel that you would like to contribute to the blanket, or leave me a comment and I'll contact you.

Just think...your square could have pride of place in the blanket (right next to my cupcakes...)

And if you will be at the Electric Picnic yourself, come over and say hi!
We would love to meet you!

Spinning Bliss

2006-08-14T12:43:00.000+01:00

I finally finally finally got a text from my Dad saying that a parcel had arrived for me from the Netherlands.
I havent posted about this previously as I had bought a spinning wheel on ebay and 3 weeks later it still hadn't arrived.
I have been in contact with the people I bought it from and they were very good, they use a track and trace system and were able to tell me where it had ended up and they were in the process of trying to retrieve it to send it to me again when it arrived.
I was so relieved. Its the largest amount of money I have ever spent on myself for a hobby or for pleasure, I'm not counting buying a car here now or a house!!
So of course I couldn't wait to get home to get it and put it together.
They also included some lovely gift cards with sheep on them, and they had the ingenious idea of using fleece to pack the wheel with to make it secure!4 packets of Blue Texel sheep, which is a rare Dutch breed..on the increase though in Holland.
I'm looking forward to spinning with it.
There were a few parts to assemble, but it was very straightforward.

I did have to wait for Micheál to do one little bitty bit, (can you see where it is in the photo above, all you spinners??)but that was because I was due at the pub to meet my sister and bro-in-law and decided to leave it for M.
He sorted it out first thing the next morning and I started spinning this

which went to this

and then this

and then this.

I still need to wash it and hang it to set the twist on it, but I'm happy!

I retrieved the drum carder from Cheryl when we met up on Saturday, and I did a bit of carding with it.
I carded together some of the fleece that I had dyed while in Clare, this is a mixture of the cochineal and madder dyed fleece
and this is some Jacob fleece that I threw into the exhaust of the cochineal, pure fleece at the time, I hadn't carded it at the stage that I dyed it (it was washed though).
The photo's don't do it justice, its actually a really nice colour blend of pinks, mid-brown and dark brown.
There was also kool-aid that my aunt sent me from Boston to be played with...and I did..
I think I may be doing some more fibre pursuits this evening again....would you blame me?

Strawberries and brownies go really well together!

2006-08-14T12:25:00.000+01:00

Well Cheryl aka ASimpleYarn, Isobel aka TeaandCakes, Holly aka WinonaQueen, Sharon aka ClicketyKnits and I met up again on Saturday.
This looks like its starting to become a little bit of a habit, meeting up outside of the normal SnB group, and a very enjoyable habit too.
We had an actual agenda to get through, it wasn't all about knitting and chatting...more about that in a later post, I can't say too much yet...sssshhhh
We also had food....some lovely cheese chowder soup that Cheryl made, with fresh bread rolls from the oven and some hummous I made, and then we had Wexford strawberries from Sharon and very scrummy home-made brownies from Isobel ...
We decided to each take photo's of our strawberries and brownies. Check out the other photo's on their blogs.
If they havent been added yet, they will be! very artisitic, all of them.
And we knit....we did!
On the way home, I just had to stop and take a photo of the fabulous heather-covered hills. So here they are!

Kitty Antics

2006-08-14T12:07:00.000+01:00

The kittens are growing rapidly, and are just lovely. Getting very affectionate and scratching less.
Ronnie's favourite place is lying on the back of the couch with his head on Micheáls shoulder.

I have been letting them out in the back garden when I'm there, leaving the sliding doors open and they come in and out as they please.
The side gate, I have covered with a bamboo covering, to stop them escaping out and meeting cars and motorbikes, and basically to not lose them.
Yesterday, we went out for half an hour, and decided to leave them out the back with the sliding doors closed, to get used to being outside for a bit.
I went around the car to get into the passenger seat, and glanced up beside the house and what did I see but a black cat standing looking at me. It was Ronnie.
As soon as he saw me, he turned around and ran back in. They had pulled the bamboo covering aside at the corner. Most upset when we tied it up again.
So there I was worrying that they would get out while we were out, when we got back I went up beside the house and there was Ronnie sitting looking at me and meowing at me, safely inside the gate.
Couldn't see Reggie, but thought he was probably investigating spiders webs somewhere in the garden.
We went into the house, and out the back.
Guess where Reggie was?
UP on the back wall. He was stuck, couldnt get down.
He must have climbed the fir that was at the back wall.
Micheál had to get a chair to stand on in order to lift him down, the wall is that high up.He came willingly too.
The results of all these antics?
We put their collars on them.
Had been planning to put them on from the first time we got them, the first attempt drove Ronnie so wild scratching at it and falling over in the attempts, that we took it off again.
They have actually took to them very well, we did do a bit of bribery with some cheese though.....

(please excuse the couch covering, its necessary to escape those kitty claws....hopefully normal service will resume once they are adults)

Rowan knits

2006-08-11T09:06:00.000+01:00

Well, I've put my order in for the new Rowan magazine (40) and am eagerly awaiting its arrival to have a look at it in depth.
I have had a look at the patterns on the Rowan website and there are quite a few that I like the look of.

Im determined to knit something larger than a hat for myself this winter, so I'll be interested in looking at these designs in more detail.
This one looks a little on the low cut-side of things for me....not sure if I would do it justice!

I like the look of this one especially, it looks nice and warm and snuggly. Doesn't help I suppose that its a bit cold and miserable here at the moment.

I also think that this design would be ideal for a wedding or a dressy event, but again I'll have to wait and see.

Luas Knitting

2006-08-11T08:39:00.000+01:00

Ruth, if you are reading this, look away now!
Well, until the weekend is over anyway...

Well, what to do when you are on the Luas, probably for at least a 30 minute journey, and you have knitting in your bag?
You knit, thats what!
It was a great time to do it and an easy knit that I didnt have to concentrate too much on.
One of the thoughts going through my mind however, was that I really should have attached a row marker to the end of the Yoga Socks as I'm pretty sure that I have over estimated how many rows I knit!
I am using one of the stitch markers that my Secret Pal sent me, I like the contrast of the pink against the black. The yarn is a yarn that I got from a yarn swap with Cheryl. She got the Lopi Light that I'd bought and didn't like the feel of when I was knitting it, or the colour of it. She likes it luckily!
The Yoga Socks are a birthday present for my sister which is why she shouldn't be reading this as she will be getting them at the weekend from me and if she IS reading this, then she has just ruined her surprise. I warned ya Ruth!
I have finished one of them and tried it on and it looks pretty good actually, if I say so myself. I think she'll like them....hopefully....and its not the only thing she's getting, don't worry!
Talking of the yoga socks, Jussi who designed them, has just opened her new shop called Knits for beloved babies . Go and have a look, its pretty cool.
Talking of cool, have you seen my knitty friend Sharon's shop? Go check it out , its great...Clicketyknits
Just the thing for someone who is not sure what to get a friend/ family member.
I knit a hat and boottee set for a friend of mine on the birth of her baby boy, and she was so delighted with them that she asked me to knit a set for a friend of hers who was also due.
She felt that it was a unique and special gift to give a new Mum.

Now, for a view from the back of the Luas
There is a driver bit on both ends of the luas, so that they can just hop into whichever end goes to the front!
I'm sitting backwards here, and just flying through all that traffic...what a luxury.

Belated questions from Secret Pal Hostess

2006-08-09T08:48:00.000+01:00

Bobbi, my Secret Pal Hostess, asked us to answer these questions a couple of weeks ago. we were supposed to have them answered by August 5th but I didn't get to it before I went away and missed the deadline as a result.
I'm going to answer them anyway!

Someone has stolen your stash and all your books: now what are you going to do?

After hyperventilating for about 15 minutes, collapsing on the floor from the excessive hyperventilating, waking up with a big bump on my head and crying for 4 hours, I would then try and consider my options.
I'm usually of the feeling that you can make something good out of (almost) any situation, so my first step would be to wash my face and make a cup of tea.
To calm me down of course.
Also to give me some thinking time in order to get my brain in order.
I would then claim it off the house insurance.

Assuming you don't let the experience discourage you from ever knitting again, here are some additional items that you could include in your answer...What would be the first thing you'd replace? What would you live without?

Well the first yarn I would replace would be a tie between my Noro yarn and my Lorna's Laces yarn. I think at this point the Noro would win, but thats only because I'm knitting with Noro Silk Garden at the moment and loving it.
The next thing I would replace would of course be something to knit with, so throw in my Addi circ's and some bamboo needles. Double pointed needles of course then for all my potential sock knitting.
I would be a bit gutted if all my Rowan books and Vogue magazines were taken, as I have quite a collection from a few years ago when I went a bit mad buying them when I lived in London, so it would be straight onto ebay or to the magazines themselves to see if I could replace them.
I could very very easily live without the mohair yarn I bought on ebay a good while ago. I don't know what I was thinking of when I bought it, yarn stash enhancement fever must have struck at the time.
I don't wear anything made of mohair as it itches the hell out of me, and I have discovered that I dislike knitting with it as well.
I think that a trip to one of the only available yarn shop in Dublin with Noro in it would be in order. I could happily spend a couple of hours in there and think I was only there for 10 minutes.
There you go Bobbi, sorry its late!!