Fairisle for a fair cat

Had a thought*

Borrowed a knitting machine **

Learnt on a swatch***

Even tried out pseudo-fairisle!

Stuffed it with wool scraps and catnip.

Had fun!

*Potentially dangerous as I often think way out of my ability
** thanks Jak!
***Silly to waste a swatch

stash busting stripes

Needing to seriously seriously alleviate my  'down-time-stress-syndrome' as well as giving an 'anti-stress-from-work' relief I needed to knit and I needed to KNIT NOW!

This was a bit of a problem as I didn't actually having anything to knit with other than stash.

So.....I started a stash-busting scarf.

It is nearly double the length now, Youngest has already wrapped it around his neck and made smiley mmmm mmmm noises - ah ha! A chrimbly pressie me thinks :)

Excuse me, off to knit a little more before going off to bed - going to try to pre-empt any work angst!!

November knittin' notes

Well - that was a damp squib was it not!?

We had, as per normal, a bowl of trick or treater-sweets. I handed out one lot of sweets to a pair of the prettiest witch/pippi-long-stocking/type girls who sweetly chirped 'trick or treeeeeat' and then having selected a sweet or two chirped again 'thank you and happy halloweeeeeeen'

And that, as the saying goes, was that...... s'pose the torrential rain had something to do with the poor turn out.

We, did however light our celtic pumpkins, and quietly contemplated the turning of the seasons. Autumn is gently fading, leaves fall, the air is cooler by the day and winter is not that far off. Winter - winter is the beginning and not the end.

Any hoo.

I've been a knittin'. Frantic finger aching knittin'. 

Squash in any free moment type knittin'. Looky looky!

I started another (yes another..) shawlette. 

This ball of  wool had almost been two other shawlettes 

but at the last moment were frogged. 

I finally settled for this pattern and finished it a happy happy knitter.

For those who think it is the same one I did before - I promise it isn't, 

look below, the one I wear all the time (on the right)  is much orangy/browner, 

where as the new one is tooooo pink for me.... A gift for some one may be???

Who ever gets to wear it, hopefully they will love wearing them as much as me!!

Then, no sooner as one shawlette finished....another begins....

obsessed moi? 

This one is delighting me as the colour variations gently slide into each other 

giving the impression of pseudo-fairisle - yummy! 

Now, I have plans for this one, to make it a bit more girly than first impressions. 

Ooh - can't wait!

There are other things on the hook and the needles but sshhhhhh - they're S*E*C*R*E*T!!

Hey ho, really glad that this week is ending. It has been 'interesting' at work and all this seems to have a knock on effect on me and consequently my family. Not making me a happy bunny. I think this is why I am frantically knitting - it is a form of escapist therapy!!

Well - here's to November - lets make it a creatively good 'un :) hawthorn  xxxxxxxxxxx

October's end

October's last day - Samhain tonight. The village will be filled with little ghosts and princess-witches. There will be knocking at the door and sweets given and costumes admired. This is the first year in many that we have simply not got involved. Oh - we have the sweets and we will answer the door and light up the window skyscape and pumpkins but the boys have suddenly grown up and don't want to actually join in with the festivity of it......boo.

We have a diva in our midst.

She poses and pouts. She wears her outfits with aplomb. She knows how to work her adoring crowds.

Oh, oh - here she comes!

Pan models a seasonally coloured cowl with wooden buttons made for a metro-sexual Siamese 

(his owner's description, not mine!)

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I thought I would do an October montage

A lot has happened.  Birthdays, foul weather, walking, Samhain, autumn arrived and Lily* vanished. 

*Yesterday, as I flung open the bedroom curtains, a big ginger cat was sitting on the kitchen roof. My heart did a skip but at the same time I knew it was not Lila. The cat turned and stared, it was a huge tom cat, short coated and sporting - a purple collar and bells.... He jumped off the roof and disappeared.

I think that this cat is the one that folk have been seeing. She has been gone for 15 days now, not a sign, nothing. We have to face facts - she is gone.

This and that and thank you x

Thank you all for your kind words and suggestions. Some we are following up, others we have already done, posters, checking sheds, garages, speaking to dog walkers, checking drains and ditches, rivers edges, walking out during the day, walking out during the night, ringing veterinary surgeries, local cat rescues, the cleansing department, the ID chipping centre etc etc.

But we have to face facts that today is a week and no sign. No body, no sightings - nothing. I still look out the window at any movement - just in case.

We are keeping our little Pan indoors, not that she is that put out, she is more timid, preferring our company than being on her own and as the weather cools, she is happier to stay at home. But that is not the answer, cats should be allowed out and about. Any hoo........

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

Youngest had asked a week or two ago for a knitted kerchief to wear whilst out walking. We chose a deep forest green in double knit with a black textured stripe as a contrast.

He wanted to wear it before I even had a chance to block it - so this weekend the kerchief had a walk out first and now is being blocked whilst Youngest is at school. Pan keeps sitting on it - hummmmmm, need to cat proof my blocking!

I then offered to knit one for Eldest. His reply - was very gracious (as gracious as a 14 year old teenager can be) in his new baritone voice 'No thanks......but, can you make one for my cat? In bright blue?'

I swear she is smiling :)

And finally, I have been doing a test knit (my first) and had fun doing it. Helped keep me busy. As the pattern is now out for sale I am sure I can share pictures and links.

Meet Humphrey the Camel.

His creator is Linda Dawkins from Natural Suburbia. Linda designs and makes the most gorgeous knitted creatures and I have long been a distant admirer, not trusting my novice ability on her patterns so when she asked for test knitters, I jumped at the chance and voila!  Humphrey.

I have other things on my needles, one item has been 'affectionately' dubbed the re-frogged scarf. I am on my third attempt....the previous two being frogged almost at point of completion. I should go with my gut instincts.....both scarflettes irked me as they grew on my needles but I kept going - just in case they improved....they didn't. So were duly frogged.

The present pattern I am now doing has potential - I just need to get further than frogging after about 30 rows. I will get there eventually!

I also have another cat cowl and crochet string bags on the go. Shame I have to go to work.

In the absence of the public, substitute with sheep

Long hours at work, once again, are eating into my crafting time. My head and heart are full of things to make but my hands are either at a keyboard or weighing out and counting tablets.

I am still managing to craft - albeit in smaller chunks than I would like...but that makes the 'making' only more precious. Snatched moments with yarn just before bedtime or in the car waiting for the boys to come out of school.

Last weekend we managed a walk out on my beloved dales. We re-trod a walk that had featured heavily in my mind all while my knee was out of action. I had an intense yearning to follow the path that lead us over stiles and through gates, across fields and alongside hills.  I even managed to get a little K.I.P-ing** when we stopped for our lunch.

As long as the breeze didn't get in on the action - the autumnal sun was delicious and I decided it was a good time to wear and share my latest shawlette.

I was, I have to admit, not that impressed with the colour way as I worked through. Two of my least favourite colours - yellow and pink - kept coming up and on occasion had the audacity to sit alongside each other. I was, like said, not impressed.

But, once blocked and wrapped around my neck, I fell in love. And my shawlette loved me back. *sigh*
Am knitting another.................

Am addicted.

Don't care.

And - coz I know you ask

Yarn:  Knitcol Trends 50gm (100% Lana Merino)
Pattern: The Age of Brass and Steam
Love?: Oh yes
Do again? (and again and again and again!)

**K.I.P-ing = Knitting In Public and in the absence of 'Public' substitute with sheep.

The calm AFTER the storm

Yesterday when I returned home from work (Thursday afternoons are mine and mine alone) I had an unhealthy itch to bond with the vaccum cleaner. Bordering on obsessive I whipped up a storm of plaster dust and building rubble as vacuum cleaner and me worked through in a determined-come-hell-or-high-water type of way. I am sure that the carpet was lifted off the floor with the suction to return to it's usual position in a quivering submissive manner. I dusted and wiped with a wet cloth, the water turning black with every rinsing. A red mist filled my glazed eyes - I*was*going*to*reclaim*my*house*from*the*plaster*dust* (this madness was briefly interrupted by the school run, feeding children, cats, dog, chickens, dispatching one off to music and dragging the other one up to his room to continue the BIG clean)

We continued, walls were vacuumed  skirting boards washed, curtains flicked and earmarked for the washing machine (which was already chewing it's way through a years worth of stashed clothing - the boys have inherited my tidying up genes....see abombstrukket). Pictures were removed off walls, dusted and stacked ready for the walls to be painted, toys were separated into re-home, keep, throw away - Eldest was shattered and pleaded to go and do homework (now that is a first!) 

Youngest returned from his musiscand was gang-pressed to continue in his brother's stead. We continued the unrelentless slash and burn action on the house. I was possessed. Youngest was procrastinating and eventually was banished to his  homework.

By 9.30pm I was finished - not in a-clean-house-sort-of-way, but in a-I-couldn't-do-another-thing-coz-I-was-so-tired-sort-of-way.

This morning - that whirlwind energy has all gone, I am back to my sore head and throat state, where only a mug of tea and some yarn action is all I can cope with....... So, the more gentle activity of knitting and tea sipping is bringing me back to equilibrium.

Don't think I could handle another frantic tidy up session for quite some time. If I show any inkling of doing so - please waft some wool below my nose (not too close I am still snotty!) to bring me back to my normal state - I thank you. 

WIP and help

Waiting to be played with.

Now, sitting in the sun, just about to press - ..Publish.. I am enjoying the quiet time, only the cats and the washing machine and me.......And Oh Yes In Case You Hadn't Realised! It Is F*R*I*D*A*Y!!

Have a good one xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Stair rods, abomstrukkets, knitting and other oddities

The rain today, on the school run, was of biblical proportions. Now, sitting by the fire with the cats and my knitting (and a box of tissues) it is still raining - in stair rods.....

I only started using those words - stair rods - after I got to know Himself. I used them without realising their origin.  It was only after a few years of usage I actually investigated the meaning and discovered that stair rods are the little wooden or metal strips used to hold a carpet fast against the steps of a staircase. Today's rain is definitely stair-rodding it down - straight arrows of water directly downward.  (As an aside - I have just sneezed and startled the cat so much she went from a sleepy pile of fluff in to a rigid legged sharp backed hissing attack-cat, she has settled back down, albeit a little wary as she keeps one eye on me).

On the subjects of using words with out realising their true meanings - here is another one. As a child with an untidy room (still struggling with that demon) I would watch my mom stride in, despairing at the artfully arranged mess and say 'look at your room -'it looks like abomstrukket - tidy up now!'

I would dutifully shove all my toys and shoes and anything else on the floor under my bed or into my cupboards and my bedroom would look a little less like the fabled abomstrukket. For years and years I would accept and call any mess an abomstrukket without even questioning the meaning. Until when, as a teenager, my mom was still accusing my now even messier room as an abomstrukket, I actually registered what she was saying in her anguish at my 'nest', my 'den', my room. She was (and I am sure you will have already worked this out) she was saying.... 'your room looks like a-bomb-has-struck-it'......

My nose and throat are a little rough today, hence the tissue box and the cat-startling-sneeze. Definitely feeling sorry for myself. But, through the haze of coughing and nose blowing I actually heard Himself say to me, just take it easy today and knit with the cats by the fire - gasp - what a man! Who am I to refuse such a suggestion.

Playing (for medicinal purposes you understand) with a self striping ball of yarn. 

Making another (!) kerchief/shawlette.

Had fun making this lace pattern up - once you have the basics then it is just a matter of having a repeating pattern that fits in the number of stitches on your knitting pins. Easy! (said after several frogging sessions and a fair bit of knitting related cussing.....)

Before blocking.

Picture colour rather poor in this driech grey light and the flash just removes any last shreds of decent colour so just imagine the rich russetty hue of the shawlette and the vibrant cheer of the multicoloured ball of yarn.

Today day is tipping day - tipping us towards the weekend - enjoy your Wednesday and remember, when it rains - you can make your own sunshine :)