Another big gap

But that is because I’m overloaded with other things to do. I have essays due in in a month, so funnily enough I’m working on those! Plus I’ve been to lots of Christmas get togethers 😀 Yay!
I have had time to do some knitting though. I’ve shrunk my mittens again, finished Shirley’s scarf, even if I need to send it to her still (eek!) and it is rather yummy. With the rest of the Kureyon, I made a bag from Felted Knits, and chucked it in the washer this weekend. The yarn felts nicely, but I think it might need another run as it isn’t really very solid yet. One of my Christmas pressies was a subscription to Rowan yarns and patterns (thanks to the DB’s parents for that!), so I’ve started the Freda poncho that I got as a free joining gift complete with the wool to make it – yay! Although it looks a bit odd at the mo… My lace knitting is not good. I’ll post pics at the weekend, as I can take them in decent light that way, and it might even be finished by then (it is a quick knit). At the moment I’m lucky if I see the sun during the day, as it is dark until 9ish am and from 3.30pm. Yucky winter, but at least we get some light!

Long time no posting

And that is because I’ve been busy again 🙁 Still have loads of stuff on the go though – there is always time to knit…
I’ve started on a cloche from knit One Felt Too in Rowan Magpie, I’m making a bag from Noro Kureyon from Felted Knits, I’m still planning to make Pinup Queen, and I haven’t done much work on my Sirdar jumper I’m afraid. I’ve been cutting netting too to make a bag from New Knits by Erika Knight
I’ve also just finished sewing a tote bag from Sew Fast, Sew Easy, which I am v happy with indeed (the lining and bag material were a perfect match in colour, which helps hide any nasties that I made). It was easy, but not that fast! The sewing was fast, but that was only about 25% of the work… Most of the work was cutting, pressing and turning the straps inside out. I think I’ll make more though, because I managed to make something that fooled people at work into thinking I’d bought it 🙂 Would work well for gifts. Would also look rather nice with some hand embroidered stuff on it… I think I’d like to try the skirt from the book next. I’ve been dieting, because I’m a fat cow (but still not as bad as I used to be). Doing ok so far, but dieting has stopped me from going for knitting or making clothes. But, making clothes is cheaper for the most part than buying, and I like the idea of having something personal and unique, so I may still make something…
Oh, and have also done work, coursework, spent time with Dave. 🙂

Brrrrrrrrr

It is bloody cold. We had our first snow on Thursday evening, and it carried on for most of the night. Then it froze, and it is vvvvvv cold now. Apparently someone local saw a waxwing, and that means the winter will be harsh, but I don’t need a bird to tell me that right now! The poor birds are crowding over the feeders, but one of them froze up, as well as the bird bath and the pond.
No time for knitting this week, as have had too much studying to do. However, went with mum to Up Country again yesterday, and spent some of my bonus from this month’s paypacket… Bought some more Maya to finish my mittens and make a matching scarf with. Also bought some lovely Jaeger merino wool that was half price. Haven’t decided what to do with it – there is a tad under 700 metres of it in a lovely taupy green colour, and it is so soft that I want to think carefully about what to use it on. I could use it for lots of little bits and pieces, or I could save it to make a sleeveless top to wear over shirts at work. I’m not sure yet.
Spent a large portion of my bonus on other stuff too, but it means that my brother now has his Christmas and birthday pressie, I have new boots, material for a tote bag, and we have food from the continental market (and good old Sainsburys). The cheeses from the market will probably be almost gone by the end of the week knowing us, but I want to try a new diet this week from Wednesday, so hopefully the freezing the salesman recommended will work…
To remind myself, today I must do some more studying, iron, plant the bulbs that have been sitting in the kitchen so long that they are sprouting (but it’s SO cold outside), and get the chance to relax too before I go back to work and have piles of stuff to deal with tomorrow 🙁 Hopefully get my mitten finished and felt them both so I can be all warm waiting for the bus. Also need to get my arse in gear and work on my Sirdar jumper.
Fat chance of doing all that.
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Birthdays and toilet lollies

Friday was Briony’s birthday, so we went on the town after work to celebrate. Things didn’t quite go to plan, but we did have a good night anyway. The first pub we went to had stopped serving food. The next one had almost stopped serving. We drank. Then Briony decided we should all have Aftershocks. Aftershock is kind of a legal version of the most potent form of absinth. But Aftershock tastes like kids’ medicine. It is vile. We all downed a shot. That was when we started hallucinating…
I realised I was going mad when I saw a man in stripey top, and thought he had a boob tube on. Several times I looked at him, and could simply not see anything other than that dark patch around his chest. Many will say I was drunk. I will say that I felt as sober as anything, and that it was the Aftershock. Two small bottles of Becks does not make someone drunk when they are used to a glass or two of wine 2 or 3 times a week. I could walk fine, I had complete control of my speech, but my eyesight and brain were not functioning in their normal way. They just couldn’t connect to each other. Then DB went to the loo to clean his contact lenses (perhaps he was having the same problem and thought it was the lenses).
He came back with a look of utter bewilderment. He had met a man in the toilet. The man had a large mop and bucket with him, so DB assumed he was a cleaner. But then the man started to get out some lollipops and place them on the sink counter. DB washed his hands. The man came over and sprayed them with liquid soap or something. DB got slightly afraid, and the Aftershock being what it is, he also became confused. Varsity is not the kind of chain to offer a toilet assistant. Particularly in the gents. They sell vibrators in a machine in the ladies loo. For a fiver. They are not classy at all. DB decided to run before it got too risky.
When he came and told us, we laughed. We thought it was the booze talking (but luckily DB refrained from performing his fave joke on the subject). S went in to see. He came back some time later with a completely stumped look on his face. The man had asked S if he wanted some perfume for his pussy, and performed the appropriate crotch grabbing action (luckily on himself, not on S). Or a lolly. S ran.
Some time later, waiting for B to arrive and yawning a little (as I pointed out, being tired at 10pm when you started drinking at 5pm is pretty much the same as going out at 8 and being tired 1am, so we aren’t getting older and more decrepit really), S disappeared. He came back with 6 toilet lollipops. He had bought edible items from the blokes loo. Apparently, the toilet man want a quid each for them, so S proclaimed that he would not be paying that much. So the toilet man gave him a once in a lifetime offer of 6 for two quid. You can buy the bloody things in the shop for 25p each, so he was still ripped off. But none of us really wanted to open them. They’ve been in the loos! Although we did fight over the flavours. The last one left over was Herb flavour, which we happily interpreted, in our Aftershock haze, to be Herpes flavour. Having been stored in the blokes’ lav of a pub, it wouldn’t surprise me…
I have not heard from the others yet as to whether they are alive, managed to stop longer than DB and yours truely, and got to dance like they planned. I do hope they can see still.

Not much knitting, but lots of studying

As the title says, I haven’t knitted much so far this week. I’ve done a bit of the tab top bag in Felted Knits, but that’s it so far. Too busy studying and dossing, and being brain dead and sleepy. And going to the supermarket.
Anyway, PH has kindly offered his support for my music taste, and asks what DB means. As any knitter knows (so PyramidHead is very blatently not one 😉 as he already knows), DB means “darling boyfriend”. There is a lot more terminology that Neil has yet to discover. Some of it he might get scared by, if he isn’t already 😀

A gentle weekend

I value my weekends far too much. Because I tend to go to bed quite early in comparison to some people my age (and crikey do I feel old for it, but I’ll live longer…), I don’t get to see much of the db, in between cooking and him having a bath, and me studying and going to bed. This weekend was nice. I studied and knitted another felted bag for someone at work (the same pattern from Hello Yarn, but in Rowan Chunky Print in Tart – I’ll take a picture when it has dried, cos I think I might knit a corsage for it, but the yarn seemed to go further, while the bag felted smaller. V odd). I cleaned up, made sushi, watched some telly (Touching the Void, which was excellent, AI, which is quite good until the Speilberg element kicks in and makes it pants, the Peel tribute, which made me very sad). I spent ages trying to work out what to make for myself now that I have pretty much finished the requests from everyone I know for now (I decided on making another bag, but for me this time, out of Kureyon from the Felted Knits book by Beverly Galeskas). Also decided that I’d like to make some mittens out of the Maya, and get another couple of hanks in different colours to make a scarf and felt that too to match. I’ve already got a test swatch in it, and it felts a treat 🙂
I’ve also got addicted to the Zutons and Goldfrappe, and Franz Ferdinand, AND the Scissor Sisters… Don’t have any of the albums yet, but I have listened to them, and I can’t get the songs out of my brain 🙂 I had the Zutons going round my brain at work and I couldn’t stop humming the single :S
Anyway, the weekend still has a small glass of wine, the lovely Micheal Palin and an extremely silly programme about US troops learning how to stop the hearts of goats by staring at them…

My first felt

I made this bag this weekend, and dressed it up yesterday. It will be a birthday gift for Katy, and I don’t mind saying so, because she doesn’t really do the web thing 🙂 But it does mean that I can get my mates to look and tell me whether they think she will like it before I give it to her (and give me a back out clause in case I decide to get her something else)…
Felted bag.JPG
Am also a little disappointed that Bush looks to be voted back in for another term. But then we don’t see him the way the US sees him. In the UK he is presented as a bumbling puppet, but also a puppeteer of Blair, but I’ve heard tell he is quite enigmatic when you see him unedited. But then, as DB says, Hitler was enigmatic too… 😉 Maybe he’ll calm down now that he knows he has had his final election and get on with making right decisions. Who knows…?

Post-shopping guilt and not enough studying

Well, yesterday was pretty good. I took my mum to Holmfirth as planned, and we managed to spend 3 hours in two shops. The first was a little gift/furniture shop. It was based in a lovely old house complete with all the original features – fireplaces, bread ovens, butler’s sinks (well the sinks themselves were missing but the stone base was still there and being used as a display shelf). Lovely place, almost maze like, with some gorgeous and not so gorgeous things in it. The other hour and a half or so was spent in Up Country (again!). My mum loved it there. Unfortunately, it turned out to be me who spent the money, although the only reason mum didn’t buy was by some sage advice from the owner on the kind of stuff she would need. Bought some Rowan chunky print to make felted bags out of. One is to be yet another birthday gift (hopefully – I’m not sure it will work yet) made from a free pattern at Hello Yarn. It looks pretty simple and fairly quick. Just depends on the yarn and its felting capability. Cross fingers! Also bought a hank of Debbie Bliss Maya in a green. No idea what I’ll do with it, but I like the look and feel of it, and it will work for all kinds of things…
Came back to Huddersfield then, and mum took me to Beatties to try and find poncho patterns for her. She doesn’t like most of them, but she did manage to find a Sirdar pattern there that has everything she wants. The yarn was a bit steep though for something of that size (it is quite a long one, knit in denim ultra, so it is pretty chunky too), so we went to the market to try and find something to sub for it. No luck there I’m afraid. The wool shop there isn’t the best for bargains 🙁 They do have a few bits and pieces, and satisfy the basics, but Huddersfield is not good for wool shopping. That’s why we ended up in Holmfirth in the first place. 🙁 Mum will have to hunt Hull for somewhere to buy from now.
Anyway, the SnB charm bag is done at last, thanks to MonsterGirl at craftster.org giving me a kick up the backside about it 🙂 Here it is. I’ve taken the pic with my purse and phone for sizing. I’m a bit cheesed off that I couldn’t get better handles, but they do, and they were the right price.
SnB Charm bag finished.jpg
Only Sarah M.’s to do now. Plus all the other stuff I have piled up waiting. Plus studying. I have had to force myself to sit down and study loads today. I’m a lecture or two behind at the mo, because of all the scarves I’ve been making! Must start making money out of the things…

Scarves, scarves and more scarves…

Well, the silly scarf appears to have taken off a bit. Not only does Briony have one, but Sarah M. and Amanda is considering an investment in my time too 🙂 Woo!
Also, do a search in google for stuff I mention on here, and apparently I rank rather highly. Goodness knows why though…
Mum is coming over this weekend for her birthday treat. My re-discovery of knitting has inspired her, and she has now made two scarves herself in the past 4 days, plus has plans for a poncho. Therefore we plan a rather tasty shopping trip to Holmfirth and Up Country 😀 Oh dear, what a shame! Then we come back to town to shop, and then brother will be coming over too to do the meal thing. Jumbo chinese anyone? Not sure that will do the tummy thing anygood tho. Think I may have to copy another blog and do some online dieting/knitting therapy.
I learnt some new things today, which is a good thing, as I better do while I’m doing the masters! I learnt something that never was taught when I was at school but seems to be part and parcel now. Metonymy and synedoche are both very interesting words for things that we use everyday without realising it. They are also very important for librarians, because they make life very difficult 🙁 Lets see if I can get this right… The former is using a property or result of a thing to refer to it (e.g. smokes = ciggies). The latter is when you use a part of something to refer to the whole (e.g. wheels = car). I have no doubt that someone will tell me otherwise sooner or later… My, I have an interesting life 😉

Dooby doo and a bit sad

Firstly, a very sad day. My fave DJ, John Peel has died. Big shock to the system. He basically taught me to love most of the music that I am into now, and therefore made me the woman I am today. Without Peelie, I would never have found my love of PJ Harvey, and (and this is sad in a cheesey way), would never have met my partner, Dave. So, in a really appallingly small world crappy way, a lot of his work has helped make and change my life.
Peelie – you will be missed a great deal. The world will miss your dry humour and down to earth politics.
Anyway, back to normal boring day to day stuff. Today I finished the silly scarf my friend asked for yesterday. It is the pink mess from last week, but in blue variegated Bigga, with blue Fizz. I actually like it a lot, even tho the yarn was a bit gammy looking on the ball. The fizz really perks it up. I have half a ball of Fizz left, so am relying on the wonderful people of craftster.org to guide me as to how to use the weird stuff up.
Have used up the pink Bigga on a hat from ChicKnits. DB laughed when I put it on, as it is a bit old lady-ish/teacosy like, but it is warm and cosy like the scarf. I’ll see if I can get a decent pic of it. I have the sneaky feeling that friend with blue scarf might want the hat as well, but maybe not 😀
Next job, to finish Sarah. M’s SnB bag and Shirley’s birthday scarf… And to go yarn shopping at Up Country in Holmfirth with Annie 😀 Yay!
Lastly, thank goodness for Little Britain on BBC3. What would I do without the crap transvestites, Vicki Pollard and Tom Baker’s voice over?