Show me the fimo *long post alert*

Well ratfans, you've been very patient with me and I aim to please so without further ado let me introduce you to....a sea of badges.


The three at the front have little rings in them so I going to ponder necklace pendants and dangly earrings. The red and white one front right is a ring! All for me!

Here is a close up of one of the colours.

This is green, purple and pink which might seem nuts but is a homage to Pixeldiva's clapotis. Actually in that picture the colours don't look the same as I remember from Wed when I saw it 'in the fibre' but this is my interpretation of them. Plus check out me using the word fibre there. Subtle, huh?

OK, before I continue I want to appeal to the ladies out there reading this. Over the last 18 months I've gone from a 10/12 to an 8/10 to a 14 to a 12 and am back at 14. The madness, you understand. During that time my tummy has grown slightly more and slightly less tubby *but* it has consistently remained proportionally fatter on the left (my left as I look down). Now, is this normal? Do tummy's increase disproportionately? Is there any other body part I should be looking out for?

In other news, not that much is more newsworthy than my stomach, I HAVE FINISHED THE CURSED CLAPOTIS woooooooo haaaaaaaa! Take that clapotis, I am unstoppable! I took a pic of me holding it up to show that it's longer than I am tall and then did a spot fat-under-the-chin-check (OK, double chin, yes) so decided to cut out the bit with my chin.

You've still got a thigh there so can probably extrapolate the chin(s) from that.

Just to give it a little bit of 'zing' I have sewn one of my labels into one end so that no one is in any doubt as to who is the daddy. Aren't they adorable? From mini labels


You may have thought I was mistaken using the parent gender 'daddy' rather than 'mummy', but you would be wrong. Who's done that bbc-what-sex-is-your-brain-test? This isn't one of those 'answer 8 questions and we'll give you a comedy icon to put on your blog' things. This is the good stuff. And you come out somewhere between 100 woman and 100 male with them both on the same line. The average man is 50 male and the average woman is 50 female. The average Byrne is 50 male. I've got a fricking male brain?! How the frickity frick did that happen? I mean, and I don't wish to sound stereotypical here, I like pink. I adore kittens and fluufy things like gypsy yarn (I do the latter bit in secret mostly though because the rest of the time I pretend to be a yarn snob). I may have committed my recent life to physics, problem solving, lateral thinking, flat shoes and big pants BUT how can I have a male brain? Pooch is now actually scared to do the test in case he comes out less male than me. He says this isn't why he isn't doing it but I reckon that's just feminine coyness.

Also finished the 2nd charity jumper at long last and cast on the 70's brown socks (for the 3rd time - the yarn is bearing up well). Have decided to absolutely definitely buy denise needles on Monday as this also happens to be payday. That is unless Pooch (who is a gorgeous boyfriend, very well-hung and a tiger in the sack as well as being extremely generous) offers to treat me to them.

PS: pooch now shamed into taking the test - he is 50 male too. He had thought when I said I was 50 male I meant I was fifty more male than the average woman, not that I WAS an average male. Is now looking at me funny.

Badges

That's 8 more badges then! I just haven't had any time to blog properly or read anyone else's blogs for the last few days. I'll catch up this weekend, I promise.

Offer of a lifetime

The people who comment on my blog are lovely. Very very lovely. So I figured...I need to make 10 fimo bages for the group. When it comes to it, once you start you may as well continue SO anyone who emails me at littlelixie at hotmail dot com before midnight tonight UK time (and I shall be strict on this!) with their postal address can be sure of having a badge some time next week as long as I don't go loopy in a bigger way.

So email away you discerning reader. You've got til the clock strikes 12!

More bombs

and I'm still standing. God knows what has happened this time but the whole transport system has apparently shut down again. Ah well. C'est la vie.

So anyway, since I'm here I should probably put something more interesting down than the fact I am still here. At the knitting group last night I was pounced on the minute I got there with demands for fimo badges for the group so the starbucks staff know who we are and can give us freebies. So that's my weekend sorted! Oh man, now I need to restart my computer. It never rains but it pours...

Thanks everyone

It really does help having you all wish me well. Thanks for caring xx Will post more later.

To blog or not to blog (no knitting)

I wasn't going to blog for a few days til things had settled down but then that is just the kind of behaviour my therapist has been trying to get me out of (keeping it all to myself and not worrying others with what's actually going on). Because, of course, things took a turn for the worse yesterday morning when woke up wishing I were dead and then it went on from there. The samaritans really are amazing. I am talking to them every day at the mo. I was very agitated yesterday morning and very upset and this great guy calmed me down and then I got very upset last night and another guy did the same again. Just got a massive headache this morning to show for it all. Feeling much calmer today.

Don't have to go in til 10 as I'm at a workshop all day (no, can't sit at the back and keep my head down - I'm one of the speakers!) and then have relaxing knitting to go to tonight. Going to take it easy for a few hours this morning.

I know I said there was no knitting in this one but I have been hard at work on my knitting dolly which is really making people give me weird looks on the tube as it has a little face painted on it and everything. Am making i-cord to embellish my bag. I now *hate* the clapotis. The decreases are taking so fricking long!!! I just want to wear the damn thing. Finally - am swatching for my step-dad's aran cardigan. Thinking of this pattern but is still all open.

Wow, people really love those little fimo knitting balls as much as I do! Guess what I'll be doing this weekend?!

And finally - something else to look forward to...Liz posted to the UKHK list about a jumper and there were some photos in her album of temari balls. She's invited me up to hers in a couple of weeks to learn how to make them. Have been looking at them online and they are sooo pretty. Will naturally post about how it goes. I'm so pleased I joined UKHK and started this blog - it's helped me meet so many amazing people.

fimo, knitting, but first...

How could anyone human create something so goddamn tasty?

To the uninitiated this is a picture of Gu Hot Chocolate Souffle - sold in packs of two at all the best supermarkets. To call this a dessert is...just not enough. These things are sooooo..ooooo...oooooooo...oooooooo good. Oh, man, just finished one and I want more , NOW! Down girl, be strong. Think of the 12-step plan..

Because, readers, the 12 step plan is going very very well. I have written it down up to step 4 but I've got a load more in my head and I want you all to know that I am now at a place where....I do not *need* to buy yarn, even if it's a really good deal or I know I'll use it *soon* or it's rare or whatever. I can choose to buy it - but I now have a choice. Yes, it is true, I have a cure for SABLE.

Maybe this is partly because I am having so much fun with what I've already got...? Here, for example, is some plain old cotton I bought I while back when I was in a yarn store and felt I *had* to buy something even though it was all quite ghastly. You know my idea with the fabric markers? Well, I went for it and let loose. Holdin the pen in one hand and the other end of the cotton in the other I positioned pen over yarn and just pulled it along. Because the yarn has a twist and because of something, probably physics, the yarn followed the path of least resistance and so only the plys that were originally under the pen got coloured. This produced this quite cool helter skelter effect.


So off I went...and on the right here is what happened. Now I had done a whole bit in red, which is the bottom, then some in variegated purple (dash, plain, dash, plain etc) and then mucking about with pink and red above that. Because of the way the yarn is it didn't work out as I thought it would but I quite like the effect.

The one on the left is just where I knitted a swatch in plain cotton and then drew on it with the pens. That's an 'N' with a exclamation mark under it btw. I have yet to wash them both and see how they bear up.

Now finally, so far - I'm still in the middle of a creative burst - I got home and immediately sat down and made these:

You see I picked up some cocktail sticks on the way home and filed the points blunter and cut them in half and then made more little balls and stuck 'em in and there they are. That's one of my little sticth markers above them. I quite like these! Now what to do with them?

1. Stitch markers - but they are a bit too likely to get caught in the rest of the knitting so probably not that useful.
   
2. Earrings - either as they are on studs or dangly. Except I don't have pierced ears so they would be clip ons.
   
3. Necklace pendant.
4. Jacks - you know that game you play with a bouncy ball and pick up little spiky things as it bounces? I know what I mean.
   
5. Runes?!

So endless possibilities. I think maybe jewellery. I am well into fimo jewellery at the mo after meeting the woman who runs this website: http://www.fireflygifts.co.uk/catalogue.php?cat=Jewel⊂=10&item=98
She was wearing the necklace that goes with this. I love it - something for the next time I'm good I think. There's loads of lovely stuff on the site. Oooo, how about a silver ball of wool and gold tipped knitting needles? Ooooooooooo.

3rd day on 60mg and was much easier today. Spoke to Dr P and he said I should stay with it for a week and then go back down. Ho hum.

Fimo and felting

Mainly felting really. Finished the french market bag and here it is, volumous in it's splendour, hanging off a part of Pooch.

I used 4 and a bit balls of debbie bliss soho from getknitted.net (great range, strange service). It's huge, I thought to myself, but it will felt down about a 1/3 so will be fine. You see I had thought ahead and used 7mm needles instad of the recommended 5.5 and the fabric had come out really nicely:


OK, so it felted down by about 2/3 and is now a handbag rather than a market bag, and quite possibly the sturdiest one ever! A la....


Very excitedly danced into Pooch's high tech programming/my stash room and of course, he saw a different use for it!

Incidentally he says he is going to start a blog called "pooch's kennel" so that he can put his side of the story across when I am moaning about him on here...lol.

I bought one of those french knitting dollies as i-cord seems a bit too movement intensive and am going to needle felt some embellishment onto it. Watch this space (will be a while as the fabric is so thick it may take weeks to dry, even in this weather).

On to the fimo...I wanted to try and make some beads that looked like balls of yarn so that's what the ones on either end are. In terms of authenticity I prefer the left, but for ease of making it is the right for sure. The middle one is because when wonderful Trudie sent me her fimo stash she had some fabulous silver and gold in it which I had never seen before so I thought I'd try a bit out and see what happened - I love it!


Had emailed silkwood about some yarn i saw at nickerjacs - the one I mentioned at the end of my last post. Tess emailed me back and it is £12 for 100g and if you see this stuff you would expect twice that. But best of all she has invited me out to their studios as well - I haven't been this excited since Nickerjac invited me to hers! They have all the angora rabbits there and instead of uding a microwave to fix the dye they have big ovens - or so I hear! You can tell I'm excited because my exclamation mark quotient has markedly increased.

All this means today is going really well so far despite the fact I hardly slept. Headaches are there but not bad enough to need paracetamol and despite my wonderfully creative day already I have more planned for the rest of it. If all goes to plan i will have some dyed sock cotton using those fabric marker pens I bought on Monday by nightfall. *Sigh* if every day could be like this one....

Also excellent news adding to my happiness - secret pal has been in touch and parcel two is on the way. I keep hoping parcel one will turn up as at the moment it is still awol. So disappointing for both of us but am sure I will adore whatever the second contains.