Bootstrap's bootstraps

There's a bit in Pirates of the Carribean where they talk about how Bootstrap Bill got weighed down when they ties weights to his bootstraps and the other pirate murmers "bootstrap's bootstraps hur hur hur". I mention this because I have made a watchstrap. You see the connection....

So here you have my watch.

It is rubbish. Just the strap. The face is fine. So let us dispense with the strap and here it is:

I decided to make this one out of plaited wire.

So now I have a bracelet that's also a watch. I'm quite pleased with myself in case you can't tell which is why I'm blogging AGAIN and have taken so many pics.

While I was writing this a phonecall came in announcing the imminent arrival of a VERY drunk Pooch. Batten down the hatches.

There's a hole in my bucket

Tragedy has struck, readers. It's not often I'll be doing this but feast your eyes on this pic of my lillywhite ass.

Yes, my beloved jeans are losing structural integrity and exposing my elements to the elements. I love these jeans. I have loved them ever since their first outing on the golden jubilee weekend. But now they are leaving me thread by thread. Once I have the new sewing machine in my paws I will begin a rearguard action but until then I'm getting a patchy tan.

Blocked Lucinda's scarf last night and is all dry and lovely today. It is mobair mohair boucle in these lovely pinky shades. When I first attended ally pally (a mere two ago) I came across the mobair stand early and astonished myself by spending a whopping £18 on a skein of about 200g. This was an unheard of expense at the time but this is the third scarf I have got form that skein so it has turned out a bargain.

Keen eyed observers will notice a hint of the clapotis about it as it is knitted on the diagonal with double spaced rows every 8 or so rows. The blocking has brought out the detail really nicely.

Not wishing to lie idle I have done the foot of Lucy's first sock. These aren't for her birthday but are just a general gift - a pair each for her and Louise when I go down there towards the end of April. If I was a nutter I'd say I'd do a pair for their boyfriends too but I think I'll see how that goes.

The yarn is celestial merino from Gill at the woolly workshop (host of the byrne-wedding-knitlist). This particular colour keeps almost hurting my eyes. I once looked at a green laser (not directly, that would make you blind) that you couldn't see properly because the colour was saturating the receptors in your eyes. BoyAlex was doing an experiment with it and did actually explain it to me in physics words but they're long gone now. Anyway. The pink in this wool has the same effect on me as that laser did. But then Pooch thinks Lucy will love it so I am carrying on.

As you may have gathered from the chatty feel to this post I have again spent the whole day at home with no one to talk to other than you guys. Spent about 3 hours sleeping this afternoon and has left me feeling really disorientated. Am fine really apart from the 40-a-day coughing fits and incessant snoozing. Apart from anything else I have now missed 4 days out of the office including tues in bristol and only had 3 days in next week as I have the rest of the prince 2 training on thurs and fri next week so there might actually be a little bit of work for me to catch up on when I go back. Also not having gone in today means still no sewing machine. Which leaves me mildly concerned. I've already been sitting here watching tv and knitting for three days. Can I really take another two without going a tad stir crazy? The paint-your-own-pottery place is calling to me....

Ooooo Handbag

Yuck. I feel yuck. That Pooch....he's got a lot to answer for.

Have not managed to get much knitting done as I feel yuck. Would have been watching lousy films on video all day except Pooch unplugged the video about 2 months ago and despite repeated requests refuses to plug it back in because "It's easy - you can do it yourself". There is often this misunderstanding that because you have a physics degree you are 'good' with electrical appliances. This is what people with physics degrees do with wires. They tend to follow the same approach to plugging things in as the chef in the muppets does to cooking.

You know how he tends to err on the 'more is less' side of things and liberally fling flour and eggs around? Well physicists find something isn't working and think "Hmmm, there's an empty socket. Maybe if I plug this wire into it everything will work again." I don't do wires. I do cook a bit like the swedish chef though, which explains why lunch was nothing more adventurous than baked beans and frankly they haven't done much for the couped-up-waiting-for-the-happy-release-of-death atmosphere in here.

I have been thinking more about the whole bored/challenging thing and it doesn't make me exactly easy of mind. Let us take the Pooch as an example. Some people would say and many others would agree that life with Pooch follows a fairly simple equation..

Pooch = Challenging

He is a bit like a rubix cube where someone took all the stickers off and restuck them and now they're coming off a bit and there's 2 missing. BUT...could there come a time when I actually understand all the intricacies of the Pooch mind? I know he can't drink out of the randomly christened 'weed mug' and that he thinks things are going to hit him on the head all the time and that kermit is a god and computer games are not 'toys' and he can not leave the house without ironing his jeans and shoes have to co-ordinate with the shirt/t-shirt you are wearing and all of that. What if there's not that much left to learn? I talked to therapist louise about this at our last meeting and she told me about the 3/4 years cycle that relationships tend to get into where every 3/4 years there is a big doubt phase and re-evaluation and all that. Now Pooch and I sre due to marry 10 days after our third anniversary. Ooer. I'm not saying anything. I'm just saying is all.

Anyway, am feeling cold and coughy without my fluffy pink blanket. I'm pretty certain I'll never really 'get' Pooch completely so there's not actually anything to worry about. Pre-wedding nerves at 14 months? Weird.

Finished object and the lurgy

I have literally just this minute finished this little baby top for Timo's kiddywink.

I'm pretty pleased with it. The double stripe at the bottom and the appearance of the st st band were both, ahem, planned. Has anyone else ever done this? It was weird. I was talking to someone and looked down to find I'd done about 4 rows in st st instead of garter. Couldn't be bothered with unpicking so kept it in and made sure I did the same on the front panels.

I really like this pattern - it's from erika knight's simple knits for cherished babies and you knit it all in one and then sew up the sides.

Pooch has given me his manflu except it has obviously mutated and become painful on its way over to me. Have been in bristol all day on a business continuity workshop hence my earlier than usual bunking off. I was having a chat with sean the other day and was talking about how it was going and I announced my discovery. In order to find something interesting I need to find it difficult. Most things I don't consider difficult because it is just a matter of spending enough time on it. So its more of a patience issue. So what this means is that nothing is actually challenging unless you don't have enough time to learn the basics and produce something. So I need to do everything in very short timescales. Which would mean I'd be stressed and the likelihood of going mad again increases. SO. To summarise. I am going to be bored for many years to come. Or mad. It's a strange choice and perhaps requires a tad more thought.

Off to sneeze and work up hatred for Pooch and his mutated germs....

Why I do not exercise

Because it makes me feel so bloody awful. Been doing cardio stuff for 45 mins and feel absolutely disgusting. Anyway...

Have started a baby cardi for Timo, who is so wonderful at massages.

Two stripe purple which I thought was quite funky while not ommitting to any gender thing. This is some of the haworth stash. I have just reached a stage where I need a stitch holder and I swear these things are worse than stitchmarkers. This one looks like a massive baby pin. And it appears to be the only one I have left!


The sewing machine arrives tomorrow. Hoorah hoorah. Have a week off from 10th April so will be making it earn its keep that week.

Bought Pooch a rose at the weekend which is now looking purely wonderful.

We had a talk afterwards about buying things for people that they would actually want and appreciate but hey, I like it. Which is I guess the point of what he was saying.

Still feel like shit. I KNOW people say it will get easier with time but I've always loathed exercise and it never has in the past. God. Wretched exercise....

Olympia

The day didn't really start that well. As well as having to rush out for supplies for the man-flu-ridden-pooch I managed to leave without taking my pills. Got there in time for my first class which was 'crazy patchwork' where we made this card:

I didn't choose the design or the fabrics which are just not 'me' but I get the idea and that was the main point.

I was supposed to stay until 2.45 for a gilda baron painted landscape one but by half way through the patchwork my hand was shaking and I was finding it hard to concentrate. Made a beeline for the knitting area to say hello to Nic, Les, Tess, Yvonne, Fred et al and then looked around for the fabric area. Now the show was called "Stitch and Craft" so I thought there would be some sewing things, like fat quarters and had been really looking forward to choosing them. BUT turns out I hadn't paid enough attention and it was ALL cross stitch. And I mean ALL. There were about 3 knitting stands and some dodgy scrapbooking stuff upstairs but apart from that it was cross stitch central. And there are so many horrible cross stitch designs out there. I think I saw them all yesterday. So I went back home in my shakily dissappointed way. To be fair it did mention cross stitch all over the publicity stuff but why would they have pathwork classes if there wasn't going to be any fabric?

So I got back, medicated, and settled down for some online shopping. But do you know it's actually quite hard to buy fat quarters online? Either the places only sell half metres as min quantities or they had hardly any stock online (mail order only - how do they survive) or naff stuff. Eventually settled down to one store on ebay and this place www.cottonpatch.co.uk

Will show you the spoils as they arrive. What I did get at the show is these:


Finally the work on the brown jumper continues. Here is about 35cm of garter stitch. I've actually quite enjoyed it because I can just do it without thinking, but it's not that interesting to blog about.


Pooch now making disgusting noises on the beanbag so must go and tend to him. He is very high maintenance.

Public Apology

I am really sorry guys for being such a bad blogger. Has been period time here and with the pill cut down it has all made for a bit of a rollercoaster. Am hoping have got it sorted now.

In an effort to redeem myself here are a couple of snaps of this evening's adventure. You remember me mentioning a t-shirt with 'Mrs Pooch' written on it some time ago? I wore it at the engagement party 2 weekends ago and someone slopped red wine down my back. Stained pretty badly so rather than give up have been at it with fabric paint. Here's the 'new' back with all the stains covered up...

And here is the front in case anyone was curious!
Mut stop there as have a man down here - Pooch has self confessed man flu and is coughing rather impressively in the bathroom. He asked me today whether if he was made of wool and died would I knit him into a jumper? Then would I make sure to handwash it only and would I let anyone else wear it? The two of us are stupidly happy and in love at the moment. Which is always nice!

I'm too boring for my shirt

Can't remember whether I've shown this beforer but this is what happened to the kaffe fassett v-neck that was never meant to be. Doesn't it just say cushion cover to you?


The red and yellow socks need washing so I'm not going to photograph smelly socks. But I have refound the camera as you might be able to tell. I have started another pair of socks though for darling Lou and here they are.

This is in 'foxy lady' by...yes, i know....cherry tree hill. I know I know but this is my last indulgence as long as the celestial merino turns out well.

Finally I've done a crochet motif. Oh yes. Out of the 'starting crochet' book I bought about 2 years ago. For some weird rason it has cropped itself in a circle which I guess works. It is slightly septagonal after I accidentally did 2dc where 1 would have done on each corner. It was the first pattern I'd ever followed in crochet so I was quite happy with the turnout.


Wow, what a boring post. Sorry peeps.

Right, well.

Am having a bit of a camera block. I know where it is. I obviously know how it works. But for some reason I loathe the idea of using it. Weird huh? What this means is that I have finished my finest pair of socks yet in hand dyed red and yellow stripes but I can't photograph them. But here is an artistic impression:

Good huh? They are actually prettier than this but obviously I am being too gormless to do any better.

Well I'm in a stinker of a mood this morning. The great medication cut-down has been going really well but this weekend we have an added dose of PMT. And Mr Pooch, bless his smelly stinky feet, did come in at some ungodly hour last night and insist on waking me up to tell me the results of his man-to-man talk with Joe. And the thing is, he did tell me. Then he told me again. Then again. And then he seemed to think I hadn't quite got it so he old me again just in case. Then he summarised a couple of times.

Dude.

I wouldn't have minded, much, except a lot of it to my PMT saturated brain appeared to be along the lines of 'bad byrne'. This is all to do with the Louise-Joe thing. Apparently I have been egging them on too much. This is despite Pooch making it the main topic of conversation whenever we see each other (when Pooch and I see each other - all a bit weird really). In their drunken conflab last night they appear to have started out with "I've committed myself too early" from Joe with an occasional chorus of "uh huh uh huh" from Pooch to "She's the best, I want to boff her asap" with a chorus of "boop boop de boop" from a probably much drunker Pooch.

An example:
Pooch: Why byrne....why.....why.....why byrne?
Byrne: Why what you drunken fool?
Pooch: Why are you meeting Louise tomorrow?
Byrne: We've got things to talk about.
Pooch: No byrne. No.
Byrne: Yes
Pooch: No byrne. Byrne. Byrne! You need to leave them to it. You mustn't interfere.
Byrne: She asked me to go down you rancid idiot.
Pooch: No byrne. Poor Byrne. Poor Pooch.
Byrne: So why did you and Joe go out together tonight (leaving me on my own to eat tinned soup)? Wasn't it to talk about the two of them?
Pooch: But Byrne (at this point I accidentally nutted him on the nose with the back of my head while turning out of the inhalation line of his smokey arsed jumper and he then fell off the side of the bed where he was perched. He made a massive squawking noise and I turned on the light to see what the damage was, expecting blood and possibly brains. This caused more squawking and it turned out all that was wrong with him is that he didn't want the light on.)
Pooch (once more on the bed): It's not the same.
Byrne: Ok, fair enough (making hand gestures under the cover of darkness indicating my feelings on this amazing example of logic at its worst). Are you going to go to sleep now?
Pooch: I love you Byrne
Byrne: You'll love me even more when I'm well rested. Sleep time!
Pooch: Ok, but (and launches into one more repetition)

Dude.

Anyway, what else? Work has gone psycho with the most stressful day due to be either Monday or Tuesday this week. Basically if "it" doesn't happen on Monday "it" will happen on Tuesday. And if "it" doesn't happen at all then the repurcussions will start from Tuesday. And if "it" does happen "it" will directly impact on about 90% of my work and if "it" doesn't "it" will impact on 100% of my work. Nice huh?

This is byrne, 8.38 on a sunday morning with her second chocolate digestive already eaten signing off.

Life update

You know how I cut down another pill last Saturday and then haven't mentioned it since then? Well the fact is I basically forgot about it which is a good thing really because I wasn't being hyperaware of possible side-effects. But then when I found myself freaking out about not having a wedding dress (the wedding is 14 months away so this really is not a problem) and about to burst into tears on Oxford Street it did occur to me that maybe just maybe I was having a bit of a reaction. And sure enough when I got my mirror out (does everyone obsessively carry a mirror in their bag? I mean, what if you get an eyelash right?) and there I was with one pupil "normal" and one like a soup dish.

I'm not saying this is a failsafe diagnostic tool but I have consistently had weird dilation effects from any increase or decrease. It all looks a bit david bowie and small children do run away from me screaming for mother. So obviously being in this highly fragile state my first thought was 'sushi'. Actually this isn't quite true. I first did some really divine confused rambling as I was trying to buy a magazine (for no real reason, just felt the need) and kept going in and out of the same places and up and down the same bit of oxford street. I did think the security guard at Bond Street was going to ask me to accompany him after I drifted past with my crazy eyes for the fourth time. After I had stuffed my face my next thought was 'bed' so I dived home and got into it and was asleep by about 8.02pm. My eyes are still kooky which makes me dizzy and so I am having a day at home knitting bedsocks for a little old lady somehow related to someone at Golders Green. Poor thing has swollen ankles and feet of a massive 6" diameter so I am actually doing these socks in the round. Although that's actually on a circular rather than the dreaded dpns.

Before I go I have found a new spiritual home....Little Knits. Not that I haveany cash but when I do get paid, that is where I'm heading. I'm just waiting to hear cofirmation that they deliver to the UK. Anyway, I think that's enough for now. I'm just going to dizzyly wobble back to bed for a snooze.

CTH update

This is the message I got from them:

" HI i sorry to hear this. Cheryl is away for a family emergency and asked me get some details from you. The type of yarn, colorway, store you bought it at, and the dyelot. She said the plain blue the dye molecule is larger than the yarn molecule. When we get some of this info we will resolve this problem for you. Again sorry about this. If you would like to send us the yarn we will look at it and see if we can find the problem and we will get this dealt with for you. Thank You Kylie "

I only just got round to replying so will see what happens next. But that bit about molecules doesn't make any sense. You can't blind a scientist with science.

Bored? Moi?

Well people, here we are again at 3.25 pm on a wet and cold Tuesday afternoon in London, England. I have been passing a lot of today by listening to Ask A Ninja and Tiki Bar TV on iTunes. And how can this be I hear you ask? Well guess what….I’ve run out of stuff to do again.

Actually let’s be realistic here. I have got bar charts to draw. Bar charts. I have a physics degree and am about to start an MBA and I am drawing fricking bar charts in excel. Here, allow me to share a bar chart with you. Oh go on.
This is what we refer to in the trade as a-bar-chart-with-three-colours. Jesus. I’m so bored. Someone come drop something on my foot. Then I can move to the exciting surroundings of A&E.

So what to do about this? Weeeeeell, I have told Sean. He knows. He is clued in on the fact that I am underutilised at this moment in time. However he is behind me with an qualified accountant at each shoulder with all three of them trying to work out what happened to £500k because the auditors are in and they would actually quite like to know about it. And the auditors are in. “In” being a reference to in-the-room-with-the-whiteboard. So I can’t even go hang out in there. I could just go wonder off for an hour I suppose. No one would notice *sob* because they know I have meetings and stuff. Actually I could just choose to go home. Ooooo. I could tell Sean and he wouldn’t say anything. It’s 90 mins extra knitting. It's a bit weird though. And he's still over there trying to find the £500k. Could have a doctor appt....

Hmmm…. I’ll let you know how I get on.

Le Sac est fini

(and other bad bits of french).

That's it, the non-pink one. I thought I'd put the original in the picture as well for comparison. It's got a bit shapeless over the last year but Pooch says it is still superior. Here is a detail of the new 'smarter' bag.

Design imporvements include crocheting up the 'corners' to giv it some definition. This has kind of felted bayonf recognition on the left there but it does work. And then sewing the i-cord handles to the inner side of the stitches only so the front of the st st doesn't get mangled and distorted.

I have been updating this in light of the arrival of the invites...

This is the official record of our engagment and so far contains all the cards we got when we first announced it and now...

...the invitations, front and back. Yep, they are postcards. We have a limited budget and I adore tulips so they're everything I needed in an invite. Now to some this might look suspiciously like scrapbooking. Oh dear me no, no scrapbooking here. Just sticking things in an album. Not scrapbooking. No.

Rocketing off to a different topic we have the latest addition to Yoshimi's wardrobe, a little intarsia raglan. Need to pick up round the neck and join the side and arm seams and then it's done. I did think about cheating and claiming this as my project spectrum project but now, I am too honest. This morning I woke up with my mind made up and cast on a second pair of wrist warmers.

This is in the lovely james c brett which is surely becoming an obsession for me. Not much to show yet but I have posted because this actually IS the project spectrum project for March.

I can't remember now whether I mentioned this yesterday but I found an organic baby shop right by the cutty sark in Greenwich yesterday before I met up with Ruth and just couldn't help falling for these.

There is a reason for this. I am totally up for having a royal family and think they are lovely despite their philanderings and foibles. So when the golden jubilee came round I wore union jack pants and lusted after some union jack shoes I saw on oxford street. In the end I gave in to my desire only to find there were basically none left in a suitable size in the whole damn country. So now I am projecting this onto Shimi. Poor little thing but come on, aren't they awesome?!

The stash has landed

So where to start? Ruth was so lovely to keep it all for me. We met up this morning in Greenwich where she handed it over. Strangely there seemed to be rather more than I remembered and the suitcase I had brought with me to put it in was pitifully inadequate! (Ruth was off to the opening of the hipknits shop and told me some very exciting news. I won't spoil the surprise but keep an eye on her blog to hear about it!) Here it all is on the dining table:


Here is some lovely 4-ply from the skep

plus some cotton tape in yummy colours that will be baby clothes and maybe even a little vest for me if they'll stretch that far.

In the background that is james c brett in the new red colourway with some funky stripe-plyed stylecraft at the front.

Then to finish there is the small astrakhan mountain.

Actually that's not quite the finish. There is also this monster cone of about 1400g of tweedy stuff. This is for a jacket in the last Vogue magazine but I am going to knit it with a strand of something else - maybe threaded sequins or lurex - to amek it special.


Now you know the space dyed pencil-thick I got from Wingham and mentioned in the last post? Well, this is what it has become using my trusty denises and a 8mm crochet hook to define the corners.

I wanted a 'smarter' version of the pinkyred bag I did before and have actually felted this and am blocking it as you read. It has turned out *so* well. Just as I wanted it. I'll post pics tomorrow if I have a chance.

Just to keep you up to date I heard back from cherry tree within 24 hours and need to email them some more details but they are very sympathetic and want to get to the bottom of it.

Project Spectrum has begun, although I haven't had any emails from the organiser so I'm not sure if I'm officially included yet. The colour for March is red so I'm thinking of doing something in the james c brett. (I really love this yarn - you can get it from dianne's knitting yarns. It's acrylic but doesn't feel like it.) Just not sure what. I think I have got a bit overwhelmed with having all this new yarn and don't really know where to start. I'm not going to force it though - something will occur to me.

Now today is an important day on the byrne calender because today is the newest 2 pill day. For those of you new to my drug habit I take 60mg (3 pills) fluoxetine a day except Monday and Thursday when I take 40mg (2 pills). It has taken about 6 months to get to a point where I do not now feel irritable and depressed on Mondays and Thursdays. So today was a big day because it was the next stage of one of the slowest, most circumspect cut downs in history. I am feeling pretty tired (a regular side-effect) and a little bit irritable but on the whole I'm good. I'm not looking out for negative signs so I'm happy to believe I have been sensible and waited until the right time and my body is now happy to take this step closer to 'normal'. (How much do a loathe that word?!)

Also happening today - I got the wedding invites/postcards in the post so have been scrawling them on and off. At this point it is more of a 'keep-the-date-free' notice. 26 May 2007 people for those who like to plan ahead! It will be a modest affair with 50 or so of our dearest so sadly my sweet knitting buddies will be underrepresented but there is an engagement party next saturday. Email me/leave a comment with your email if you'd like to come along (erm, only regular readers will receive an invite. Nothing against you lurkers but you could be one of Pooch's ex's set on having a terrible revenge and be a danger to my stash.) I will post a pic of the invites as soon as I find the camera again.

Suddenly feeling in need of another snooze. Hopefully will dream of what to knit next!

Blue fingers and the stash starts to arrive

Let us deal with the first topic first. You know I love Cherry Tree Hill sock yarn? Well, you might also know they've had a bad rap recently because their colours have been fading in the wash. I myself have had a pair fade (as well as one pair be absolutely fine). Now last night I was happilly knitting away at Golders Green when I noticed my fingers had turned an interesting shade of blue.

I had loads of dye on me! I wasn't , ahem, sweaty. I was just sitting there minding my own business and the dye came off on my fingers. I am going to send an email to Mrs Cherry Tree Hill and see what she says. It doesn't bode well for the washing and also means if I want to continue I have to resign myself to blue hands. Anyway, I will see what she says.

So the stash has started to arrive - the parcel from Winghams has made its way home, at least in part. Let us start with the variegated DK that is a new line Wingham have started doing.

I would love to see some of this knitted up. I really love the colour but am not entirely sure it will suit me. Time will tell.


This is the pencil thick wool I am going to make another felted bag out of. This is what I made my first bag out of (and bought the wool at the Bradford trip in 2005). I saw a sample of this knitted up and loved the colours. A bit like moss on an old stone wall. Oo lala!

A rather lovely surina wood crochet hook.

Wingham had the whole range of ornate and plain crochet and knitting needles, straights and doouble points. The double points go up to about 15mm I think too and the prices are very good - the plains are about the same as your average john lewis own brand ones. This is a 12mm.

Now the other project I cast on from the cone I brought back is this:

I did the bra test and it's lovely wool but something it's just not talking to me. I've done 20 rows of 1x1 rib though on 3mm so there's no way I'm ripping that out in a hurry.

Now did I mention I have swung a business trip to Philadelphia in May? Is going to be awesome and feel free to suggest which yarn hot spots I should ensure are on my itinerary! Not that I need anymore yarn at the moment....

Photos (but not actually on the blog)

There are now SkipNorth photos up here. In other news I have had a letter published in the Inst of Physics member newspaper AND the stuff I bought from Winghams and paid to be posted is here already. Mmmmmmm. AND...I have made a big decision, actually a couple.

I am selling the knitting machine and ribber. £50 (what I paid), you collect. Life is just too short. And this way I can have the spinning wheel and there's no net gain in "stuff". Aha!

The other decisions are wedding related. Pooch and I have set a date: 26 May 2007 which is incidentally the eigth anniversary of when ManU won the treble. We are going to have our wedding list at some conventional place but there will also be a list pour moi at Woolly Workshop as Gill very nicely agreed to setting something up for me. How exciting! You see even if the list was at John Lewis all they have in the offbeat way is Noro which I don't rate (although I did see a fab shawl knitted in silk garden this weekend). This way I get Cherry Tree Hill and lots more! Woo ha! Invites and so on will go out in the autumn. There won't be room for many knitters unfortunately but I will be inviting a fair few of you to the hen afternoon (very refined) which will be at art4fun.co.uk in West Hampstead sometime in April 2007. I don't drink more than the odd sherry and like to be asleep by 10pm so I'm not up for a big night out or an expensive meal. And it will be painting for yourselves rather than for a marital tea set!

Pooch and I actually had a massive row last night. The weekend is the longest we've been apart maybe since we moved in together and I think we had both built up the homecoming in our minds a bit too much. We made up this morning though and now everything is sweet in the house of Pooch&Wool. I love my Pooch xx

SkipNorth - awesome

This is where we stayed, so the setting was lovely just for a start.

It was nice and comfortable and the food was excellent. There was also (how happy was I?) a YHA cat in residence.

I didn't get to spend long with her but I'd like to think we formed a bond for 10 minutes. More than that this photo gives me an opp to show off my Ruth Paisley Original that I purchased on the first night. You know I posted that hexhat buttopn a few posts ago? Well it was one she had made and I just fell totally in love with it at first sight. After buying it I was once seen in public without it before arriving back in London late last night and that one occasion was only because I was waiting for my hair to dry. That hat is the bomb.

The shopping was totally awesome. First Coldspring where we shopped our socks off. Then the Skep where we shopped our socks off before heading to the pub for a quick drink. Then Bombay Stores. Now there is a place with wow factor. Got some amazing fabric but there were shoes, clothes, jewellery, crafty bits. SO much stuff basically. Unfortunately we didn't have nearly long enough at any of these places. Nic and I have already decided less is more for next year (oh yes, I said "next year"!). Then on to the KCG Collection. Now there collection is amazing but what was almost equally amazing was the 1p a gram yarn mountain which I hadn't known about and those that did had assumed it would all be rubbish. But there was rowan and all sorts as far as the eye could see and dare I say we have added considerably to the buying power of the guild now through all our shopping.

This lovely dress was something that caught my eye. The photo doesn't do it justice but it was absolutely lovely and quite wedding-esque I thought in a kind of burne-jones type way.

As well as all the great shopping there was great chatting and knitting talk (as well as copious mentions of breasts and bernard matthews). The evenings were mini social whorls as we totally took over the lounge and did the spinning-and-knitting-in-public thang while glugging wine and sherry.

People had cooked cakes too which were scrumptious.

Sunday saw the final shopping destination and many people said to me that we had saved the best til last. I do love Wingham. Ruth who owns it was lovely and opened early for us and was so so helpful. As an added bonus I scored another cat.

It's left front paw was paralysed in a car accident some months ago but she gets around fine and as you can see frequently jumps up onto shelves and chases things. She was a big softy too. In fact it was a highly satisfactory weekend for cats.

At Wingham there was this particularly beautiful multi coloured merino roving. Yes, I did purchase just a tad. After we got back there was an excellent show and tell session with more knitting and chatting. People had brought some gorgeous things. Just as an example on this table...

...we have shawls from scotland, hats from Ruth (the same type as mine is at front right in its full hex glory) and then some lovely colinette patchwork creations. The mitred square one I am particularly loving and am thinking what to make one from. You avoid all the heaviness of sewing mitred squares together by picking up along the edges and doing it that way. So sensible and a technique that is in the patchwork knitting book I've already got.

So, do you want to see what I got then?

That's it. Because the thing is there just wasn't enough room in the car for everything and by the time we had packed the car absolutely to the brim the only two bags still on the pavement happened to be mine. I took the small brown cone of wool so I had something to get started on but all the rest went with Ruth so I will need (and I mean NEED) to meet up with her one evening soon to get it back here. Thank god she did have enough room in her car though as otherwise we would have been totally screwed. The other cebtre pull ball is some cherry tree hill that Jane gave me as a thank you present when we dropped her off. WHAT A DUDE. I can't see on the label what it is called but needless to say as soon as I got up this morning I wound the skein into the ball and cast on a sock. I LOVE this stuff. Can I say it again? She is a DUDE. So so far this morning I have done a swatch in the brown which has been residing in my bra for the last 2 hours doing the bra-test. And done the first inch of a sock. I will have to delay the gloating and stroking until later in the week. But...don't worry - I'll report in full when I do get it back.

These are just the tiniest part of the photos. The majority will be up at www.proudtobecrafty.co.uk by the end of this week.

Now I did mention next year because Nic and I have discussed making this an annual thing although with some necessary changes. One of which will be to offer accommodation in EITHER the hostel for still around £100 a head for the two nights or add a premium for people to stay in the hotel opposite in either single or shared rooms. We have also dicussed going overseas somewhere with a smaller group of people in the autumn so I'll let you know how that turns out.

Basically it was all very good but pretty tiring. It would have been nice to actually make a profit out of it instead or barely breaking even but now we know what works and what doesn't we can make the next one even better and hopefully attract some extra people along.

I met Kaffe!

Ok, how sad is this but Natalie took my picture with him while he was signing my book.

It was a really cool event at the V&A last night and I really enjoyed it. He is a very lovely man and spoke really well about the whole process and his inspirations. He also had two of the quilts from the V&A book with him and look at this...

He's using it as a darn tablecloth? This quilt was totally to die for. Wow. OK, I've caught the kaffe bug now. I now know what Nickerjac means.

Speaking of whom she will be here shortly for last minute scheming before we head off at 6am tomorrow morning for SKIPNORTH. Dudes. I am so excited. I even bought a bag.


Ha! See you on the otherside and clear those bandwidths for some awesome photos and tales of fun.

I'm not pregnant

I just wanted to make this clear. Not because I have been gaining around the circumference but because a certain something is 4 days late and I was starting to freak. Did an unforgivable but excellent thing to Pooch yesterday. I bought a test and did it when I got home. I did a little dance when it came out negative then took the spatula thing to where Pooch was with a worried look on my face. I silently showed it to him and gave him my best forlorn look and at first he waved me away. Then he realised what it was. Then, with panic causing his voice to rapidly scale an octave he squeaked "What does that mean?". I know it was mean but you know he only had a 15 second scare whereas I was stressing about it all day. Anyway, will be seeing the nurse on Thursday anyway so will ask her what's what if nothing has appeared by then.

So back to knitting....check this out (click on the button to get the pattern).

I am a long time admirer of Ruth's work but this one has really grabbed me, even though it is crochet.

No other pictures because I did NO knitting last night. This is because I was totally captivated by "Unleashed", a film with Jet Li, Bob Hoskins and Morgan Freeman. This was one hell of a film. The thing that really sets Jet Li apart for me is that he can really act - he isn't just ("just"?) a martial arts expert. This film was amazing and I failed to complete a row of garter stitch while it was on. I recommend it...

I love Pooch

Another pair of friends have broken up this weekend. That's two in about 4 weeks. Pooch and I have been having lots of hugs and generally been being in love with each other. We're so lucky to have found each other and to be safe and secure within our relationship.

So it was very good timing that this morning I finished sewing up his first pair of handknit socks.

This is the curious yarns sock wool in ocean that he bought me for our secret pal in January. It was a pleasure to knit with - really lovely stuff. Good consistency. Lovely colours. Soft and generally lovely. Pooch is very excited with them and I think actually surprised at how comfy they are.

I was going through all my pattern books last night listing the wool I'd need for all the projects I'd like to do. There were 19 in all and it came to over 5 kilos so I guess I might not get all of it at SkipNorth! In fact I really won't because I have omitted to save up for a blow out. Ah well. Something will turn up. But until then (remembering it is only 4 days til kick off) I am left with a deartyh of projects. Actually that's not true at all but I've gone right off the cargo jumper and the black shawl is not giving me enough immediate reward as it just goes on and on. So....

....I'm going to start a little jumper for none other than Yoshimi of course. When I was down there last weekend they both liked the intarsia designs in a book I had so I am going to start a very simple one. I'm thinking a conventional raglan or other jumper type in the darker rainbow wool with a heart on the front and back in the pinky wool. I say wool, but it is actually courtelle.

I will keep you update on progress!