Fancy any of these books for free?

I have occasionally mentioned Bookmooch before. I love it. You list books and people request them and you post them off. Then you request other people's books and they post them to you. No money involved. No hassle.

So this morning I started listing all the books and patterns I am destashing. They can be yours - for free! All you need to do is go to bookmooch and list 10 books you want to give away (they can be literally anything). Then you can search for my books and I'll post them to you free. 

Swap your books at BookMooch.com

Now just to be fair - my account is currently set up to only post to people in the UK. But if you are further afield and want a book leave me a comment with your bookmooch name and I'll reserve it for you so you can mooch it. Can't say fairer than that. 

 

Write your own story...

I was in a meeting earlier today and out of the window I could see these little footsteps.

 

It inspired a Scheherazadian diluge of stories to occur to me. Plus, if you follow them backwards, it looks like lots of little planes on a curvy runway. 

I'll leave you to create your own story...

It's cold outside

According to my phone is was -2 when I got up this morning. Far too nippy to get out of bed, but then a quick dance round the room to Nina Simone singing 'Feeling Good' and I was fine. When I did venture out the Dock had frozen. 

The seagulls always seem to handle this quite well, but the Coots, with their skeletal feet, just cannot walk on ice and end up staggering around like little drunkards. As I was walking past I could see the bubbles caught under the ice, looking like beautiful polka dots. 

I had gone out to go to Craftacular in Bethnal Green. (One of the things to do from my last post.) It was soooo crowded and so not the best place to be as you couldn't help jostling and being jostled. But I did get a lovely present for my parents so it was worth the visit. Sadly I can't blog about it as they occasionally check in here. It made me realise how close christmas is though. That was my first bit of xmas shopping so I think over the next couple of days I shall have to get on with it a bit more. I've got the next two days off work so I've got some sewing to do, some knitting to do, and some time for shopping. 

The knitting I've mainly been doing it the Inaugural Cardi by Annarella. I've had some fun with it but am now down to just the last sleeve. I tried it on earlier, with the single sleeve, and really like how it's turning out. 

The Dream in Colour yarn is delicious to work with and I do adore moss stitch. Another of the things on my to do list for the next 2 days is picking out the perfect buttons for it. That in itself is going to be a treat!

I've tweeted and blogged recently about the Slow Stashing article on Knitters Review. I've now finished my destash, with the result that more than half is heading elsewhere. Here's what that means in real terms. This is for charity:

And this is gradually going onto ebay:

There's a lot of history going with that lot but it really is a good feeling, and has given me a new momentum for tackling my books and other craft supplies. I think I was really trying to cocoon myself against the world with all this stuff. "I deserve it" had become my catchphrase instead of "I need it". Plus I very rarely did deserve it anyway, I just wanted it. So fingers crossed that this is a new dawn, a new day, a new life for me, because I'm feeling good. 

 

A Crafting We Will Go...

Social Butterfly that I am, there are now five things on my to do list for the next month.

1. Craftacular at Bethnal Green this sunday - I went to the summer one (blog post here) and had a great time so am definitely going to this one for some xmas shopping.

2. Deathtrap on Shaftesbury Avenue - looks like just my kind of thing.

3. Bridget Riley at the National Gallery - I have always loved her opart so am looking forward to seeing a proper exhibition along with art from those who have influenced her.

4. Wildlife Photographer of the Year at the Natural History Museum - I've always liked this exhbition and missed it last year because of my back. Looking forward to this one.

5. Book of the Dead at the British Museum - the BM is an easy walk from work now so am planning an evening viewing, if there are any.

If anyone fancies any of these let me know and we can meet up. I may already have found a willing victim for the Bridget Riley but the others are all open.

Swing, brother, swing.

This is the title of a Ngaio Marsh detective mystery. It is about a swing band and the accordian player is stabbed and so on and so forth. I am a big mystery reader and I do have a soft spot for the Inspector Alleyn mysteries. However, that is not the reason for the title - which is more to do with mood swings. It hasn't quite been metronomic, but there are some definite highs and lows going on.

I'm still taking part in the LSE 'Mappiness' study which involves plotting your happiness, relaxation level and awekeness using a little app. You can click here to see how happy people taking part are right now compared to the average. There's a map too and lots of other info on the site. I have now made 147 submissions to mappiness via the app and my graph is all over the fricking place. I started doing it just after Pooch and I separated so you can imagine for yourselves what some of the lows are about.

I compared it to a friend's and his was essentially the graph of a cheeky chirpy little bugger without a care in the world, which is fairly accurate.

I have been finally getting on with my stash review. I have been very influcenced by two things. The first is a print which the V&A has in their online store and which I will very shortly have in my flat:

The second was this article on 'Slow Stashing' from Knitters Review about a year ago. The article got a lot of attention when it was published but for some reason it has taken a year to sink in. So last night I went through about half my stash ans now have 2 bin bag fulls for charity and another bin bag full on ebay. (Click here if you're interested in some bargain Rowan etc). I can really relate to keeping stuff for 'should' reasons and that is most of the charity stuff. Also things that I had bought because I loved them but were just not speaking to me were definitely part of the 'unhappy' pile. And having done this I already feel so much better. A knitter on twitter wants some for her school knit club but there is plenty to go round so if anyone does want any for charity knitting then just email me your address and it's yours. Plus of course this frees up a lot of space in the flat which is gradually starting to look less stuffed and more homely. Somewhat ironic really when you consider the situation but there you go.

One of the lines I particularly liked from the article was:

"At its core, slow stashing involves being mindful of every skein we own, and only bringing in new skeins that are truly deserving of our time, our attention, and our resources".

Being mindful of every skein that we own is something that can easily be expanded to almost any sphere of life and ties in so well with the William Morris quote on the poster. Because if something is not useful, and you don't believe it to be beautiful in at least some small way, why give it space in your life?

Feeling Blue

I think it's fair to say I have been feeling a bit glum the last few days. It started when I had just finished watching the Lord Mayor Fireworks by myself on saturday.

I love fireworks. I hadn't been to see any for ages and so off I went.

They were really good but the thing is, they only lasted 10 minutes. Which left me in central london at 5.10pm on a sat night with nothing to do and no one to do it with. So I wondered about for a bit and had an early dinner of steak and champagne. Because I may be miserable but I know what I like.

So that left me fed and with nothing to do. So then a friend took pity on me and got me to go to a bar in shoredith to keep them company while they kept another friend company on a school reunion. A kind of double beard.

So I was there, drinking lemonade, watching what Temperance Brennan would have called "Hackney Hate Mating Rituals" and rapidly coming to the conclusion that this is what life holds for me.

So then I had this idea on the tube this morning.

How about a social network where you list an event you're wanting to go to by yourself and then others say whether they're going and you can arrange to meet. In a totally just-hanging-out-with-no-one-hitting-on-anyone-else kind of way. So I told the boys at work about it. Their response was to speculate the sheer quantity of lecherous apes it would attract and to suggest it be called various names which I'm not going to put here.

Really, what this all says to me is that I am lonely but don't want to date anyone. I really don't want to do that. And in the meantime I may be a bit lonely but I'm well, fed, roofed and have enough money. So really it could be an awful lot worse.

It's still all just a bit sad making though.

Pinterest

I am pretty much in love with Pinterest at the moment.

Sadly I've used up all my invitations but I signed up the waiting list and I think it was only about a week before I got my invite.It's just so handy. You create 'Boards' (think pinboards) and then pin stuff to them. This is my 'Embroidered Beautiful' Board. (You can see it in real life by clicking here.)

Then this is my 'OMG I want a cat so much' Board. (Click here for more.)

You add stuff by adding a shortcut button to your favourites menu bar and when you see an image you like, even if it's mixed up with a tonne of others and a load of text, you click the button and it isolates the images and asks you to click on the one you like. Then you select a board to pin it on and away you go.

I've always wished there was a way to categorise my Flickr favourites as well as a better way to collect lovely things together than just bookmarking the whole page. And here it is!

My Tweet Cloud

You can make your own here.

Resin Pendant Love

I just bought a kit for making some of these so have been seeking inspiration on Flickr.

1. IMG_5005, 2. sweet and salty 6 in a series of pretzel necklaces by isewcute, 3. Loveheart sweet pendant/necklace, 4. Handpainted Dog Silhouette On Black Resin Pendant Necklace, 5. resin pendant "pin up" necklace handmade, 6. resin pendant, 7. Custom Color Resin Guitar String Pendants, 8. Time Disc Pendant, 9. Resin Floral Pendant, 10. happy little ladybug - WATERPROOF resin necklace pendant, 11. Sad Jack - resin pendant, 12. Resin Button Pendant

Blogging for P-Hop

What Knits for Which Wrestler?

I always wanted to get Sky at home and Pooch didn't want to pay half because he said I'd watch Wrestling (and a load of other stuff) all the time. At the time I thought this was cruelly unfair, but in retrospect he was right. Since staying at Dann's I have been watching the two 2-hour shows Raw and Smackdown each week plus any special shows like Bragging Rights. I've also been catching up on things like Wrestlemania 26 from April. All in all it's a lot of wrestling. So naturally I have become slightly obsessed. So, possibly for the first and only time online, let us consider what knitted items these wrestlers would wear.

I've chosen a random sample of 8 Wrestlers from WWE. Some have only been wrestling a year, and some are 18-0 at Wrestlemania, and we all know what that means. 

Seamus

I first started thinking about this knitwear issue while pondering how they got Seamus to look so pale. 

He is the pale ginger one in the middle. Now don't make any mistake here - obviously they've gingered up his hair to go with the whole oi-rish thing - but he is 100% beef. He is 6ft6 and 272 lb. But they always fake tan the others whereas Seamus seems to glow persil white. So, this leads me to believe he has sensitive skin that maybe burns in the sun. Now to go with that irish puck-type hair I'm thinking an elf style hat. So I have chosen the Ribba Hat by WoollyWormhead. 

This one was knitted by Toastbrot on Ravelry here and I think the colours would be perfect for Seamus. 

Randy Orton

Now Randy, short for Randall but also apparently an abbreviation for Andrew, is in my opinion pretty near physically perfect. On WWE he is known as the Apex Predator. 6ft4, 245lbs, which means unbelievably he quite often looks short when with the others. He is fit though. 

I personally took that photo in April last year. Mmmm. So Randy is manliness personified and requires very little adornment. So I think a classic jumper. So let's go for a classic cabled jumper with a funnel neck.

 It leaves all those tattoos covered up and ready to be explored at a later date. This is a free Drops pattern on ravelry here.

Triple H

HHH is a legend. He's known as 'The Game'. He is my first wrestling love. 6ft4 and 255 lbs. He's also known as the 'Cerebral Assassin' which makes me laugh everytime anyone says it as I can only assume it's because they don;t know what cerebral means. 

This is another of my personal photos. He's out injured at the moment, although apparently is coming back very soon. Now the one thing I do not like about TripleH is his long hair. And long hair means inevitable bad hair days. So it's got to be a hat. 

And what better than my own most recently finished project. HHH could knit that himself. 

John Cena

Cena is the People's Champ. Literally. He is loved. There's an amazingly silly storyline at the moment where he's basically had to become the bitch of the baddy english wrestler - no it's not William Regal, he's a bit old now. It just means he gets to show what a legend he is a lot. A mere 6ft1 and 240lbs but he does look to be the most genuinely muscled of that lot. Serious definition going on. 

Now Cena is not only a wrestler, he's also starred in several films. Not quite in the Rock's league, but he's not that bad considering. So he has nothing to worry about, which is why I have chosen ribbed boxershorts. Because the ribbing will kind of ....cling. 

This is a free pattern on Ravelry here.

Edge

The Rated-R Superstar is 6ft5 and 250lbs. For a long time I thought he was a knob but he's been a bit more interesting recently. He wears a floor length black leather coat.

He's from Canada and it can get very cold up there, so I think a chunky jumper. And in keeping with that gothic vibe he's got going on, let's make it the Big Bad Wolf Pullover from Domiknitrix. Incidentally, I do like that book. Great how-to section which I've used for other projects, as well as the actual patterns. 

This one is by AnneArquis and she used a different gauge, but it looks good. 

Undertaker & Kane

These two are currently worst enemies because they are half-brothers, but their Dad, who had supported Undertaker, switched sides and went over to Kane about a month ago. Then things festered til Kane (7ft and 323 lbs) beat Undertaker (6ft10, 299lbs) in a 'buried alive' match when he....buried him alive. So actually Undertaker may be dead. Who knows. Except he's obviously not going to be. 

Undertaker is the one with long hair. So what knitwear would suit these two? Well...what else can you get siblings except matching sock monsters. 

I've loved Rebecca Danger's patterns since Nickerjac knitted me one as a get well present when I had my back op. So here are Sammy the Sock Monsters. This is a link to her etsy shop for the pattern. 

There are of course many other wrestlers so if you have a favourite I haven't covered here let me know. 

In my personal life, things continue to be fairly miserable, but Wrestling makes it all bearable. Thanks for all your comments and messages xx

Larkin About

An interlude to the emotional turmoil. There was a big review article in one of last week's Evening Standards about a new book of Philip Larkin's letters. I don't know his poetry but there was an excerpt as something he'd written in a letter to Monica on 27 Nov 1968. I rather like it.

Morning, noon & bloody night,
Seven sodding days a week,
I slave at filthy work, that might
Be done by any book-drunk freak.
This goes on til I kick the bucket:
FUCK IT FUCK IT FUCK IT FUCK IT

Consumed by sadness

After a rather tumultuous day, Pooch and I have mutually decided that it's over.

I am as upset as I have ever been. I've lost my best friend as well as my husband. It is just so utterly sad.

Day 19

Here we arrive at Day 19, and what do we see? Different hair colour, everything else the same. Hmmm.

Pooch and I have been talking a bit more recently and spent some time together at the weekend and had dinner last night. We have been talking about what we feel is wrong and what we've been happy about. At the moment there seems to be an awful lot that is wrong. Plus there are things wrong that I didn't know were wrong which have only come up since we started talking about what was wrong. So to keep the marriage going we are going to have to rebuild it completely.

This echoes a comment a reader called "Lauri" left that said....

"Just remember that you don't have to make any permanent decision. You can choose what's OK for now, and choose something else later. FWIW, I've been married for 21 years and marriage is HARD. It's really hard. You're not alone in finding that relationship the most difficult thing you will ever do!"

This is something I've thought about quite a lot, along with something in a book I've been reading about the 'fit' between two people. The fit there was when you met will not necessarily always fit right. People change over time and so the fit between them is bound to change too. Some things, after a while, just don't fit anymore.


Having decided that there was no point going back to Relate for a third time, we're going back to Relate for a third time. I changed my mind after drinking Raspberry Shortcake cocktails with a friend who I have never known to willingly answer any direct question, but who is good at reflecting stuff back to you.

Raspberry Shortcake Cocktail

* 1 shot Amaretto

* 1 shot Tuoca (no I have no idea what this is either. Plus the internet thinks the factory that makes it is closing down. I think vanilla vodka would do fine)

* 1 shot Chambourd (raspberry liquer)

* Cranberry Juice

* Ice

* Bucket to drink it out of

So. There you go.

Red Hair

Done at Pimps and Pinups. I'm really happy with it!

What are you going to do?

This is what everyone keeps asking me. It's also what I keep asking myself. What am I going to do, what am I going to do, what am I going to do, like a train clikkity click clikkity click.

It is all absorbing and everytime I stop doing something else I come back to it. It's terribly annoying. Mum wants me to go down to hers in Exmoor and stroke the cat. 

I can't say I'm not tempted. But it's not like I'd be leaving the choo choo behind in London. 

It just seems like every mortgage advert or every woman with a pram is rubbing my face in it. I assume as a self-defence mechanism by brain has started associating things with older, safer memories. Writing on a flipchart at work I had the most vivid flashback of having a piano lesson at primary school. The teacher was telling me how important joined up writing was because it meant you could write faster. 

I can remember the uniform I was wearing, the room, the temperature, the piano, the weather - all so vividly. I must have been about 8. Or getting on the bus yesterday I was reminded of a time I saw an old man drop a glove from the top deck and dragged my sister off the bus 2 stops early much to her fury so I could call after him to pick it up.

Of course by the time we got off the bus someone else had already done this and Sian was absolutely outraged and complained to Mum when we got home. I guess I was maybe 14? There have been other things - none of which I had thought about for 15+ years but which are vividly flashing back to me at random moments. All completely and utterly pointless. 

To try and take my mind off things I've been ploughing on with the grid embroidery. This picture is pretty awful because of the lighting but you get the idea. 

When I last showed it there were only 2 squares - the 1 and the pretzel. The newer ones are fairly self-explanatory except perhaps the cherries. When I was in Covent Garden on saturday I stopped off at a specialists to get the best chocolate bar on earth. Cherry Ripe. 

I have actually emailed Cadburys begging them to start selling them here but no reply. They're only native to Australia. Anyway, hence cherries.

I really hate emotions. Really hate them. Bleh.