Stand Back. I am going to try Science.

When I moved, my best friend helped (i.e. did most of it) while wearing this t-shirt.

Source: store.xkcd.com via Alex on Pinterest

Alex (his name is Alex too - but he's male. We shared a flat once and people asked whether it got confusing. I always felt it would have been more confusing if it had been confusing.) is a proper scientist with a PhD which he strangely refuses to use (as in the "Dr" bit) and now works in Science Policy. He may be on linked in. He's met Neil Armstrong and knows Prof Brian Cox off the telly. He occasionally politely humours me when I come out with something vaguely scientific because although we did our Physics degrees together I have forgotten 99.9% of mine whereas his brain just keeps expanding daily. I was reminded of this in my therapy session this week where, for reasons that will become clear, I started talking about one theory to do with the creation of the universe.

Think of the path a bouncy ball makes as it bounces across the room.The ball hits the floor and *boing* that is the big bang. It springs up into the air and that is where we currently are - the universe is expanding. The ball stops rising and starts to fall again - the universe stops expanding and starts shrinking. Ball nears the floor again and then goes off again - the universe shrinks to nothing in a big unbang and then big bangs again and it *boing* all starts again.

I dare say that since I did Astrophysics someone has disproved this theory.

Alex would know. But it came up in therapy because we were talking about recognising cycles and patterns. The Therapist is naturally very keen on me getting better and not having a recurrence at a future date. So she keeps pointing out that I've gone mad before and got better, so can do the same thing this time. My counter argument, and the reason for the undoubtedly scientifically inaccurate analogy, is that it did get better, then it got worse again. And so far the getting better and the getting worse again have happened in equal numbers which looks to me like a cycle. But then once you have recognised the cycle you have to break it.

In my science-addled mind I'm going to call this "Going Supernova on your Own Arse" although Alex will explain to me how that is wrong.

Of course it is often said that there is nothing new on heaven or earth, so I find it easy to believe that life is mostly a series of repeating cycles of behaviour. This is often born out in knitting, where I find myself making the same pattern more than once, or at least using the familiar increases and decreases. But with the SunRay Ribbing top I am returning to something I had mostly frogged and cast aside.

Not only am I returning to something that is broken, I have also converted the pattern to knit in the round so as I fix myself my knitting also revolves. As I knit I have been thinking about my next project, which I hope will be something that has been inspired by being down here at my Mums. She has a collection of Spode and other blue and white china. As I have eaten from these plates and bowls during the past few weeks I have grown more aware of the patterns, and the way they might translate into fairisle.

There is a free online tool for converting photos to charts for embroidery and knitting here. It needs some work and manipulation, but I think it could work.

It will certainly make it easier to chart a whole jumper's worth.

I leave you with a final thought.

Source: store.xkcd.com via Alex on Pinterest

6 Years of Lixie

Today is the 6th anniversary of this blog. From that first week when I couldn't get the pictres to work properly, through all the ups and downs, I have arrived here - somewhat bruised and battered but still in pretty good nick.

Looking back I see a mention of my stash filling 4 boxes (fairly small ones too from the picture) at the time when Pooch and I first moved in together and wondering whether to try and hide this from Pooch and enter into a life of deceit, or just brazen it out. Considering that after my recent move to a much smaller flat it was 4 bin bags worth, and that was after a massive destash, I am once again struck by how things that seemed so important or tragic or serious just a few years ago become so nonsensical and trivial with hindsight. In a few years am I going to be looking back on my marriage breakup in much the same way as I do on when Matt Andrews didn't really notice me when I was 14? Back then I'd spend hours writing in my diary about how unfair it was. Now I have a blog. Somethings change while others stay the same.

Of course there have been some great times over the last 6 years. I've made brilliant friends through knitting and blogging - Nickerjac especially who I first 'met' through her blog (and blogged about the day we first actually met back in June 2005). It was together that we started SkipNorth and although I'm very sad to have missed out on the recent one I'm really proud of how they have grown from such humble beginnings. It was also Nickerjac who taught me magic loop which enabled me to move from my obsession with socks knitting flat and seamed up the sides to actual proper socks, which are now my default go to item if I want something fairly calming to knit.

My recent rerun with depression has made it harder to think ahead, and certainly when this episode first started I couldn't think 6 minutes ahead, never mind any longer than that. Thanks to my Mum and the meds I am now feeling a lot better and will be back at work again next week. I think looking ahead another 6 years might be a bit ambitious, but let's put some goals in for the next 6 months.

• Finish the blog header I started, or at least did an M and an I for.
• Find a knitting group and go at least twice a month.
• Finish the hexagon patchwork quilt.
• Book a holiday to replace the one to Seville I've just had to cancel.

Modest ambitions, but all achievable.

To end, I've put together some photos, although these are only for the last four years since I wasn't using Flickr before then.

www.flickr.com <> <> <> <> <> <> <> Littlelixie's 4 years of Lixie photoset



Thanks peeps

Everyone has left such lovely comments - thanks for that. I've cherished all of them. The meeting with the consultant went well and he remembered me from all those years previously and asked whether I was still knitting. While packing for my recent move I cme across a pair of intarsia socks I'd been making him, flat on two needles, that were really pretty rubbish. I boldly threw them out, thinking all the while that I would never finish them because I wouldn't see him again. Oh irony. So naturally I am now making him another pair.

I am all about simplicity at the moment. I have this horrible feeling that if something even slightly unfamiliar happened I wouldn't be able to cope so intarsia and anything more complicated than a pattern I have made before was out. Fortunately I have made two jaywalkers before and has this Regia from a long past SkipNorth. It looks more complicated than it is too, which is always a bonus.

I've been knitting socks at a fairly impressive rate since I spend quite a lot of each day knitting at the moment. I used up some Koigu I'd had in my stash for maybe 6 years.

I was a bit dissapointed but I think that is down to my colour choices. I had a 50g skein of blue and another of green so striped them. Plus they came out too big (my fault for not checking guage) although I've given them to my mum and she loves them. I also finished a pair of Cookie A Kai Mei (I only had the toe left to do on one of them) which I cast on just after I'd moved out of the marital home last October.

My second pair of these and they won;t be my last. I really love the pattern and the fit of the final sock. The yarn was from The Knitting Goddess which I got at some show or other and I'm sorry to see it's discontinued as it is very soft (BFL) and the colours are lovely. She has lots of other sock yarns though so worth a look.

I am signed off for another week and have my first therapist appointment next Thursday so I'll be staying down here in Exmoor with my Mum and Dad til then. They have been so wonderful, plus there is an added bonus in the following shape:

Her name is Artemis (goddess of the hunt - and she is an awesome hunter) and she is the only cat I have ever known who will lie on her back so you can stroke her stomach.

Had a Visitor

It's been quite a while now since the black dog came to visit. Which makes it even more of an appalling shock. A week ago, night three in my lovely new flat, I suddenly started panicking and have been a in a state of terror since. It's illogical, it's crippling, it's my old friend come for a visit. I've been down at my Mum's since wednesday and have an appt later this week to see the Consultant who put me on the right road last time. In the meantime I'm just hanging on by my fingertips and trying to keep food down. I'm incapable of doing much else - it's taken me a week to actually blog.

Thoughts on Being Single

As a single woman there are many things you suddenly need to think about that, to be honest, did not really matter that much anymore. For instance, first impressions. It hadn't mattered for the last 6 years if the first thing an eligible young man heard me say was "He's got about as much of a chance of getting that approved as the hensen has of living through the whole episode of Star Trek." 

Or indeed if I said this while sporting hair that needed washing and cheap jeans. Because I had my Beloved who knew of my Star Trek knowledge and rarely took notice of my jeans or hair. But now...well. One never knows, in this modern metrosexual world, when to expect one's next close up. With the result that things like bikini lines and matching underwear have once more popped into my life. 

I did already have some nice underwear, but just not that much of it. So I decided yesterday that this was the best possible time to go shopping for some. So off I went. I chose Debenhams. I have tried John Lewis and I have tried House of Fraser and they are both laid out weirdly so you get lost wondering about, like Father Ted. But the Debenhams on Oxford Street packs it all in there tighter than a thong and so you get maximum shop for minimum schlop. 

I think no one who has read this blog before can be in doubt of my polka dot addiction. The only surprise about my new undies is that only two of the sets feature them, and only on these are they the main attraction. Purest silk. I shall wear these while playing quoits on the sundeck of a cruise liner. Under my ASOS play-suit which will be a playful little thing with a nautical theme. 

A more practical cotton for those days on the farm when the cherries have ripened and need picking and making into good old cherry pie. To be topped off with a pinafore dress and one of those smock aprons. Plus hair up in a teatowel to stop the flour getting in it. Or it in the flour.

With a B for Byrne, these babies take no prisoners as I strut on 4 inch black patent stilettos from one high powered meeting to another. Lunching on sushi and expresso, I exchange flirtatious glances with the man from Marketing before making him redundant at 3pm.

It's the first night at the Opera and a  single beautiful tear rolls down my cheek as Madam Butterfly plunges the dagger into her breast. I stand and applaud as the curtain closes, it's folds reminiscent of my own scanties. 

And what does this have to do with Lixie Making It? Nothing whatsoever. It is purely my underwear. My only craft recently has been my sock yarn cardi where second sleeve is 75% done. I move next Saturday and just boxed up all my other craft supplies so there will be nothing interesting to show for another week or so. But then, expect pics of the new flat! Tra la. 

The House Byrne Unbuilt

I started packing on friday night (social diva that I am). A rather thunderous thought struck me - that I was now dismantling the home I had tried to build for Pooch and I.

I've blogged quite a few times about creating a home. Most memorably for me is when Pooch and I got married and he said I could have as much wool as I liked because now it was like I was building a nest for us both.

Of course that didn't go so well because I ended up cocooning myself from real life with the stuff. And who can forget the immense amount I then got rid of just a few months ago. Then there are the pictures on the walls which I blogged about here and the Pins on Pinterest I hve gathered about what I hoped it would end up looking like.

Source: via Alex on Pinterest

It does scare me a bit - to be moving somewhere new, away from the area I've known for 5+ years now - and to be moving into a new flat - just a flat, not a home. But I'm just trying to view it as a good thing. Time to start fresh. As I pack I continue to get rid of more and more stuff and I'm really holding strong to the beautiful print I bought from the V&A last year.

Having the Snip

I really do love Etsy.

It's so awesome getting a little gift to yourself in the post. This one was from Crave Jewellery Design. I'd seen it on Pinterest and convo'd her to ask if she had another for sale, since the original had sold. You can either wear it open....

.....or closed:

So sweet. 

Scissors were much in use to finish a project this week. I've been taking part in the #craftsocial heart swap and here is my offering:

I always find needlebooks so handy and I didn't just want to make 'a heart' as I preferred it to have some use.

Yet more scissors on the inside plus some felt 'pages' for the needles. It's flying off to America as I type. 

I was in Greenwich earlier today to visit the library (prompted by the "Save Our Libraries" Day today) and had a look around the clocktower market. It is my favourite bit of Greenwich. This time I spied these gorgeous little jampots.

I was sorely tempted to at least get the strawberry one but then I remembered I started packing for the move this morning and I already have more than enough stuff. It made me sad, because I wouldn't have hesitated to buy it 6 months ago. Ah well. 

At work the recycling bins have just been labelled to stop the small of brain getting confused about whether teabags constitute paper or not, and the ordinary bin has been labelled 'landfill'. This struck me as a simple but effective way of really making you think about the rubbish you thrown away. And so in spying an old sofa cover about to be thrown away I took a look at it to check for unmoveable stains or holes, and then resolved to make a tablecloth for my new flat with it. 

I wanted a red and white one and was looking for polka dot fabric (naturally) but couldn't find any in an upholstery weight that wasn't super expensive (thank you Cath Kidston!). This is an excellent red and I can use the machine embroidery skills I learnt at the Make Lounge to decorate it. Bonza. I've washed it at 90 degrees and it's come up as good as new. And all for £0!

Second Base

Source: stumbleupon.com via John on Pinterest

Cinnamon Buns, Tupperware and I.

I saw this recipe last week. I knew they must be mine.

The recipe is for twice this many so I duly halved the amounts and ended up with a dough that, once risen, had the consistency of custard, which is hardly condusive to kneeding. So I had to add about twice as much flour as the recipe suggests. But man, they still tasted gooooooood. I took half into work for the boys and they were highly appreciative. The coffee in the icing really does bring out the maple syrup. Nom.

They are pretty calorific though. In fact, the only way you could make them less healthy is...if...you....

Nutella. I was extremely upset to hear nuts do not count as one of your five a day. Thought I was onto something there. And yes, I do feel quite sick now.

While actually using the kitchen I had a dig through the cupboard and pulled out all the tupperware. Considering I never seem to be able to find any when I want it we seem to have collected quite a lot. This is not a small box.

I have ruthlessly been through it and thrown away anything without a lid or that had gone nasty. It's all being done with a purpose now as I have a flat to move to. So 3 weeks until the next phase of life starts. To coincide I've been thinking for months about going back to my maiden name and I have now put the wheels in motion at work. I was thinking of when to actually draw the line between names and was looking at suitable mondays in February. The most suitable one is...the 14th. Hmmm. Bit odd, but just another day, right?

Meanwhile the sock yarn cardi continues - thanks for kind comments! It is my own design although I may put a recipe style pattern together at some point. Plus my blog project continues....today's letter is the letter I.

M is for...

I have a cunning plan. My blog was in the middle of a makeover when the sky fell in October so it just got left halfway. I've decided to get on with some of the changes I had planned, one of which was a new header. The M is the first of three letters I've done already. Only another 11 to go.

I had a little crafty spurt the other day, but I'm being cheeky and saving it for the thing-a-day month. I've been making other plans too. Mainly on Pinterest.... Little ribbon hairclips:

Source: etsy.com via Alex on Pinterest

Fabric wrapped coat hangers:

Source: corrieberrypie.blogspot.com via Alex on Pinterest

Button Pendant:

Source: thinkcrafts.com via Alex on Pinterest

Lots and lots of lovely inspiration.

My sock yarn cardigan continues pretty well.

I'm halfway up the first sleeve now. I'm going to make the sleeves more or less match although it'll be impossible to do it exactly because of the self-pattering sections. But still, I think it'll look quite fun. It reminds me of another pin I've seen recently:

Source: imgfave.com via Alex on Pinterest

Even if whoever created it wasn't so hot at the spelling. 

Big white fluff

I have a bit of a problem at the moment. I keep trying to think about the future and plan n'stuff and it's like when you're in a plane, in the window seat (my favourite) and you climb or descend through some cloud. You go from blue sky....

to fluff.

I have negotiated a record 20 days off work in March. 20 days all in a row too, not in blocks of 2 or anything. I was going to go to Egypt. I tried to book and what I wanted wasn't feasible so now I'm trying to make a decision about what to do instead and...I...just...can't...seem...to....think....about.....it.....fluff......There are things I need to do but I start thinking...about.....doing....them....and.......fluff......I'm moving flat and so I start.....thinking....about....moving....and......fluff..... It is literally like walking into very dense fog. It dulls all my senses and leaves me disorientated. 

So....I saw this thing:

My first thought was that the last thing I need to do is put pressure on myself to do something every day just when I'm moving and have got...other....stuff....to.....fluff. But then about 5 minutes later when I was able to start thinking againI thought that actually this might be quite a good thing to do to structure things. It says somewhere on the website that you can just spend half an hour a day creating something and I thought that actually that might be quite good. And if I miss a day, well, it doesn't really matter. It's just for fun. 

I've decided my theme is going to be buttons and beloved Pinterest provides plenty of inspiration for quick projects, a number of which I have been meaning to try for ages. This is my own Button Pinboard, then there is Crafty Inspiration, which also includes a number of button projects, and...speaking of clouds and fluff...

Source: ohdeedoh.com via Alex on Pinterest

Cool, huh?

Freaked out on Mars

One of the books I seem to tell people about fairly often is 'An Anthropologist on Mars'.

It's written by Oliver Sacks who also wrote 'The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat' and is the guy who Robin Williams played in 'Awakenings'. It's 16 years old now and it must be at least 10 since I first read it but several of the stories really got stuck in my brain and there's one in particular I keep going back to. To put it into context, the book is a series of case studies looking at people who have some sort of brain abnormality, either something caused by an accident or illness or something they were born with. There's a daredevil surgeon with asperger's syndrome, a buddha like religious convert with a grapefruit style brain tumour and then there is a woman, an expert in her field, who has autism.

The field this woman is an expert in is the human slaughtering of animals for human consumption. She lectures about it all over the world, consults widely, is credited with patents and so on, but she is not comfortable with people and is seemingly incapable of forming relationships. One of the things she has invented is a device that holds a pig securely but without cruelty so that it can be killed accurately and quickly without unnecessary suffering. Although she doesn't feel comfortable getting close to people, she recognises the psychological benefits of things like hugs, so she builds one of these machines for herself, and sometimes she wriggles into it and it gently compresses around her and hugs her.

*hug*

I'm flat hunting. It's depressing. Pooch has got a place in a house on stilts surrounded by water in which ducks and swans swim. We used to walk there on sundays sometimes and say how cool it would be to live there. I am pleased he has somewhere nice sorted out but also fairly gutted. All I really want to do at the moment is sit in bed drinking champagne and having the occasional cry. I guess that makes me Elizabeth Taylor circa 1970. But you guys can call me Liz.

It's what's inside that counts

It's not the skin, it's the 'nana.

I've written this post so many times in my head now. It basically comes down to the fact that in trying to protect people, myself included, I have hurt myself and apparently hurt them too. 

Shame is also involved though. Big fat shame. My own shame. Shame that started off as a response to being cheated on two years ago, then warped into shame at my own emotional response to being cheated on, then ended up as shame again in response to a conversation I was never meant to hear and which marked the end of my marriage. 

Public vs Private is another element. My marriage ended on 1st October so my life now is not very similar to what it was on, say 30th September. I have been using twitter for maybe a year. I've been blogging for about six. And while my blog started off as almost a personal diary it changed and become more private after I got married. Except of course now I am not really married. Except I am legally, just not practically. I am meeting new people and doing different things, but Pooch is through his own choice still reading this blog and my tweets. And so while what happened and what has happened since is something I want to refer to he's not comfortable with that and thinks it should be kept private. 

This week has really been one hell of a week. The kind of week you just don't want to have too often. Work pressures, an argument with Pooch, all underpinned by PMT such as you get let off murder charges for. And one of the things that made it worse was my mistaken efforts at shielding others from the truth crumbling in a quite spectacular fashion. If I had just been honest about the reasons for my marriage breakdown then I wouldn't have had the stress of it all coming out recently, and wouldn't have felt the isolation I have felt by keeping things from people, even though I realise this was self-imposed. 

So what should I do? This is my blog and I'm starting a new life which is, I assume, going to involve dating and the rest. Last night I went to a friend's house for dinner. It was a low key chill out thing for both of us since he works long hours and socialises hard during the week and I was just burnt out after the week described above. 

This friend and I had a few rebound type encounters in December but we were both clear that it was just one of those things and so that side of things is over. Pooch knows this but he does not like any mention of this friend. But if I spend time with someone and something that I want to blog about happens, how much should I consider Pooch's feelings and not make any reference to it online (which seems to include not tweeting at them) and how much should I just get on with it? 

Pooch is not going to be happy about me putting this much online, but I am increasingly feeling like I'm approaching a point where I might want to try out dating. I'm not there yet, but I think in another month or so I will be. And I don't need the stress of living a double life and trying to remember what I've told to who. So...this is it. Stage 1 of this whole process was when I moved out and was in a state of shock where eating and sleeping went haywire and I just couldn't believe what was happening. Stage 2 was when I accepted that the marriage was really over and started making serious plans for the future. Stage 3 is now. I am single and I'll be blogging as a single person from now on. That doesn't necessarily mean the content of this blog will change at all, but it does mean I'm not going to censor myself from now on.

I won't be doing it with the intention of hurting anyone, or scoring points or getting revenge. I'll just be doing what I've always done - which is blogging (and tweeting) about my life.