THE best day

Today, because i was good in a pastlife or something, I got to go to Nickerjac's studio. It was ...a...w...e...s...o...m...e. There was wool *everywhere* and dyes and needles and postcards and beads and oh wow it was the place good knitters go when they retire, die or win the lottery. Plus of course it had Niki in it and she was the best bit. She knows everything and let me dye some of her own wool that was going to be used for public consumption and everything. She got going like a fish gets down to breathing under water while I had a little bit of a try out - guess which is which...

Yeah, that is it, that little reddish splodge in the bottom right of the bowl. Under her expert tutorlege (how do you spell the damn word?) and bolstered by ice cream she sent me into the dyeing room ALONE. Just like that. It was like when the bird gets tired of waiting for it's chick to learn to fly and so gives it a push over the edge. She was on hand but otherwise I was flying solo, so off I went. And it was splendiferous, truly, it was wonderful. And here is me with the finished product.

It's drying in the kitchen at the mo. So excited and impatient to see it knitted up. I think maybe a purse, but I will ponder that more later. It really was the best day - I wish things were different and I wasn't so attached to my income. I wish I could take the chance and go for it and I really should do considering my brush with death last year. All I've done though is carry on just doing what I was before. Anyway, don't want to get all down after such an excellent day. It really was just so good.

There is a yarn store called 'creations' just down the road and went in but it was SO hot in there. Got 2 balls of wendy mosaic in a stone-ish colour as sian's boyfriend wanted a scarf just like the one I gave her last xmas but in a different colour - and here is just what I need. It looks quite impressive close up!


Have managed to get quite a lot of the french market bag done, especially as I only cast it on at the group last night.

And check this out - I cast on and did the first zillion rows on double points - uh-huh, yeah baby, oooooh yeah. Me using double points, followed by circulars. I've got it all going on now.

My final photo for the day concerns another idea that came to me in bed - this time concerning needle holders. I haven't quite developed the detail yet but it meant that I felt justified in buying a cheap table cloth (with daisies on) and a plain, clear shower curtain. I'll keep you updated on how it goes. The little circle things are stitch markers (because nickerjac uses these ones and I want to be her...she's so cool)


I was supposed to be going to a birthday thing tonight but have major PMT. It's weird that it only really comes out when I'm with Pooch. Actually that's just me letting it come out then. Poor Pooch...he is lovely.

I am trying to reach the place I have reached with jewellery (other than, you know, diamonds and the good stuff). I see it now in accessorise or pound shops (good one in bethnal green btw) where I pick something up anf try it on and think oooo that's nice but then think 'i just dont need it' and PUT IT BACK. I think this briefly happened this afternoon in that shop. There was lots of kooky stuff but I kept picking things up and thinking "yeah, but what would I do with it" and putting it back again. THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED WITH YARN BEFORE. Maybe this is it. Maybe there is a 12-step plan in this. Maybe there isn't but I think it probably deserves more thought. Hmmm, ponder.... - ponder away little byrne.

I love it, but what is it?

This is a now common reaction to my little ball of fluff (no, not Pooch) since it was created yesterday. I speak, of course, of 'the ball' as it is known. Anna - you are right, it is just a big ball of fluff, not a ball of yarn I am going to use to knit with. It is done by needle felting, which is when you repeatedly stab a ball or lump of unspun wool with a small barbed harpoon type needle. It messes all the fibres (there's that word again) up and makes it stick together. It is basically felting but without soap and water and with a harpoon. I made the basic ball first with some boring stuff then harpooned the colourful curly bits on afterwards. There is a link to a Yahoo needle felting group in the left column somewhere so click on that to see a cute bear that someone has made. You have to join the group to see the other pics but some of them are awesome. I can't remember now how this fascination started but I am well into it after just one attempt and have only sustained two superficial wounds! (Needles VERY sharp - fingers very unfeltable.)

What is your business?

Not a philosophical question but a true to life one asked often, even by people I have already told. It is, in essence, providing unnecessary things to crafty people to allow them to emblazen themselves with the language and imagery of their chosen craft. So, for example, I might wear a t-shirt that says 'BORN TO KNIT' on it. My favourite is 'Man enough to knit, strong enough to purl' except of course I am of the female persuasion plus someone in america is already using that one. There will also be mugs, notelets, baby-things, wrapping paper and whatever else springs to mind. Tea towels maybe. I have grand plans but no cash! Incidentally, anyone interested in putting a couple of grand into a depressed woman's crazy business do get in touch.

How could I forget?!

Finished the damn OST project and took it round to the dti personally. The dude there told me it was just in time to go out to all the heads of the research councils to be best practice and to lead the way in what they should provide to the OST. Aha, chuffed. Have told the director who was 'overseeing' it at work and he got v excited. I'm telling you, if I don't see some sort of bonus as a result of this (going into work during my holiday! I work for a charity for physicists for goodness sake - nothing should be that important) I'm going to be rather miffed.

*such* a productive day

So we'll gloss over dinner. I followed the recipe to the L.E.T.T.E.R. and it all stuck - edible but looked as if someone had already eaten it. So we'll leave that behind and move on. A rather irritated me wearing my lovely scarf - all finished!

I love the suggestion that the wool fairy will now come and leave something under my pillow :) I haven't done anything this quick for ages and even though in many ways it is hideous, I absolutely love it. (I may well be wearing it at the Knitting and Crochet Guild meet-up on Friday. British Museum restaurant at 5pm for anyone in the vicinity.) Here is a close up, mainly just so that I can use the word fibre again - check out those....fibres.


I know what you're thinking - anyone can pick up some 20mm needles and three balls of whatever from their stash and knit a scarf. And you're right. But B*E*H*O*L*D* the ball.

Oh yeah, baby, work it work it. I needle felted some merino into a rough ball and then added the wednesleydale or whatever the (blatantly brightly coloured) sheep are called over the top. I've deliberately left it a little fuzzy so I don't lose the texture of the we....whatever sheep bits.

Just to make this post even longer I wish to report that I went to see my accountant today. Yes, my accountant. Ha! I have an accountant! It was my first consultation about starting a business and has got me all fired up again. I came home and rang LLoydsTSB for a loan. I have banked with them for 14 years so I didn't expect any problems and indeed everything went swimmingly until...."have you had any health problems necessitating a visit to a doctor in the last 12 months" 'yes' "oh....what was it in connection with" 'Depression' "oh - it seems you've been declined for that loan but you can have one over a shorter pay back period at a higher interest rate" ....just incase you go nuts again miss byrne and we don't get our money back. Dude!! I'm not keen on multiple exclamation marks but...dude!!

We have the technology...

La tra la tra la tra la I have the stuff I need (implements as we needlers call them, aha) for needlefelting. Bottom left is a book with needles in it that explain the whole caboodle. Have some merino fleece in red and a kind of pinky grey to add to my other bits of fleece to make felt balls from plus some wendsleydale (maybe) curly bits just for fun. The thing is - it all sounds horrifically expensive (silk is something like £70 a kilo) but you buy a clump of it and you pay 70p. Yippeee for 70p.

The packet of reddish fibres in the middle is more silk. The bags at the back are blue faced leicester (not a cheese strangely), yak, more silk and camel. I love camel - it is unbelievably soft and lovely to combine with other fibres. Ooooo, look at me casually using the word fibre. I wish there was a living in all this. Anyway...back to the runown - the ball of terribly boucle stuff middle right is ...boucle. The boucles are HUGE though. What is it about me and boucle? I hardly ever knit with it but I do seem to hoard it. I just love the way it looks. Finally there is something that arrived in the post - my flower fairy cross stitch kit I got from ebay. I *love* flower fairy things and had a hankering to try some cross stitch again so here we are.

Now I kid you not, but I actually dreamt about knitting a scarf in a combination of three yarns last night. And this is them:

Pink mercerised cotton, crazy pink gypsy and this weird puff slub pink and white stuff I can't remember buying but there it is. It is quite mental and therefore I love it. I'm on 10mm at the mo but think I might go to 15 or even 20mm. I'm quite liking the combination and hey, I dreamt it, and if you knit it, they will come or something like that.

I know I've been blogging a lot recently and forcing the faithful to read inches of drivel but I can't seem to help it. Another addiction along with stashing, chocolate and cyber-stalking other knit-bloggers - my apologies...

Holiday? What holiday?

The project for the OST got delayed by me being ill and then the bombings on Thursday so I'm trying to get it finished remotely from home. Which means I have to be in contact with work. Which means I get to talk to a senior civil servant complaining about the rude and unhelpful attitude of one of my staff even though I'm not fricking there. Bloody hell.

Have felted a couple of swatches to see how they react - one was knitted with the stuff I dyed with koolaid and the colour stayed perfectly! Even in a machine wash. Felted nicely too. The other one is the debbie bliss soho which I'll obviously need to do on larger needles - maybe 7mm. This (one on right) was done on the recommended 5.5mm.


Have been umming and ahing about getting some denise interchangables. I'm really fine about knitting on crics now - what was the issue dude? - so rather than pay £2.50 a pair for each length vs size combination doesn't it make sense to splurge? Have a load of stuff on ebay so will wait until that has sold now before actually doing it - need £34 inc postage to get them in my paw.

Just waiting for my Pooch to come back to me - he is very uncomfortable about travelling at the mo - as is everyone I should think - so will be good to get him back for a hug. Once I've finished the (now) hated cable red top (still fiddling with the back) I'm going to have another go at altering his space invaders jumper so it is about half the size and actually fits him.

Ok, before I go, one more thing. Look what I did today - bread. (Yeah, I know I used a machine and it does it all for you, but still....I made bread!).

Holiday plans

Hoorah hooray, look what I've just been out and collected:


Hair dye in 'plum' to brighten up my ghastly locks. Knitting magazine (because some of the patterns have potential although the edgings and so on are a bit yucky - ooh hark at her!) Time Out London to plan all my little excursions. 3.75 and 2.75 mm circs for portable sock knitting. Little red notebook to be my stash-on-the-move log so I can instantly tell if I have the yarn for a pattern I happen to see of if I need to go shopping. 3 fabric marker pens to make self patterning sock yarn without having to make up any dye (have been pondering this method for a while so will see what happens).

And last, but *not least*, a postcard from my lovely secret pal. This one has got cats on it - she's got me sorted sure enough!

Tomorrow I've got a trip to the london handweavers studio planned. The rest of today is for knitting on the sofa and reading one of the books I bought last week when I was hiding in Waterstones.

Red cable top finished...or is it

I know I said this was finished before - but I hadn't sewn on the poppers or finished all the ends. But here it is, actually done...

...(nice moody look eh? Pooch and I ended up on different sides of a 'discussion' about whether the neighbour's music was loud enough to be complained about) or so I thought. Because what has happened? It is TOO BIG. Now I know why this is. I almost lost the will to live while doing the cable repeats all up the front (here they are by the way, not that I'm showing off or anything, ahem)

so I decided not to do the cables up the back but just to do the 4 lines of twisted stitches in the original cable. At the same time I CAST ON THE SAME NUMBER OF STITCHES AS IF I WAS GOING TO DO THE CABLE. Hello? Earth to Byrne? So I have a plan (cue maniacal laughter). Naturally this does not include ripping the back and doing it again, because that would be silly. No, it includes putting a kind of f*ck off pleat in the back and pretending it's part of the 'look'. A la...

The other option is cutting (steeking?) and sewing up the two sides, but that scares me.

So it fell to Andrea to be the only one who told me I didn't look like su pollard which was obviously what I was fishing for. Hmph.

Are you kidding me?

Look what he was doing!!!!

Eating curry products right next to my silk clapotis. What's with the boy? I shouldn't get too annoyed though. I have been going through a transition in my life - from mid to late 20s - and I have come to realise that i have been dressing like.....Su pollard. I'm using her sacred name as shorthand for when you dress like you used to when you were ten years younger but now you're ten stone heavier and 10 inches wider and look...awful. It's this combined with the fact that you look at clothes and judge them only in terms of comfort. And even worse, comfort = trousers you can wear big pants with. Discomfort = anything that requires less than huge underwear.

I have been moaning about the onset of pollarditus for weeks now and so Pooch finally had enough yesterday and took me shopping. He agreed to buy me clothes on condition that he liked them all, and that they were boho, and that they went together. So this is what we end up with:

A lacy cream top you can only wear with certain bras and a boho skirt you can not wear big pants with without looking like....you are wearing big pants. It didn't stop here either - there is a white skirt and a brown top. There would have been a little lacy bolero cardi but being a knitter and a yarn snob I recoil from the synthetic yarns they've produced these things in. Later today we are going to look at my wardrobe and he's going to rate my clothes 0-10 on the pollard scale (10=something Su Pollard wouldn't even wear if she were on stage as a pantomime dame). It's for my own good and at my own instigation but is surely a recipe for a fine old argument. The goal is for me to end up with a style that I'm comfortable with (but not in a big pants way, although it could turn out that way) but that is more feminine than my current one. I'm not going to throw anything away, but I might just put it to one side for the duration.

A knitting related thig that goes with this is lace knitting, and here it is Kate who inspires me. The stuff she does is awsome and this is her latest one to get underway and I LOVE it. I would really like to be more of a shawl person. I have always loved Alphonse Mucha's painting and feel sure the women in those would have lots of lace shawls. So need to get choosing on one to start with. Birch from rowan 35 (I think) is a possibility. Will surf and see I guess!

Way too early

I remember about 2 years ago sleeping til 10 or later at the weekends. *sigh* Been up for 2 hours. I have become quite used to watching this weird world-sport programme on C4 on Sat mornings. This week was white water canoeing and cricket. My fave was the monster trucks. Let's face it - I should have been born American. Proof follows:

1. I adore sugary foods
2. I love WWE and Monster Trucks
3. I like doing all the stupid cheers during baseball games
4. When I was in America last year for 4th July I was more patriotic (to america) than the american cousins I was staying with.
   
5. I think the royal family are 'cool'
6. I am a big fan of the A-team, columbo, murder she wrote and twin peaks.
7. I dislike Canadians (or not wishing to generalise - one canadian)
8. I have a therapist
   
9. I have a birthmark in the shape of the statue of liberty

OK, that last one's not true but it could be. Anyway, back to the knitting... here is the clapotis. I am just over a 3rd done. Going to be huge! That dark line you can see across it is my own spun silk It varies in colour froms greys to greens to reds and oranges - lovely! Of course my spinning is not quite the article so as you can see my contribution was roughly three times chunkier than the hipknits stuff. Had a small (ha!) effect on the tension but I've got five, or even ten, on it so it's under control.

You know how it's wrong to crochet? Well...

I've always had this hankering to give it a go. It means one less implement to poke people with on the tube, when I venture back. So now I've seen this from a link on crazyauntpurl's blog. They (as in 'the general public') say that it's easier to learn when you've got a goal in mind so could this be my goal. Crocheters out there - is this a hard project or a good one to sink one's teeth into?

So at the moment I want to try patchwork, more spinning, needle felting, crochet and machine knitting. And I have no money and a massive stash. So I'd best just keep to knitting for now.

The clapotis in hipknits pink silk continues beautifully. I remembered the little sample packets of silk fibres I spun when I did that spinning course and so I have incorporated that into it and it looks really cute and makes me very proud that I've now knitted with stuff I've spun myself. No pics today but will try and rustle one up tomorrow.

iconlove

I am in love with the icon creator I used to do my portrait, top left. I've just done one of Pooch


Even he agrees it looks like him...moody Pooch! The little icon of me in the left sidebar (buttons section) takes you to the webpage where you can do your own.

Joining a knit along?

Futuristic, milky, and silky, you are willing to go
where no crafter has gone before. You can do
just about anything, with strength agility, and
pretty colors to boot! While you are good at
slipping and sliding out of sticky situations,
remember to stay where and when you are needed.
Don't overdo it on star gazing when there's
earthbound knitting to be done!


What kind of knitting needles are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Hmm, where's the picture? Think I might have mucked up the code there. I am pink plastic needles though! I'm such a sucker for these things.

Thinking about joining this http://greekpulloverknitalong.blogspot.com/ but not quite sure. Could only do it if I've already got something in my stash for it - maybe some of the coldsping stuff? Have never done a knitalong before.

Am half way through another premature baby sock which will make 6 pairs once done. It is so satisying though to have finished objects so quickly. Finding it really hard to blog and carry on normally with all this carnage on the news and so close to me. It really is horrific and I guess it's normal to feel so detached from reality when something so tragic has happened close to you. I might be mad but some people are sick.

Am OK

OK but bloody freaked out. Hope others in London are safe. Our building is staying open all night so email me at littlelixie at hotmail dot com if you are stuck and need somewhere to shelter.

8pm - got home after 4.5 hours. All safe and sound and sitting tight for the forseable. Pooch hugging me lots so all good. Hoping everyone else is likewise - the picture of the torn apart bus is haunting me.

Tiniest socks ever ever ever

So who's had too much time for knitting today? Woah there, can one ever have too much time for knitting? What am I saying...

Pooch is out on the raz so have indulged in x-men 1 and tenny tiny tiny teeny baby socks. I'm a fervant supporter of 'ray of hope' (http://www.rayofhope.co.uk/) and there has been a request for booties for babies with feet an inch long so I whacked out 3 pairs while watching the film. The two-needles sock pattern just makes them so easy. Here it is in case anyone feels like having a go (if you think you're hard enough). (Other teeny tiny patterns on the ray of hope website).

With regia 4-ply or something similar (needs to be machine washable) and 3.5mm cast on 16 st.
4 rows garter stitch (all knit)
change to stocking stitch (one row knit, one row purl) for about an inch.
Knit 7 st, wrap st and turn
Knit back to one before end of row, wrap and turn (this is short row shaping which I can not posisbly explain but you can easily find on google)
Do three wraps on either side then knit across all stitches, knitting wraps and actual stitches together as one stitch. Once you have done this you should be back to 16 st.
(That's the heel turned by the way)
St st for about an inch
On right side row, k1, sl1, psso, k2, k2tog, k2, sl1, psso, k2, k2tog, k1.
Cast off purlwise
Lastly - sew up the side using your preferred joining technique and sew in ends.
Do two.

Right I'm bushed. Sweet dreams y'all (and god bless crazy aunt purl for introducing me to "y'all")

Lights, action, camera

So I switched on the light and went to work sorting through my stash and then took a picture of what I'd done. A pleasing summary of my day I think. Here is what it now looks like:

I post this here not to show off how incredibly neat it is (or is by my standards) but as a start to my - show us your stash - campaign. People always talk about how bad they are but what does this actually mean. Join me, bloggers, and post pics of your stash for all to see. Be brave...

Almost slept through the olympic announcement which would have been...inconsequential seeing how I live in Stratford and can hardly fail to notice the big statue of non-specific black female athlete outside the station. You look up at it and all you you can see is muff - wall to wall or at least filling my personal field of vision. Have managed to get some knitting done on the hipknits sillk clapotis. It is like knitting with butter or something and I have just started the drop stitches (far left) and they drop like raindrops running down a window pane (so fricking poetic I could cry, yeah right).


During my clearout I came across the villain cardigan in colinette tagliatelli that is just asking to be ripped.

I hate this thing. I loath it more than blueadt hated that cardigan. More than crazy aunt purl hated zelda. So the big question is, when's it gonna diiiiiiieeeeeeeeee? Tonight at golders green or will it live a few more days and maybe get frogged when I'm down visiting my Mum this weekend? Hmmmmm....

6pm - been a good girl. Not going out to knitting but have made use of what would have been travel time to frog the hated cardi and put the stuff on ebay. Search for '470g tagliatelli' if you're in the market! Feel so riteous now x

Blog roll thing

So day three of the surprise sit-in. It's more the tiredness now than the depression - I'm also gearing up for going in tomorrow and blitzing all the work that has piled up. Girding my loins is the expression that I've been using to the lovely people who have been emailing me and leaving supportive comments. I promise to change the tune tomorrow as there are only so many sympathetic things to say I can expect people to think of ;p

Seeing how I do not have much else to do (apart from knit, blog, read knit blogs, eat chocolate) I have been sexing up my blog unnecessarily (sexing - ha!) with this blogroll tool. It doesn't look that different but apparently it will auto check who has updated their blog and make their name look different and then I'll just read those ones rather than clicking through them all. Can you believe I am actually proud of this achievement? Geez. I'm going to spend the day slepping (and quite possibly sleeping), knitting, looking for new knitting blogs to read and eating chocolate.

If you go back to sleep 2 hours after waking up does that count as a nap? Or is it 'going back to bed'? I'm not dressed yet so I guess it is 'going back to bed'. But it seems a bit defeatist to go back now. Will see if I can make it til 10!

For those following the flat-next-door-saga I heard lots of noise out there yesterday and stuck my head out. The guy who was sawing the door with a big saw (using the hole previously made right through it to get maximum saw usage) claimed to be our neighbour but I'd never seen him before. He left after I spoke to him, leaving the door just slightly worse off than it was before. Now, sure, I thought about calling the police, but last time the door got battered I dialled 999 and it took them three days to come and say there was nothing they could do about it. When I told Pooch about this he was quite annoyed about me talking to strange men with saws. Hadn't thought of the whole "sawn up body of middle-aged depressee found in stratford" angle.

Yukity yukity yuk

A second (unplanned) day at home today. Got as far as about 50 steps from work when decided that there was no point going in if I was already rehearsing how to cancel the next few day's meetings without crying at anyone. Depression swooped in with a "boo" last night just before I went to bed. Lo and behold if about half an hour later I hadn't got the whole 's' scenario planned out complete with note contents and how to locate implement. Just as well I've got Dr P on Thursday.

Woah there, just got distracted by a path I could not replicate to looking at knitting books on amazon. Weird. Worse places to end up though I guess. Have become fascinated by needle felting. I have even joined another yahoo group about it.

I have put my day indoors to good use and have finished my secret pal's next present. Won't post a pic of it here until she's received it and not sure when that will be as was going to space them out a bit.

So randomly moving on to a different thought, how about embellishing your own knitting needles? Are the steel ones coated with something that would mean they'd go weird if I put them in the oven with some fimo on the end?

OK, obviously too easily distracted to blog anything coherent. Blehhhhhh.

Shopping, shipping and stuffing my face with chocolates

I'm classing picking up my pottery from art4fun as shipping - just so you know. And here it is...


The thing to remember, when being very unimpressed by it, is that I had great fun doing it. And now I've learnt a lot about what not to do. I do quite like the mug for Pooch though. It says 'Pooch loves tea' which is very true and on the bottom I've written 'Alex loves Pooch' which luckily for him is true too. The "knitter" mug is nasty - poo brown and splodgy and I had such high hopes for it and I still really love the shape. So disappointing. And as for the plant pot....hum... People comign to my desk for a meeting will think I have a deranged child somewhere churning these things out for me whereas it's just the result of a deranged me.

While picking the things up I just happened upon four chrity shops and had a little rummage. Sadly no knitting things but I do have three star wars books and a Dr No video for Pooch. Plus I managed to find a few little things.


Aren't the green shoes horrifically fab? And that a cherry red velvet jacket on the left and the polka dots are a little shirt that I think is very sweet - reminds me of one Pooch and I first met (I was dressed as minnie mouse you see).

So what happened to me spending the day machine knitting and making felt beads. Yes, well. Things did not start well. Here I was, all ready to get going:

and this is what I ended up with: I've put my mobile there to get an idea of scale - it is such a pathetic little thing. The next one basically dissolved so I gave up. Easily discouraged, that's me. Next time I'll try doing them inside little bits of tights and putting them in the machine. Pah!

For the tube ride to and from west hampstead I took one of the colourways I got from designs and cast on a sock. I still can't decide whether I actually like it or not. Any thoughts? It is chocolate by town and country.

happy birthday to me!

Yay. Although I am not in any way american I feel a certain bond with y'all (crazy aunt purl's influence there) so happy 4th july to all my american cousins. I was going to post a picture of my party last night but they are all too high res to post here so will have to wait til I rejig them. It was awesome - jelly, ice cream, choc cake, hotdogs, squeezy cheese - we had it all.

Many thanks to andrea and everyone else for e-cards and comments wishing me happy bday. There were many times in the last year when I didn't think I'd make it to see another birthday yet here I am, still standing and knitting more than ever. The day holds either the knitting machine or felt balls or maybe both! And maybe an exhibition? Ooooo, lovely!

Felt beads

http://www.homeofthesampler.com/howtos/lili_feltbeads.html

So I am rather pleased with myself for just managing to edit html to make the above into a proper link and everything. I have some roving left from when I went on that spinning day so now relly want to spend the day making them but....it's party day! Will just leave that link there for later consumption.