Parcels parcels

Woo hoo! I was made very happy this morning by my secret pal's parcel arriving at the crack of dawn (Pooch always thinks this is hysterical when I say that because my mum's name happens to be 'Dawn'). Lookie...

So much good stuff. Had a good rummage through the Interweave Crochet and found this:

..which I rather like but without the peplum. I like my circular yokes. There was of course yarn too:

Lovely malbrigo and some rowan yorkshire tweed 4-ply in a beautiful red. This was being discussed at golders green last night so very well timed. And then there was la piece de resistance....

Aren't they just divine? So ladylike. I fricking adore the colourway and the little buttons just make them absolutely perfect. I have long believed that

1. When you see a magpie you should say 'good morning mr magpie' or the world will end
2. You can significantly raise or lower your body temp by apply warmth/cold to your pulse points

I actually crocheted a pair of wrist warmer things while at the first SkipNorth but they were really rubbish. I think general cosmic karma was stopping me from making anymore because I knew these ones would be coming my way. Am going to wear them to tesco later. And then never take them off. I really really like them - thanks Plum xxx

I'm catching up after that wobble at the weekend so haven't shown you these:

I got them while visiting Nic and the gorgeous Pete at the weekend. I was actually holding Pete when I picked these so I like to think he had a hand in the choosing. Once again I took my camera but failed to take any pics. He really is just the most adorable baby. Everywhere we went people were stopping Nic and admiring him and asking his age, name, weight and all sorts of other things that were one more than 8 weeks old would probably seem terribly intrusive. But then I don't really need to take photos because there are lots over at her blog. Doesn't he look amazing in those hats. Broody? Moi? Ahem, moving on...

Earlier in the week I did get hold of my yarn and chocolate swap parcel from the ravelry swap. Yum! Reeses pieces and m&ms and lots of other stuff now sadly gone but not forgotten. Chocolate tends not to last too long around here. I did get this rather lovely stuff which is Lorna's Laces sock yarn.

I am vaguely thinking of this for them. But then I don't know if that is a bit aggressive for such a mellow colourway. Perhaps this could be the yarn that does justice to Jane's bracket fungus socks? Hmmm.... There was also an adorable felt covered tape measure that gives me an idea for my next parcel to my SP.

Very last thing - am not totally comfortable with the idea but I do need a voice recorder so have added a 'donate' button to the podcast site.

Turning a corner

Wowsers - thanks everyone for sending me all those lovely messages and especially to lurkers who de-lurked for that reason. It's all meant a lot to me.



Pooch and I had a big old talk last night where we shared a whole heap of stuff and talked like we hadn't done for months. We really do love each other an awful lot and want to make each other happy which is why I think we were both so shocked that things got to the stage they did. I'm still not sure who was more upset by what happened but I know that he was lashing out and that it was p[artly a result of a position I'd put him in so I fully accept some responsibility. We are going to see the lovely Relate counsellor who helped us before but as pooch puts it "I think we only need a couple of visits - just to remind us what we've forgotten".



As I've just written in an email to my SP - in a way this might have a silver lining as it has reminded me of how before my last spell of madness I was holding everything in and how I learnt the hard way that I needed to share things. It's reminded me just in time to share my feelings with people, especially Pooch. It's also reminded me not to cut myself off from experiences and not to give the negative voices so much airtime. Listen more to the sqeaky me!



I don't want to come out with a whole list of "...and therefore I am going to do this that and the other..." but I have decided to give the MBA another go. I've been getting good marks and there's no point giving up til I am sure about what I want to do.



So things are looking a bit better today and hopefully normal knitting service will be resumed shortly. Thanks peeps x

When is what someone says true? (non-knitting)

Things have not been so hot chez byrne recently. I don't want to cause a panic so let me start by saying that the stash is safe and the lack of temperature refers solely to non-knitting things. The fact is that married life is not quite the domestic bliss it's cracked up to be. In fact I'd go so far as to say it was periods of domestic silence interspersed with blazing rows and tentative reconciliation. The best, or quite possibly worst, episode took place on friday night and the repurcussions are still being strongly felt.

Now naturally I am not blameless in all this because as ever it takes two to argue. I don't want to go into the details but some things were said that I never thought I'd hear someone I care about say to me and I can't get them out of my head. I've just been talking to a friend who tells me that it isn't good to hear things like that as sooner or later you'll start believing them but I think it might be a tad too late for that.

When things started going bad at work I was being repeatedly told that I wasn't good with people, that I wasn't communicating ideas appropriately and that I wasn't any good at persuading people. For a while I fought my corner and insisted that it's hard to sell bollocks to clever people who are being told by people more senior to me that it is bollocks and they don't need to buy. But then I gave in and decided they must be right and I was wrong and that must mean that I was a bit useless. This is what Dr P and countless others would descibe as 'entering a phase of low self-worth'. Since then it has felt like I was like one of those russian dolls. There's the outside me all painted and strong and then there are these other versions inside, each a bit smaller than the last but trapped and that can't be seen until you take away the larger one. Somewhere right in the middle is the littlest one who has a voice even higher pitched than mine and who squeaks about having value and being good at things and having useful skills. It squeaks about deserving respect and trust. It likes socialising and doesn't feel ashamed about how it acts as it has the confidence to back up its actions and to judge these as appropriate. That's somewhere in there right in the middle.

As you move through successive layers there are hurtful things people have said tatoo-ed on the outside of each doll. You can still hear the squeaking here but it is pretty muffled so sometimes it's hard to make out the words. Then as you move out further the surfaces of the dolls get thicker and instead of other people's words being tatooed on the surface my own thoughts are carved into them. Lots of things like 'what if they're right that...' or 'what if it's my fault that...'. You can barely make out the squeaking except every now and again when a word or two comes through and reminds you that there is a person inside that used to be different. And each time that happens a new doll forms with a skin even thicker than the last one trying to block out the squeaking because somehow it's better to be worth nothing and just to accept that than to remember that once you were worthy of more than that.

I told Pooch this morning that I felt like I was trapped inside a facade that was painted to look happy. I felt like there was something inside screaming to get out, clawing at the walls until my fingers are all bloody and my voice is hoarse. He said he didn't understand. He said an awful lot more than that on friday night but I'm supposed to be able to forget about that and move on.

My friend says that people don't think it's my fault things have gone like they have with Pooch. That people are concerned and that if Pooch doesn't want to come out I should go by myself because people want to see me even when I'm by myself. But I just can't believe it. I am so ashamed. Ashamed of my marriage, of what I've become, of the things I can't bring myself to do because of the shame. Ashamed that I don't want to go out by myself, ashamed that I secretly believe people think his behaviour is down to me, ashamed of his behaviour, ashamed of him.

I haven't written anything like this on my blog for months because I was ashamed. I didn't want people to know what was going on so I tried to hide it. But at the same time I ended up not going out because I thought that if they asked me I might not be able to lie and it was better to be ashamed and alone than to admit all wasn't rosy. But to be honest that hasn't really been working that well for me so after much consideration I am effectively jumping out of the closet. I am at the moment terribly terribly unhappy but not depressed. I think if I made myself hide it any longer that would change and it is (probably) better to be outed than to risk falling back into the abyss again.

When you next see me will you do me a favour though - don't ask me about the specifics. Don't ask me to talk about how I'm feeling because I'm just not good at all that emotional stuff. Just talk to me about normal things and remind me how comfortable it can be to be a part of the world even when things aren't going that well. Remind me that it doesn't make any difference if you don't hide things and that you don't have to pretend to be happy and robust to be treated with respect. Or if all else fails ask me what it's like trying to keep the tension even when making cabled socks in two colours using the magic loop method.

A little time out to mourn the passing of an era

When I was mad an exercise my therapists were fond of and I loathed was "Putting things on a scale of 1-10 where 10 is where everyone you love is dead". My reaon for loathing this exercise was that it seemed obvious to me that if all my loved ones had just died I wouldn't be in whatever situation would cause me to panic because I'd be at home grieving. But depsite this I do recognise that it has its moments.

Let us for a moment consider orange squash. I assure you this is not a deviation. When I was weaned off mother's milk I was put onto orange squash. Robinsons Special R orange squash with no added sugar. It was orange. It came in a bottle with a blue cap. It was good stuff. Over the years Robisons decided to try out the occasional new recipe but somehow my love for it always managed to see the silver lining in this dark grey cloud of marketing and find something to love about each new slight variation that came along. Until now. Now Robinsons has discontinued Special R and replaced it with.....Robinsons no added sugar Orange. Yuk. And believing the picture on waitrose's website and ordering what I thought may well turn out to be some of the last stocks of it surviving on the planet I thereby ended up with 6 litres of the yuk being delivered to my house last night. Thank goodness I decided that any more than 6 might seem a bit unseemly.

So here we come back to the exercise - this is obviously a disaster. Not only do I not have any special r, I now have 6 litres of yuk. Also I squandered what turn out to be my last ever glass of special r thinking I had another 6 litres to go. How could I? So you can see that for me it goes in at roughly an 8 on the scale.

I have emailed Robinsons and asked them to reconsider but just got a standard reply saying my comments would be passed to the brand manager. 'Woe is me' doesn't even come close....

Has it come to this?

I was cruising for a bit of tv action when I came across "The Most Annoying Pop Moments We Hate to Love" at 7pm today on bbc4. Not only that, but this was episode 5. The mind boggles. By the time you get through episodes 1-4 what can still be left to cringe over? And as if it's not bad enough that they've gone through every conceivable "100 greatest/worst (insertnamehere)" in the last 12 months on british tv we now have entire series built out of these ghastly things.

Pooch is out tonight so I was resolved to put my feet up with a decent film and what I sincerely hope will be the last of my secret project. A few sewing in of ends and it should be ready to hand over, even though it is rather late.

Before leaving work this morning I made a row counter bracelet for my secret pal. I really wish I could post a pic of it as I am really really chuffed with it but it is personalised so it would be a bit of a give away. I am almost definitely going to be teaching people to make their own row counter bracelets at SkipNorth next year. They are so cunning and yet deceptively simple to put together.

So no pictures today as it's secret knitting all the way. But soon it will be over! And then it will be knitting as far as the eye can see...

New blog alert

It has finally happened. Pooch has entered the blogosphere. Go over there and leave a comment. You just know he wants you to.

So in other news, you know how I was going on a bit about how I didn't need to buy stuff to make me happy? Well let's just reel that back in a little bit and have a little shoe-love. Now bear in mind when looking at these pics that it was *pouring* with rain in london and they are a bit on the soggy side.

These shoes....are It. Oh yeah. I love them. And I wore them for a whole day and they didn't hurt or rub or anything.

They've got a kind of little nose at the end. And most of all they are exactly the right height to wear with long length trousers.

I think their acquisition may be a direct result of my training course last week as I have been pondering the johari window. The 'unknown' 4th quadrant is said to be where all those intuitions and lucky guesses come from. I like to think it was my 4th quadrant that was picking up signals that these shoes had arrived on Oxford Street and yesterday was the optimum moment to meet up with them.

Speaking of optimum moments, let me bring some sock yarn and needles to your attention. This yummy parcel arrived last weekend after an unfortunately long stay at the post office due to their random strikes.

Now that is a rubbish photo so here is a close up of the two coloured ones.

Oh yeah, it's good. The blue/purple is 75% wool and 25% bambus, which I am choosing to believe is bamboo, and is called Admiral Bambus. The stripey is 75% wool and 25% Poly and is called Admiral R Druck. There was also a skein of undyed which I'm thinking of dyeing for my secret pal, and not 1 or 2 but 3 sets of dpns! Purple pins (which are obviously purple) and metal, hiya hiya which I have been hearing mutterings about and which are steel and some Pointy Sticks bamboo ones. The yarn is satisfyingly soft and squidgy without the slight harshness of mixed-fibre sock-yarns like trekking and opal.

The whole lot came from Knit'n'Caboodle whose tagline is rather satisfyingly "where only the sheep are fleeced" and who I see will be at Ally Pally. I can see the Admiral R Druck having a pleasant stay with me but I fully intend to share the goodies and the blue bamboo mix and some of the dpns will be the competition prize on the next podcast. Don't forget there's still time to enter the last competition...

400th post

since March 13th 2005. Almost 67,000 hits and still going strong. I've been discussing life with pooch and and co recently and feel that I've reached a point of consolidation. I no longer have the same urge to go out and shop my socks off. In "How Proust can change your life" AdeB talks about how in modern society once you're earning a certain amount there is no need to yearn for things any more because you can go out and buy them. I don't want to be big headed and sound off but I reached this point a couple of years ago. If I wanted something I could just go out and buy it. Made life a bit boring really, which probably says more about my life than it does about my earnings. Recently I have slowed down my acquisition of things and am thinking more about what, besides shopping, makes me happy. Geez, how hollow does that sound?

One of the things that does make me happen is sorting stuff out. So today I've been making lists and thinking about things that need sorting out. I've set myself a deadline of ally pally to get the proudtobecrafty.co.uk website sorted out and the spreadshirt shop finished and ready to be publicised. I'm planning to make the PTBC website into more of a portal so not just for Skip Holidays but also for the podcast and also as a distro for crafty bits and pieces I and others want to sell. I've also been talking to Pooch about restarting the zine as I did like doing it - but that depends on making a decision about whether to continue with the MBA which is a whole other can of worms.


But there has definitely not been enough knitting content in this post so a little teaser for you - SkipNorth will definitely be taking place in 2008 and the dates are Friday 7th March - Sunday 9th. I will be letting the SkipHolidays yahoo group know first when Nic and I finalise the price. It will still be well below the £200 mark but costs have risen this year so be prepared for a bit of a hike.

Isn't she pretty? (and a podcast)

Chuck's cabled socks by Eunny Jang.

Very well written pattern. Have warbled about it a bit among many other things on the podcast. Listen if you dare. It does include a competition this time too! More details here.

Audible.co.uk

We take a break from our usual feature to hear from this week's sponsor.... audible.co.uk

In fact they're not sponsoring me (sadly - sponsors? hello?) but they should be sponsoring knitpicks podcast as that is where I first heard about them. Take a look at this...

I joined yesterday for £14.99 a month. I first checked on itunes to see how much buying the audio books from there would cost and audible came out cheaper everytime. Then I looked at their library and general website and liked what I saw. Then I saw that by joining the two-a-month package I get 2 free and thought "wa-hey" and got in there.

So now for £14.99 I've got £56.89 worth of listening, including the great SPM who I adore (AKA the Yarn Harlot) - and it is even read by her. And I didn't even choose the longest or most expensive ones. The unabridged one is about 19 hours long! I am a bit of an audiobook junkie so this is fab for me.

PS: Don't judge me, just because The Blair Years is in there. I am curious - I can't help it. Which reminds me of something I am sure I must have mentioned before. On a training course a few months ago a man was talking about the LGBTTQ group. LGBT I am au fait with as my little sis is their social sec at bristol uni but Q? Q? I finally asked him what it stood for. "Questioning" he tells me. So there you go. I guess I'm not curious, I'm questioning.

Another weekend, another cold

Once again I am cursed again by the cold that only strikes at the weekend. My freeeeee time! But you've heard me go off on one about this once or twice before so suffice to say that I am pissed off.

Spent the weekend up north with Pooch's family. You know you're going to have a good weekend when there's something like this going on in the seat in front of you on the train.

Had a lovely time, head cold aside. I saw the blackpool illuminations for the first time. Photos from a car don't do it justice in any way at all but they give an idea.

Also met up with one of Pooch's old school mates in halifax which contained the promisingly named "Woolshops" shopping centre. Although as it turned out there was just the one market stall with mostly acrylic.

I had a lovely parcel arrive just before I left from knittingmama as part of the ravelry summer camp swap. There were some really cool things in there - not the least of which were the tortilla chips and dip which both survived the journey wonderfully!

The yarn is as delicious as the dip!

Here is the whole haul:

I was reading the book - one of the Lord Peter Wimsey stories - on the train this weekend.

Probably my favourite thing is this knitted headband. I have honestly hardly take in off since it arrived.

It's so simple but I really really love it. It puts calorimetry in a whole new light for me as I'd assumed they wouldn't stay on my head. I can see my future containing some of these sometime soon. (And don't you just love those above the head shots which somehow disguise, at least in my mind, the rotundity of the overall face?

On that note diet starts again next week which I'm not looking forward to but which I do have some new motivation for. I found a picture last week of me in Jan 2003, just before my entrance into one of the finest loony bins private healthcare can buy. I was mega thin. Now I am mega not. Ah well. It all focuses the mind nicely...

How do you lose a stitch dictionary?

I just don't get where the bloody thing has gone. It was one of those big'uns - a hardback and many pages and some pounds in weight. Not the sort of thing that would be easy to mislay you'd have thought. And I've been looking for it for more than a month now. Now that is some ditsy tidying on my part. All this means that I am in the market for a new one and I'm not really sure what to go for. Here are my options:

• Vogue Stitchonary amazon link
• Harmony Ultimate Sourcebook amazon link (this is the one I have lost)
• Some sort of Barbara Walker one
• Something else..

Does anyone have any advice/guidance for me? I think I'll hold out til ally pally to see whether there are any on offer and if I don't find one then I'll go with whatever you guys recommend.

In other news I have been relieved to hear that my ravelry queue is in fact nothing to be worried about and not a sign of my impending deterioration into madness. I liked one comment that it was a place to use to be able to find things again so in that spirit I really ought to make it a great deal longer than it is at present!

The other thing weighing on my mind - other than the whereabouts of my stitch dictionary, the length of my queue, the circumference of my stomach and the location of the nearest chocolate - is the podcast. I *really* enjoy doing it and I've had loads of lovely messages from people who seem to like it as much as I do. But I'm having terrible trouble finding time for it. I will be continuing with it for definite but it may be one of those annoyingly irregular ones that just happen to pop up now and again. In the meantime I can not recommend strongly enough my all time favourite: CraftyPod by Sister Diane which is just amazing. For pure knitting I've been listenging to all the knitpicks podcasts on my trusty ipod and they really are very good. Both are on itunes.

Oh yes, that reminds me. There has been a lot of emails flying about SkipNorth - that fabulous knitting and spinning holiday that takes the hardcore knitters and spinners to Haworth every year. I can confirm that there will definitely be one! The date and cost are currently being confirmed by Nic and I. The cost is going to be a bit higher this year as we have two small coaches instead of that huge one from last year (not doing that again on those tiny roads!) but it will still be remarkable for a weekend including bed, meals and transport. Give me a week or so and I'll know the exact price and open up the bookings.

Kew and Queue

Knitting first... the 2-needle socks progress nicely. Turned the heel on the first one.

Ah, actually that's the only knittign I can show as the rest has been secret knitting. But you can go and look at it on ravelry (I'm littlelixie btw). I do however wish to highlight this little bit of it...

A while ago there was a big fuss about knit clips to hold knitting together while you sort out the seam. These are hair clips - about a £1 for 20 in matalan and other more reputable establishments. Work really well. Or why not break out the patterned ones...

Very cute!

So lastly on the knitting front - queues. I now have 74 things in my queue on ravelry. Is this normal? I suppose I ought to go and poke around in someone else's and find out. I just keep seeing things I like and want to make. The new knitty.com has also added a few items to it. There is a circular yoke in brown/turquoise I rather like the look of.

And so to other things - Pooch and I went all the way to Kew today. I looooooved it - Pooch didn't. He'd expected there to be animals. I really love a nice plant, especially some variegated foliage. Pooch and I both agreed that the waterlily house was the best. Amazing to see them so big and surrounded by every type of chili you can think of growing on bushes. Enjoy...

But what would this blog be without the weekly wine inspection. Tesco have a sale on so the collection has grown somewhat. We're well into third row territory. I haven't yet enquired whether it is red or white, but as soon as I find out I'll report back.

PS...new shoes!

Those who can, do.

There are several rather unattractive insults that start like this but in my case it is very true. For if I could I would, but I can'[t so I'm going to get on with my knitting which is what I would be doing if I had any choice in the first place. Ah yes, can you hear the delightful overture played on kazoo and nails-on-blackboard that is the start of one of my moans about this goddamn MBA? The thing is - if it were easy there'd be no point doing it. But if it's so hard and time consuming why do I not find it is worth anything in the real world?

Ok, OK, I'll shut up. And all this distracting myself form what I can't do has meant quite a bit of knitting has taken place recently. Yes because the ugly duckling that was this..

is now all grown up into this...

Observe the sticky-uppiness of the seams, which I did indeed backstitch in the end.

Yeah baby.

So yes, a very good knit and very enjoyable. Good pattern and well written. Is one of web of wool's own ones. Can see myself making it again in years to come.

The other FO is the never ending jaywalker socks which I find I have actually only been knitting since July.

The yarn is Stroud from Violet Green and really is lovely to work with. Haven't worn them yet so not sure what will wash like but will keep you posted. The service i got from them was really good too.

Then I've just started a 2-needle pair of socks in this lovely stuff that my sp10 sent me. Is Loooooovely and soft!

And finally I have begun the long-awaited u-neck fairisle jumper from vogue about a year ago. Loved it on first sight and the yarn is pukka jamiesons so none of your rubbish. Not sure about the very dark blue but have decided to just go for it and see what happens.

I happened to pick up Rowan's book 10 which looks like an early nineties publication. The patterns are not remarkable although the pattern designer list reads like a who's who of today in knitting terms. What really caught my eye was the model. For yes, that is a young Kate Moss. I've never seen Pooch pay so much attention to a pattern booklet in my life!

Speaking of him-indoors, there have been some classic Pooch moments recently. He spent some time doing his weekly wine-rack inspection on saturday.

Yep, still empty. He did explain to me how he had had to start a new row for the whites or might put a white on the red row, although obviously he'd rather not. The problem was neatly solved by quite a quantity of wine being consumed last night during a poker evening. The picture below shows Joe, sporting his lucky afro, and Dann with 2 n's and ladies - if you're liking the look of him, are clean and live in london I might just be able to put you in touch. He does something complicated with hedge funds in the city and has a flat in pimlico that only needs a few balls of wool to make it look complete. He didn't actually say he'd prefer a knitter but I'm taking that as implied.

Pooch didn't have a lucky afro but did have his trusty kermit.

I, of course, had my lucky date cake - made in one of my heart shaped tins.

Although as the cake dwindled so did my good luck - I came out £4.50 down - I could have bought a ball of wool for that!

Infamy! Infamy!

They've all got it in for me!

I speak, of course, of the germs in my throat. Once again I've been struck by the weekend-only bug which insists on keeping me fit and healthy when I have to work and only ever makes me ill in my own sweet, free time. In my hour of despair Pooch did a good job looking after me, bringing me flumps, dolly mixtures and heinz spaghetti with pork sausages (small size). However, you know how Nero fiddled while Rome burned? Well this is Pooch fiddling while Byrne moaned.

To be slightly more precise this is him reading me information about Nigella Lawson while I lay on the bed in pain. Apparently she has 32G breasts and never wears pants. There's a woman looking for a chill in her kidneys if ever I saw one.

All this finally served to remind me of something that caught my attention on the Knitting Daily newsletter from Interweave. Now this newsletter is really good stuff. Recently they've taken to getting women from around the office to try on the knitted garments they've got in their magazines to see what they look like on 'real' people. Now admittedly a number of these random women look like they've never seen a chocolate muffin but some of them are more familiarly shaped and it is interesting to see how the garments hang on them. But the thing I was really reminded of was a debate they've been following on what size knitters really are and what sizes their patterns are. And a very interesting fact was revealed. I had always assumed that when a pattern said 36" chest it was designed for someone who was a 36A, or 36B or...you get the picture. But no. It is the actual measurement in inches around the fullest part of the breasticles. It seems from their results that about 50% of you reading this are going "yeah? so what?" and the other 50% are saying, as I did, "OH MY GOD! I NEVER KNEW THAT! THAT EXPLAINS EVERYTHING."

Some of you have asked for an update on the sock wool jumper but there isn't really much to say. I'm on the last panel so will hopefully block these last two bits and start joining the rest this afternoon. Here is a shot, much the same as all the past ones!

In others news I've got my hands on the wool for a fairisle jumper I saw in one of the Vogue mags about 2 years ago. Real shetland stuff. Am going to start that, maybe, once I've finished the sock wool one. Nic helped me choose the colours and I really like them! She is so clever with all that kind of thing.

And so to leave you with some yarnstormesque pics of dolly mixtures.

There weren't any of the round ones left to take pics of as I always eat those first!