and.sew.to.knit

Slow,slow

quick,quick

sloooow

dancing socks, the yellow ones at least will be dancing socks as they are for the dancing princess, special request. She informed me on christmas day that she didn’t get socks for christmas and both Mummy and Daddy did! How could I resist, the yellow is her choice, I of course would never choose to knit something yellow. I am hoping her favourite colour changes sometime soon!
The top blue socks had bad karma and I thought they were never going to be finished. One of the kids on holiday snapped the wool to have a piece of wool to fish for mussels, I was worried about the join being noticeable but my Mum tried them at christmas and pronounced it fine. So finally they are done and I can start some new socks on my 2.5mm needles. I need to buy another set of bamboos in this size but have been unable to here, I don’t want to work with 8″ metal needles, so will have to order some online.

The middle blue socks were a quick knit for Jordan who suddenly realised that he had no handknit socks, he does like them so a pair in finer wool is next on the cards.

The lilac/pink sock is New England from Knitting on the Road, these are going to my friend Margaret, she needs some good wishes right now, so these pretty socks are going to be full of love as only handknit socks can be.
Today I have a cardi blocking so finished item coming up soon…… after the seaming party of course, G&T’s all round……

Today is the start of the “ski” holidays for my boys, so I am sure for this week at least we will have boys and friends, coming and going at all hours of the day, sometimes its hard to keep track of everyone, they arrive, play the “empty the fridge” game and then leave. I think I need some kind of clocking system to keep track of who is here.
To aid in the food issue I bought a waffle machine, hoping this will have some entertainment value as well filling the hunger gaps, I only hope that the cleaning up part proves to be equally important and entertaining! First on the menu chocolate chip waffles,hmmmmm.

It maybe is a good job that I discovered this morning that our lift will be out of action from the 26th february for one month. I live on the 7th floor that is a lot of stairs, so I get to eat more waffles. I am feeling a little sorry for the dog though as he really doesn’t “do” stairs!
More knitting etc later, I do still knit, just slowly!

Well so far everything is working today, yesterday I had phone and internet on the boys computer but not on mine, thankfully the tech person fixed it when he got home from work, well its his fault it was broken in the first place.
So in punishment I made him drive me to Ikea, you know this is usually not a good idea on a friday afternoon. Well, it wasn’t a good idea yesterday either, the traffic on the way back was horrendous. We went to buy a bookcase and bedding but as usual came back with soooo much more!! Someone didn’t measure the inside of his new car, so we had a teeny problem getting the bookcase in the car, I did try to NOT say “I told you to” but I couldn’t help it!!

So here is the jumper and skirt I made this week……

…it was great fun, I think my nieces could have some fab outfits for Barbie by the time their birthdays come around, next up is a pink leatherette coat…..

Jamie is looking for some bright pink satin to line a waistcoat according to the message he sent me yesterday, he has a little hand sewing to re-do on his first one, he must be quite pleased with it, if he wants to make another, photos soon. He also asked if he could have one of my boxes to store his fabric in, hmmm not sure if I can give one up!

The preview of the new Rowan magazine is up here, nothing that grabs me on first glance but that is quite often the case, anyway I don’t need anymore inspiration I need more time to knit!

If you haven’t already you have to read Jessies article on Gender Based Blindness, living here with 4 guys I have to say that apart from the youngest, GBB affects all my guys, some more than others!

On the knitting front, I have knitted a whole jumper this week and just have to sew it up, so pics to follow, it will have a skirt that matches it soon too.

We apparently have a working phone AND internet so maybe things will be back to normal, whatever that is, around here. I dread to think how many messages we have, bags me not listening to them all…….

I now have internet access but no phone!
A few months ago I received a telephone call from a company who wanted to combine my phone and internet lines, I said no thanks.
They called back and got my son or husband, they said yes!
The company called back, I asked a few more questions, and once more said no thanks, sorry my husband was mistaken he didn’t understand everything you said etc, etc.
The thing is, I didn’t want to have to deal with more paperwork, everytime we have changed telephone provider, moved house, we have had problems and its me who has to deal with phone calls and paperwork as Jims french is much worse than mine. So the guys in this house harped on and on about changing and the deal was, only if it went smoothly and I didn’t have to deal with it all. Well THAT didn’t happen did it, we are now on day 4 of no phone, its driving me crazy, what is it with guys who have to change everything, upgrade everything, it almost never goes smoothly and if its not broken in the first place, why change?

Creativa was the usual disappointment for me, I love the craft fair in Glasgow and always find something new to try out, here no.

I did buy a felting kit for something that looks very complicated when I got out all the instructions but should be fun.

I did buy 2 skeins of wool, one is camel and silk and the other is 100% wool in a pretty colour. I would have liked this tweedy which came in aran weight for a jumper but he did not have enough of the colour I liked and I had no yarn amounts in my notebook!

I bought some Tchai tea too which is yummy, just what I need today as its freezing.

If anyone can explain COD and COI in french grammer in any way that helps me understand it, I will send chocolate, thanks…..

will be resumed as soon as possible.
Someone in their wisdom decided to change our phone provider which led to a few days of an internetless house.
I promised chocolate brownies and I have lost the photo, it maybe still on the camera, so in the meantime I will leave you with new sock yarn instead, it is very pink but I love it, I am now in a mad dash to finish up the couple of odd socks lying around. I’m off to Creativa (craft fair) to see whats new, this morning, probably nothing exciting though, more later…..

This weekend I did a little trade with my Mum, she cooked all weekend and I sewed her a new wardrobe. Two pairs of trousers, two skirts and four tops, she is a very happy lady and looks very stylish.

My Mum cooked chilli, tattie soup and roast chicken, cauliflower with cheese sauce and potatoes, yummy, yummy!
Sunday we took a walk to the market and I found two rolls of tie silk, I thought it would make nice bag lining, one roll has lots of different patterned pieces on it. Jamie has his eye on it though, he wants to line a waistcoat with some of it. No pictures of it yet though, soon….

Does being a knitter automatically go hand in hand with a love of chocolate then? Or did I just catch you all on a weak day when the chocolate looked too tempting???? I have pictures of chocolate brownies with Rolos in the centre to post but not today, I’ll save that one!

Chocolate.
Not just any chocolate, this is the very best dark chocolate truffle on tiny glace half mandarins, delicious.

My neighbour has been working in a very posh chocolate shop in the city for the holidays and she brought me these yesterday, unfortunately the boys really like them, so there are none left, just as well really, isn’t it???

Isn’t it cute, this is Jamies first finished item home from school, I am really impressed, its very neat. It now belongs to his Granny and I have to wait till he is finished his third item, as one of his friends has already asked for whatever his second thing is. I’ll keep you posted…..

So, one skein of Noro Kureyon is not enough for the beret from IK, I was left with 10 stitches to cast off and the little toggle to knit and no yarn left. Nothing in my stash or Mandys matched so I had to make a trip to the Rowan/Noro stockist in town. She of course did not have the right shade so I bought this one and had to take a piece from the middle to match, I quite like this colour so may make another pair of fetchings. My Mums fetching has been frogged, she was having trouble keeping track of the cable with the dark colour, so that Noro is now going to be a beret as she likes mine, picture soon as she is here to visit. She forgot the digestives but did remember the cheddar and the broth mix and butter beans so I will forgive her…….

The knitting bee was fun yesterday everyone has been knitting away over the holidays, Mandy is finished the back of her first cardi and is now knitting the front, its lovely, in her signature green, which was decided yesterday was sludgy green, hmm sounds lovely…..

This weekend was spent trying to get the apartment back to normal after the holidays. The boys went back to school today, yipee, and I went back to french lessons, you know Monday morning really isn’t a good day for me to do anything too brain taxing, the grammer is killing me!!

So in preparation for my mum arriving, who did indeed come armed with cheddar and chocolate Hobnobs, I decided the amount of wips lying around needed to be dealt with. So the question is if you find a new resting place for the wip, does that make it art and therefore acceptable to be lying around the living room? Or is it still piles of wool and other crap that really need to be hidden away?

There were a couple of new bags that were just calling out to be used as knitting bags….

And a bowl that shows off the fairisle hat perfectly, I thought….

The fabric pile I did hide away in a drawer as really it is just a pile of fabric I was contemplating, it hasn’t decided what it wants to be yet, that is partly because I do not want to make anything to fit me right now as I seriously need to lose a little weight as most of my clothes are seriously not comfy anymore.
The bead pile has been put back on the shelf until next time.
Knitting Bee tomorrow, I can’t wait to see what everyone has been up to in the holidays, lots I hope.