Generous knitters

I received this in the post this morning ............. Allison said that she wasn't happy with the colour so sent it as a freebie to try out !!!

I love it.

The colour is beautiful and the feel of it is beautiful too as it is 100% bamboo.

I don't think there is enough room on the server for the amount of thank yous I want to say.

Best of it is, I bought some DK light damson off Allison when her shop first opened and I've been looking at it ever since wishing I had enough to make me a knitted jacket. The turquoise blue of the bamboo goes so well with the Damson it gave me an idea.

For Christmas, I was given Nicky Epstein's knitting in blocks book which is super fantastic amazing. And in there is a lovely shawl jacket that I would love to make for me. So I am going to collect skeins of DK in analogous colours - like the damson and the turquoise - and I'm going to make the jacket using all different blocks from the book. The one in the book uses blocks all the same colour, and symmetrically positioned. I'm going to make a crazy paving of different blocks but all within close colour groupings.

Not sure how the bamboo will sit with the pure wool but I'm fairly certain it will work and obviously I will knit up tension swatches to see how they match. It may be just a case of changing needle sizes to get the same size blocks - that part is important otherwise it will just look a mess.

But again all I can say is thank you so very much Allison. You are obviously very self critical as I think it's lovely. If you are going to be dying anymore DK I'll be back on your shop asap .... just need the other half to look the other way.

The advantage of being part time now, is that I get home before him so I can pick up and hide any squishy packages in the stash before he gets home :)

F A Cup

Well today at work I had my photo taken with the FA Cup!!! One of my colleagues had won the opportunity to have the FA Cup in his house for a day, and he had arranged for it to be brought into work.

So it was set up on a stand with an Eon backdrop and all and sundry queued to have their photo taken by the professional photographer - the DVD will be sent to my colleague and we all get our photos for free. Not that I am a big fan of football but it will wind up my brothers :)

Then to add to the excitement, the fire alarm went off and the building had to be evacuated. So the two security guards packed the cup up and trundled it down the stairs to the firepoint in the carpark - where we waited for half a wet hour before we were allowed back in again.

We don't usually get that much excitement at work !!!!

I think I mentioned that I had been knitting a double breasted baby jacket for Sue Hill who employs outworkers to produce her high end baby clothes - cashmere and merino mix, the yarn was incredible. Well she was pleased with my work as another package of yarn arrived today with a request for two round neck cardigans. This time the yarn is 80% cotton and 20% cashmere. Again, absolutely beautiful yarn, a dream to knit with, fantastic stitch definition and a lovely creamy oatmeal colour as well. I feel very privileged to be knitting these garments in such wonderful yarn. I don't even want to know how much it costs - but I wouldn't waste it on my mucky duo that's for sure :)

Working on my OU course I had to send a postcard to them detailing three things I'd like to do before the end of the year - and one of those is to finish something for myself. I have not yet managed to finish anything bigger than a pair of fingerless gloves and I have so many cardigan patterns waiting to be started ....

My little animals are very popular at work. I've already been asked for a shelf sitting chick - with long legs that dangle - and one of my colleagues has even asked for six bunnies even though I haven't even worked out the pattern yet!!! Good times.

I hope you are all having knitting fun and good times yourselves.

So much to do and so little time to do it in.

From the beginning of January I have dropped my hours at work to 20 per week - 9 til 1 every day. This was done through direct pressure from Alex's school as they thought his day was too long. Well I suppose they were right although he is hardly the only child to spend time in breakfast club and afterschool club with working parents.

However, despite the fact that I was pressurised by the school and the inclusions officer from KCC, I am actually quite enjoying the part day. I pick up Alex at 1.30 - he isn't doing full days at the moment as he is having one to one support and cannot cope with a full day at school. Hopefully as he gets older, he will learn to control his temper and be able to work around the problems caused by his Aspergers.

You'd think that I would have plenty of time now. But some clown has put life on fastforward for me. I have started the Crochet Club with Jane Crowfoot, and it is a really exciting project because there is no way you can guess exactly what the wall hanging is going to look like.

I'm also in the process of finishing the baby jacket that I am knitting for Sue Hill (she was interviewed in The Knitter last year and uses out knitters) I'm hoping that my work is good enough for her because the merino/cashmere blend she uses is a dream to knit with - so soft and has great stitch definition. My only problem, because I'm left handed, is that as I knit I have a tendency to untwist the multi-strand yarn - so I have to be careful not to split the stitch. But I have loved knitting with it.

I'm also working on a hat from The Knitter, with a complicated loop pattern on the edge - slow going because it is very difficult to translate the loop into left handed knitting. It needs to be exactly right otherwise it looks very strange.

Alex turned 6 on the 9th January and we had his party at our local Kidz Planet on 22nd January. Kidz Planet is an absolutely massive indoor play area - one of the ones where there are lots of ball pools and slides and all sorts of exiting things if you are 6 :) They do a fabulous party deal - It cost us £200 (we provided cake and party bags) and they do all the work - providing the meal - hot or cold - and loads of drinks for the children. They deal with the cake and do all the cleaning up - What could be better? Unfortunately Alex came down with a stomach bug on the day and spent most of the time sitting with us - his friends had a good time though - and he got loads of very good presents from them. Mind you over the last two years I've probably spent about £100 on presents for his friends when he's been to their parties.

Generous little chap that he is, he gave me his bug and I spent most of last night being sick. Why do children only get it mildly and adults always go for broke? When I phoned in to work, I was told that I had to produce a sick note because I'd had so much time off sick before Christmas!!! That was stress and they caused it!!! To make matters worse I had to fork out £10 for a sick note!!! There's going to be trouble tomorrow if they don't reimburse me that's for sure.

I'm starting yet another course at the beginning of February. It's an OU course in design and they sent me a box of items for the pre-course activity. This is going to be so much fun. So far I've had to make a banana out of masking tape and there are loads more waiting to be done - hands on stuff - I love this kind of thing. But I'm going to be busy :)

I've also decided to take Alex swimming after school at least once a week. I've been a bit neglectful in that area - basically laziness if I'm going to be brutally honest - and it makes sense for Alex to learn to swim as we do live right by the sea :) It'll do me good as well. Even better is the the swimming pool is owned by the council I work for and part of last year's no payrise deal was that we get free swimming there - so I'll only have to pay for Alex.

I've got plans for some heart keyrings and hopefully I'll be setting up a Folksy shop. I've got loads of plans for little knits - pocket money items - for me as well as the buyers :) and I'm starting to get interest at work for commissions - a friend wants me to knit a dog coat. So hopefully, although I'll never make the amount I've lost in wages, I should still make enough to go towards knitting !!! And at the end of the day that's what matters. :)

Finally - time to stop and blog

I'm determined to do nothing else for 2 hours - until the Turkey is cooked whereupon I will be baking two cakes - one for the kids as the Christmas cake I've made has far too much brandy in it for them - and one for the in-laws hamper that we are creating.

It has been total chaos the last week or two. What with Alex getting himself excluded three times !!! and knitting those little mice for people at work - I have made 16 of them in total.



My yarn from Allison arrive wrapped in a lovely sheet of printed tissue paper. The yarn is so beautiful - I really think that Posh Yarns would struggle to better this. I'll be keeping an eye on your Folksy shop Allison :)

And my secret santa box arrived and I managed about 30 minutes before I gave up and opened it. Oh so wonderful - each item unwrapped from bright orange tissue (I've kept it) brought yet another squeal of excitement from me. I love it all, and I am so impressed with the bead work - I especially love the little angel - I need one of them at the moment and she is perfect.



The cloth teddy pattern has given me loads of ideas for crafty makes to sell at work. I've had to drop my hours to 20 per week because of Alex and his problems so I'm going to need a source of secondary income to keep me in yarn. :)

It's Christmas Eve - I hope you all have a very wonderful and fun packed Christmas. Best wishes for the New Year - onwards and upwards Ladies - I feel very privileged to know you all - a wonderful bunch of knitterly sisters.

Sorry for the long old absence

I've been struggling for some time with this and that - Alex and his Aspergers, Amber and her teenageritis and work and all of the vulnerable claimants whom I can't help as much as I would like to. My problem is I've been on the other side of the counter - claiming benefits - and I know how hard it is. So I find it hard to switch off from it all.

The upshot of this is that I have been signed off for the past four weeks with anxiety and depression. I'm going to counselling and have doubled my antidepressants and I'm attending a six week course of stress control. The biggest thing is that the Occupational Health people have told me bluntly that I am not suitable for my job !!! The council has a policy of swapping staff into other jobs if there are any available and it is needed. So this may be happening to me soon - if no other jobs then no job !!! So that is a scary thought, although they keep telling me that they are not allowed to do this.

Anyway, I never know what my mood is going to be from one moment to the next. I can be happy and optimistic one moment and then within seconds dip into the pit of doldrums convinced that nothing is ever going to go right again. This is not me.

I'm knitting Bagpuss for a friends daughter, and I have got a knitpicks bag on the needles and a plethora of small projects planned for Christmas presents. I always love Christmas so I'm using that to keep me going.

I know who my swap box pal is for this Christmas but all I can say is - could you all blog and let us know what you cannot have - for instance if you hate chocolate or are allergic to it or anything else for that matter. I know we did this last year but do you think I can find the lists we made?

Anyway, sorry again for the long silence - I have been regularly reading all of your blogs and they have cheered me up - I love reading all of this stories of normal life going on around me. I am now going to watch Kirstie's Homemade Home.

TTFN

XXX

I'm still standing ....

Just about :) The last few weeks have whizzed by so fast that I've almost got rope burns from them. I am so busy at the moment - at work and at home.

Having to find holiday childcare for Alex because our first choice let us down badly - basically they don't want him because of his Aspergers. So many people have said that they are discriminating against his disability and I should report them to OFSTED but to be honest I don't want to ruin what there is there. They do provide breakfast club and after school club during term time and I really don't think I should rock the boat too much.

Going to Farnham Maltings on Saturday with my Mum to do a City & Guilds workshop. We are going to be doing the messy arty stuff and I am so looking forward to it. I have a terrible sense of direction so tend not to go too far on my own as you can guarantee I will get lost. Mum is not much better but she has a Tom Tom and is not afraid to use it either. I've printed off the AA route finder - no motorways as they are boring - which adds 2 hours to the journey but it will be so much nicer along the coast roads.

So between Tom Tom and AA hopefully we shouldn't get lost - everything crossed :) My other half is very rude about my ability to drive this distance and says he'll keep an eye out for me going round and round the block - cheeky so and so.

I've got humungous amounts of WIPs but I still felt the need to join the SheKnits Lizbeth KAL on Ravelry. I joined her Autumn bag KAL last year and loved it. This time it's a shawlette and I can't wait to get started.

HipKnits

Well, I thought I'd give HipKnits the benefit of the doubt and order some silk aran yarn from them as I wanted a bright yellow and they had a yellow through to Orange that I loved the look of.

Got the yarn quickly, and indeed it did look good - then I unraveled it to put it on the swift. Immediately I noticed that the yarn was crinkled and tangled - obviously hadn't been hung properly whilst drying. It only had two ties on it and not in figure of eight.

The first skein wound off slowly as I untangled the tangles along the way. But the second sken was appalling. It consisted basically of a lot of short lengths of silk knotted together - I got several very small balls of yarn from that - and it was badly tangled. The last skein was whole but so badly tangled it took me nearly an hour to untangle it and wind it off. I wouldn't have been able to do it without the swift.

I am definitely NOT buying any more yarn from HipKnits - they still haven't learned how to provide good service.