A wonderful christmas

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I am sick, have been for a while but I guess it wasn't allowed to catch up w3ith me until boxing day. Now I feel like I have done ten rounds with Tyson.

I started a FLAK for Ron, to be honest I'm not loving it, so thought I would look for a Gansey to knit for him. Now, for quite a while I have been avoiding my yahoo groups, mainly because that is how I get sucked into KAL'S. While bored a few days ago I ventured into the EZasPi group, to discover they are starting a Gansey workshop in January. PERFECTO!!!
















The group is EZasPi

Making a list

Checking it twice.

Get kids to school..... check
Return library books...... check
Go to Gemini fibres...... check
Spend too much money..... check, check
get nails done..... check
Do christmas grocery shopping..... check
sleep.... check
Weave, knit anything to advance the gift lists....... check, check, triple freaking check
Take pain killers
Take pain killers
Take pain killers
Listen to the pain in hand

OY!!!!!!!!!!!
TAKE YOUR FREAKIN PAINKILLERS YOU DUMBASS!!!!!!!!! ....... ok check.

Pain in hands has indeed returned, I now have to accept the fact that I have to take a good long break from the obsessive nature I take on with my hobbies.

Gee I am so glad I didn't spend too much money at Gemini Fibres today!

Urghhhhh......


But seriously who can pass up on fleece artist fibres.

Busy spinning

I have spent the past three days spinning up 8oz of Merino/silk, to about 528 yards of yummy yarn. This yarn is destined to become two scarves, I wanted to make three, so will still have to get more fibre.
Right now I only have this one picture of two bobbins of singles, but rest assured it is all spun and plied now. I am going to the guild hall tonight to make the warp for weaving.
















Here is the socks that I made to send to Britain for my sister and her family.
I admit to cheating and actually buying one pair from the guild shop. My hands just couldn't take knitting another pair of socks.
the blue bag has the purchased socks in it, so therefore are not actually seen here.
From left to right, Fair isle socks for Charlotte, Ribbon bow socks for Molly and golfing socks for Chez! I hope they all fit just fine, I have had enough of knitting socks for a while.


















Since I am back into spinning for now I would love to get spinning some cotton, since I have never spun cotton i don't know where to begin, I have to get checking some books out at the guild while there tonight.
I have a few bags of cotton, one really nice bag, and some little bags of bits and bobs.

Working sucks. My new work never seems to be able to sort out my hours, they are beginning to wear on my nerves.

Where are all the Wii systems!!!!!!!!!

Christmas is beginning to wear on my nerves.

Baby alive, don't even get me started on that! One store wants $100 for one where as everybody else wants $50-$60. Thieving pigs. My nerves are at snapping point.

Katherine is likely to get surgery on her eye in the summer next year, it may well just put a spanner in the works for my holiday to Britain, This wouldn't bother me so much if I hadn't missed out on my vacation this year..... I need to travel.

I discovered a long time ago that I like to travel, I haven't traveled any further than Niagara falls in more than three years, I am going crazy. My nerves are about 1/16th of an inch away from popping and snarling crazily around the entire family, which break for vacation in 4 days. All of them! Every single body around this house for two weeks.



Work may well turn into a blessing during my time of need.

With two weeks to go

I am sadly behind in all the knitting I had planned for gifts.

I have decided to gift myself this year, the gift of taking it easy, my hand now no longer hurts, and it feels good to say that, so instead of rushing right back in and ending right where I was two months ago, I have decided not to worry about gifts, those that need to be posted will just have to be late, those that are for people here will just have to wait. If anyone ever wants handmade crap from me again, they will have to wait.

I don't want surgery!!!!

I am however busy making a pioneer costume for Eliz, she visits a pioneer school on wednesday (is there something wrong with how that is spelled? Spell check is highlighting it) she is really into all this stuff, I think in most part because of my involvement with the Burr House, spinning and weaving and of course the knitting.
They get to eat a proper lunch, mason jars and home made bread, LOL, I am making her some bread in a neat little kit I found at a store.
Photo's will follow, I just don't have any right now.

It has been so long since I have posted pictures that I will have to do a big photo post, I have lots of FO's to show, so soon hopefully.

Passing the torch along

Ok so I apologize to the like, one reader of my blog, that I haven't posted in over a month.
We had internet issues for 2 days, 2DAYS man, I got over it pretty quickly, still seething at bell a bit, but we soon figured out what to do with no computer, problem is I got to into not doing computer, and I am now just getting back to reading blogs, etc, but still not totally into it.

Tomorrow is my tenth wedding anniversary. My gift is a new digital camera, I so loved my old Olympus digital that I went with another, this one is a 6.0 MP, I am stoked, tomorrow the old will pass along it's approval to the new. I am not opening it until then, but hopefully will get piccies up soon after that.

I have of course been busy knitting, what on earth else would I do with no computer. I finished my moms shawl the green moss from HK's simply stunning line.
I have made socks, a shrug is almost finished, I have spun, I have done lots of weaving, I have plans to make a FLAK for Ron, I made a lace baby booty.
I have been busy, but perhaps the biggest thing in my news recently is that I start work again this week. Part time, in a shop, it is exactly what I wanted, Katherine is still only part time school, so I want a care free job until she is in school full time. In those two years I want to finish my architecture diploma and hopefully do a course with Humber college for Building inspection, I really should have a few other ideas if that doesn't work out.
History seems to be my second biggest interest next to knitting, that and architecture go hand in hand so I think I should also look down that avenue.

My hand is still hurting, I finished a month of anti-inflammatories, they helped but not completely, so I have another two month supply, at least the burning sensation has all but stopped.
I am finding it hard to completely stop knitting to let them heal. My other hobbies hurt just as much. The last resort is a major jigsaw puzzle. I don't particularly want to end up having surgery for it, so I should stop knitting, but I have things I need to finish, others can wait, it's these few things I need to finish that are bothering me.

Anyway, more tomorrow hopefully, don't hold me to it though, as I know that I uually don't post for a month when I say something like that.

Weaving, like I needed more things to do.

I have been so busy over the past 5 weeks. I took my very first weaving class, it ended this tuesday, having woven 4 placemats you would think I would have pretty much had my fill of weaving for a while, that is if you know me, that I really didn't have much interest in weaving going into this, it was supposed to just leapfrog me into being able to hold my own at an upcoming linen weaving class at Burr house, date yet to be set.
Well, that plan of not weaving much more completely went to pot, I wove a small stole for Katherine, and have enough warp left to do one for Elizabeth. I am currently warping my loom for some stripe work, I only have a table loom, so can't fit a full size tea towel on it, I figured at 2/3rd size I was also pushing it, so plopped onto the idea of doing little towels for the kitchen, the girls are always driving me crazy looking for towels in the kitchen, so thought 6 little things would be nice, my towel draw is full to bursting, but all it takes is one time for Katherine to get her paws on the drawer to empty it completely. Too many towels is never enough.

This is the stole on the loom.
















This is the placemats.















Since I last posted, I have passed along the baby blanket to the lady that ordered it, she was very pleased with the blanket, and I breathed a huge sigh of relief.















In future when I am blocking I shall take a picture, and I shall look at picture to see if the thing looks remotely like the shape it is supposed to be.

A visit, an FO and a pain.

Wannietta came to our spinners guild last week. I t was so great to finally meet her. She is as bubbly as she appears on her blog, she is as into knitting as you would expect, she is also a very nice person, and can knit like a devil........

I felt insanely slow knitting next to her, I can't imagine how one could get any faster than that.

Her talk about the speed competition was great, I would like to go to the Creative Festival now this year just to see the speed knitting.
I may well have to teach a bit of spinning to Wannietta too, this is cool, I love to share spinning with people, while I am no expert (nowhere close) just a spin to knit kinda person actually, I really enjoy the feeling of creating my own yarn. It gives me an opportunity to meet Wannietta again too, which I suspect could be a lot more fun than the meeting at the guild where we didn't get much opportunity to talk.

I did see a bit of a secret project, and what I saw I liked, but it wasn't enough to give away anything, so I too have to wait!


I finally finished my Fair isle cardi, it dressed out nicely, but needs a bit of a firmer dressing in the sleeves, which I suspect I may have to alter before I am totally happy.














I wound some balls of the cobweb silk I have ready to knit the wedding ring shawl from Heirloom knitting, it took almost 45 minutes to wind these two little balls, thats a lot of yarn in those two little bundles. I am busting a gut to start the shawl but desperately want to finish the Princess before I start another huge project, so Princess has been dragged out, kicking and screaming, to the top of the lace basket, which is currently quite full.
I just couldn't let go of wanting to start a new lace project, so I started another simply stunning project, the Jade shawl in yellow, it is looking good so far, so this is project three on the needles of Heirloom knittings. Yet I still kept going back to the wedding ring shawl, wanting to start, I got as far as checking needle sizes, I found my 2.25 mm needles after a bit of hunting, they are in my Unst stole! That's project 4 of HK's designs..... I should finish at least one before I put the big project onto the needles, it will be hard. I have a birthday coming up, and was sure I was going to order the Cora shawl kit as a pressie to myself, but here's the bitch, it's another HK design, and while I obviously adore her designs, I also just as obviously have issues with finishing them. While I have finished lots of them having 4 on the needle right now isn't sitting too well with me.


Here is some Princess progress, and a kind of marker for me to see how much I do in months to come.