Hello Twenty Thirteen

Happy New Year my lovelies :D It's good to be back but I can't tell you how much I wish it were still the holidays, even though I know it wouldn't be as special if it lasted forever. We spent a very long week down at my folks in London, although a week didn't seem long enough in the end!

Christmas Day was very chilled out and merry. I was up early to see my brother before he had to work (!!) which meant opening presents, followed by more presents when J got up (fair-isle slippers!), followed by party food for lunch, mulled wine, dinner making, a nap, plying my parents with alcohol while they were being busy, my brother coming home still in good spirits, more presents, Christmas Dinner, Christmas Crackers, Trivial Pursuit (my Dad lost) Christmas Pudding and then bed.

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, or if that's not your thing a peaceful end to the year :)

I can't quite believe where the year has gone but looking back at my projects for the year sort of puts things into an order I can make sense of! I really enjoyed making little mosaics at the beginning of last year so I've done the same now, only this time I've discovered Pic Monkey which is a brilliant website for making collages, mosaics and editing photos - a huge time saver.

There are four projects from last year that I've finished which was one of my 2012 resolutions, but I've also started this year with more unfinished WIPs. Oh well!

1. Hexagon blanket - completed :)
2. A stockinette stitch cushion cover. I've cast on too many stitches for the cushion inner I have so I may start this again...
3. Spring Garden Granny Squares. These haven't worked out so well when joined, I'm wondering whether to make more squares in different colours and make a small lap blanket...!

4. Nanny throw. I don't think this is a project I've blogged about yet so more about this later!
5. Bubble Gum Ripple Blanket
6. Pomegrante snood.

7. Little Woolie Inspired Cushion. I should finish this soon, I've only got a few more rows to do!
8. Ribbed Phone Cover
9. Stripy Snood


1. Crochet hook handle, made from Fimo
2. Moss Stitch Scarf
3. Crochet owl

4. Crochet Father Christmas
5. Knitted bunting
6. Knitted cable hat

7. Bunting
8. Knitted cat mouse hat
9. Polka dot skirt


1. First pomegranate snood
2. Turquoise cable hat
3. Lingonberry biscuits :)

4. Winter striped scarf
5. Snowflake Christmas card
6. Chunky mustard snood

7. Pink fluffy scarf
8. Grass cable snood
9. Giveaway cactus

I've got loadssss of other things to show you that I started over the holidays too, lets cross our fingers for some good weather this weekend and I'll try to get some half decent photos to share :)

x x x x

Quarterly round up :-)

Back in January I decided not to set myself any ridiculous New Years Resolutions; there would be no joining the gym, no expectations to do things I know that realistically I am never going to achieve! Instead I opted for a couple of goals, simple things I wanted to do and thought "that might be possible!"

So climbing was part of it, I wanted to do some outdoor routes and lead a 6a - both completed! I wanted to eat more healthily and have less meat in my diet the latter of which I've managed really well (I made a veggie lasagne a couple of weeks ago!) but I still have to admit to the odd KFC... THE SHAME!

I was really keen to finish all my 2011 projects and apart from my hexagon blanket and a few other little things I think I've done really well! Here's a quick round up;


Stripy snood, one of my favourite things to wear because it's so cosy!


My mums crazy fluffy caterpillar!


I haven't done much sewing in 2012 but this is one of my proudest productions


Ahhhh finally! This scarf took ages because moss stitch calls for a little more attention but I'm so happy it's finally completed


My favourite project of the year, I think it will take something really special to top this



Admittedly I've started a few other projects too but mostly they've also been finished :-)


Baby hats for little heads


I've started some mini bunting; I'm not sure what to do with it yet!


And this will eventually be my new laptops cover :-)


I'm also knitting up a snood for my friends birthday and that lovely pink bunting. I'm starting to think my 2012 unfinished projects are getting ahead of me again!

x x x x

I finally finished that scarf

Hello folks :-)  It's very much the end of the weekend now (3 minutes to midnight!) - where does the time go?  I've been spending a lot of time down at my parents in London so there's not been so much time for blogging, but *lots* of train time for knitting and hooking!

Time for a ta-dah post!

 

Yesssss!  I've finally finished my moss stitch scarf, what a relief I can tell you!  I've been knitting this on and off for longer than I care to remember (Ravelry says since August 11') but I tell you it feels a lot longer!

The yarn is king Cole Big Value Chunky - colourway Heather, which I bought last year in Ramsbottom and for roughly £2 for 100g it's brilliant stuff!

I've been wearing it this week (now that the colds settled back in again...) and I can happily report it's not a horrid itchy scarf.  A.w.e.s.o.m.e!

I'll tell you what else is awesome!  This fabric :D

 
I decided to treat myself in Hobbycraft (a trip I was easily able to convince my mum to take me on!) to some new shades of pink (all half price!) and this lovely flowery pattern (not half price but sooo worth it!)

 

 Truth be told this fabric will have a very specific purpose.  My friend CJ and I decided that what her kitchen needs most is bunting.  CJ isn't a particularly vintage or chintzy person so I might leave out the flowers but she's a  very pink person and my fabric stash was pretty lacking in pink...  What a poor excuse :-)

My mum barely let me leave the house with it so I think I'll have to sew something for her too.  I hope there will be enough left for me!

Right, I was just going to say it's 10 past midnight when I realised it's actually only 10 past 11.  Excellent!  It's still time for bed though.

Hippywitch!! - I haven't forgotten your cactus, I just haven't been near a post office yet :-o

x x x x

One hundred lovelies

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

That's the noise you make when you realise you've got 100 followers :-)

I honestly don't know how or why - especially as lately I've been a pretty bad blogger - but I'm thrilled all the same and even more motivated to do my part and erm, write stuff!

So I would like to say "thanks very much!" indeed to all you followers, and all you readers who might not be followers - I love you too! I will be posting a giveaway as soon as I make something and thanks to Teresa Kasner I have just the idea!

Well part of the reason I've not been blogging much is I've been finishing off things and I think there's only so many photos I can show you of this scarf:

But there it is! Half a ball of yarn to go - I think it's going to be long!

I made another baby hat too for my friend - now very proud father - at work who had a little boy two weeks ago.

My only reservation was the colour because he asked for "United Red" - I could barely bring myself to do it!!

Moving on.

Since my granddad died my family have been on "Nan watch" which essentially means making sure she's got lots of visitors and things to do. I should take this moment to say that my Nan is super strong and copes with most things remarkably and has taken everything so well - she is no quivering mess - so last weekend we took her out to Dunelm Mill to buy cushions. As you do. She'd not really been able to leave the house without someone to look after my graddad so this new found freedom is all a bit, well new!

While we were there I found this amazing mug for £2.99! "NO MORE MUGS!" said J. Haha said I - this one is coming home with me and you'll just have to put up with it and ALL the other mugs we have. So here we are :-)



Even better is my Dad paid so technically I didn't even buy the mug we didn't need. WIN! The last time my Mum & Dad did this they paid for wool I was after as a Christmas present. We've never seen it since.

x x x x

Pink Fluff Ta-Dah!

One of my 2012 Resolutions has been to finish my 2011 unfinished-projects and I'm very happy to have this one done, especially seeing as it was meant for Christmas...

But before you see it be warned, it looks like a giant pink fluffy caterpillar!!!



:D

I've told my mum she really doesn't have to wear it out if she doesn't want to just-because-her-daughter-made-it. It's not that I don't like it, I kinda do which I didn't think I would but it just seems rather large now it's finished!

This is me wearing it:



I'm pulling a silly face so I chopped my head off for blogging purposes :)

If you'd like to create one the yarn is Patons UK Lulu in Colorway
07005 (pink/purple). I cast on 36 stitches (I like even numbers) and knitted until my mum said STOP!

Well it's 1 down and a possible 5 to go before I can start anything else. Boo! The start of 2012 is going to be rubbish!!

Now if my herbs will just start to grow I can create some culinary masterpieces!!

What's pink & fluffy?

Hello my lovelies! How are you all doing on this fine Sunday afternoon? I can't believe we've finally had a sunny winters day, lots of sunshine, frost on the ground and NO rain! I know the weather in Manchester is usually pretty bad (and we Brits love to discuss the weather!) but honestly it was getting ridiculous. So there we are.

Last week I was nominated not once but twice for a blog award! The very lovely Suzanne (Crea in the City) and Hazel (Hazels Crochet) both gave me the Liebster blog award and now I need to nominate 5 other upcoming blogs who have less than 200 followers which I love reading; believe me this is not easy because lots of you are already very popular!!

I've had a good old look through my reading list and I think I've made a good choice. I hope you'll all visit & enjoy their blogs as much as I do :-)

1. Rainbow Bunting
2. Hilly Town Blue
3. Lucy in the Sky
4. According to Matt
5. Aurora Blythe

None of this of course has anything to do with pink fluff! Last week I was hunting around for the yarn I'd bought for my stripy snood and it turns out I have a lot more hiding places for yarn than I thought! I found a few balls I'd forgotten about (woops!) and a load of "pink fluff" that my mum bought to make a scarf. I stole it because I knew she was never going to start (let alone finish) which is ironic because I've only just started it myself...





It's not what I'd usually choose to knit with (the yarn if you can call it that is Lulu by Patons), the problem with it is when you drop stitches (and you will!) it's hard to see them and pick them up. The good thing is if you drop stitches it's hard to see them ;-) So I'm trying to get this finished in time for Christmas! Fortunately I've got two bonus days as I'm not seeing my mum til the 27th. Stripy snood is slightly on hold (again) but here's this weeks progress!






New Years resolution is going to be to finish some scarves I think!!

:-)

x x x x

Friday feeling

Horray it's F-R-I-D-A-Y! That means no work for two days and a lie in tomorrow! I have had serious wake up issues this week I just can't get myself out of bed :-( I'm looking forward to a glass of wine later but only later because I can't knit with wine because I can't see or think straight with wine...!

I'm working on a new project for my friends birthday next week - it's ok there's no chance of her reading this!

I was really hoping to make a Danger Craft monster so I bought the Daphne and Delilah pattern but after opening the PDF and trying for two hours I just couldn't do it!

The first step is to Cast On 6 sts onto DPNs which is 2 sts on each needle, just too fiddly for me even though I made a jar cosie with DPNs a few weeks ago *Sigh*

So I got a lovely free and easy pattern on Ravelry that you can see here! I am definitely giving it a Danger style face though :-)




Haha it looks like a pair of pants doesn't it! I'm pretty sure it will work out though, I just hope she likes it because it's put One A Day on hold til it's done! The colours look a bit weird here (they look a different weird in real life!) but that's all quite monstery isn't it?

I still can't stop knitting this though...




I LOVE this wool!!

Tomorrow I'm looking forward to a day in town while J is at work. Horray for me time!

Have a lovely weekend all!

x x x x

Knitty business

Good evening all! I just wanted to pop in and see how everyone was doing. It's the end of the weekend and I've only made one hexagon, no knitting, sewing or anything! I don't like these weekends. I can't even say we've been busy with amazing trips or visits to friends but we have just cooked a roast dinner!

Yesterday J and I rearranged our livingroom because we were bored and it had been the same for two years. We learnt that we'd put things in their old places for a reason but at least things look a little different now :-)

What have you been upto? Maybe it's still your weekend and you haven't finished. I'd love to hear!

I'm still loving this wool, it's absolutely beautiful. It's actually 50% wool 50% acrylic which is great because it was probabl y50% cheaper and seems to be 50% less itchy. Win win!

I frogged the straight garter stitch scarf I'd been working on and now I have something that looks like this




It looks a bit wonky but I can assure you my stitches are exact so I'm going to block it at the end. What do you think? I really like it! It's still garter stitch but with an increase and decrease on either end which makes it just a little bit more complicated and enough to keep me interested.

My lunch break Moss Stitch scarf is also coming along nicely too. I make sure this is the only project I take to work because I know it will be forgotten and never finished!

Time to get another hexagon done! Good night and thanks for visiting, it means very much :-)

x x x x

More projects!

Achoooo! Ahem don't mind me, I've got a case of the sniffles (or man flu if I were a man!), maybe it's all the wind and rain recently or not enough sleep. Please ignore my whining though, it's best not to encourage me to feel sorry for myself :-)

I've been loving reading all the blog posts about the One a Day CAL and what can I say! I leave my computer alone for like two days (I also upgraded to Windows 7 (yay!) so am only just using it again properly) and look just LOOK at all the commments :-D AND I now have 61 followers. This is mind blowing stuff!! I'm looking forward to reading all the updates on Tuesdays Tallies and of course sharing my own.

Over on Ravelry Nanita my swap buddy posted photo of an amazingly cute cactus she made! Nanita has produced lots of lovely amigurumi (I was lucky enough to have received some in my swap yay!) but sadly has no blog, but you should definitely check out her Ravelry projects :-)

So... I got a bit inspired to make my own!




He now lives with my pin cushion cactus from & Made:



*Terrible blurry photo!

On Saturday afternoon I bought a little addition to add to my stash, some gorgeous Mille Colori from Lang Yarns which I bought from Purl City Yarns in town. Perhaps too much excitement ruinied my immune system!




It is actually amazing to work with. Initially I knitted it up with 6.5mm needles but the stitches were too loose so I frogged and started over with a 4.5mm. I wanted to try a 5mm but I don't have this size and being impatient I began but 4.5mm seems to be perfect.





Unfortunately I'm not quite as thrilled with is as I thought and the patterns very basic so I'm going to frog this too and try this pattern which is knitted diagnonally. I'll see how this one goes, who knows it might end up frogged again!

Time for some sleep now!

x x x x