Sunday, October 7, 2007

Zippedee-doo-dah, Zippedee - ay!!


The Clappy has left the needles, I say again, the Clappy has left the needles!

That’s right, the Knitting Goddess smiled upon me and I finished the Clapotis on Saturday night – so a 16 evening knit, including my presence at 2 unavoidable non-knitting meetings and an evening of entirely fruitless tinking, knitting, tinking, knitting because I have no memory and can’t write decent instructions to myself.

Comments: I love it, and fully intend to do another next autumn in wool or wool blended with something – the corn fibre drapes beautifully and looks very nice:

But it has no memory and is, effectively, un-blockable. It’s also not so warm, so great around the shoulders on a cool night, but no so great for the real cold. I also must have MUCH wider shoulders that the designer, as it’s not as long for me – but I presume that if I’d used wool I could have blocked it longer. On the definite plus side it took 5 (yup, 5) 50 gr balls of the aMaizing (130m/50gr), so 250gr rather than 400gr.

Yesterday’s surprise lunch for my Father in Law was great – and was, indeed, a total surprise. It was his 70th birthday and lots of fun. The added bonus was knitting time in the car coming and going to the northern capital, so my Tulip FandF sock is on the instep stretch (sock on!).

This week, however, I intend to finish Juno. She has waited very patiently for me to return to the cables, been shunted aside for my case of the Clappy and I will now finish her collar, block and sew her (because given how cold the weather is, I will need to wear her for the next month or so!).

I managed to prepare a tomato bed on Saturday, but everything has stalled since then, so hopefully the tomato plants will get into their bed tomorrow. Raven, if you ever get to Tasmania, I will happily provide room and board in return for some gardening help!!

It was also fun getting dressed and made-up (rare events since the advent of motherhood). I wore a new kimono style top and new red Rivers shoes, and actually felt rather good! The Princess loved wearing a party dress (her mother was also pleased because any wear for a party dress is a good thing before it’s grown out of), and even Destructoboy looked respectable.

All in all, a good weekend. Finished the new Southern Vampire novel and can now return to the book which keeps getting put aside because library books always take precedence over those I own, After all, there are no overdue fines on MY books!

I also invented a rather nice barley and lentil pilau, involving the above ingredients plus preserved lemons and ground coriander, sumac and a finely chopped tomato (inserted at the end). It makes enough to feed an army and has provided meals for days – I’ve been teaming it with gently sautéed gourmet mushrooms for lunches at least twice (enoki, shitaki and oyster) – yum!

Back to the grindstone – washing up and tidying await me!


9 comments:

DrK said...

oooh that feather and fan pattern looks lovely in that yarn, perhaps there is hope for my abundance of stripey yarn yet! the clappy is lovely too, great work!

Rose Red said...

Ooh, a finished clappy! Yay!

Nora said...

Lovely Clapotis. I think I'll make my next one longer too. Have you seen Jane's [RoseRed]? D.I.V.I.N.E!

Nora

2paw said...

My Oh My what a wonderful day!! a-Maizing!!!! Record knitting time too, looks wonderful!!! I made a Mini Cup'o'tea (as I like to call it) scarf, and it does the rolling thing too. I saw somewhere, once, where someone made a garterstitch Cup'o'tea and that didn't roll at all. Good luck with Juno, hope all goes well. I can't plant tomatoes till November at least because we still get frosts here!!!

Lynne said...

I considered using Amaizing too. Yours is very pretty. Congratulations.

Thanks for the heads up about the warmth rating of Amaizing.

Five Ferns Fibreholic said...

Congrats on finishing the clappy. Looks like the others will have some work to do to keep up with you.

When we brought the kids to the wedding back in Sept, I was sure to take pictures. The three of them might not look so good at the same time ever again.

Georgie said...

*applause* Well done you! the clappy looks fabulous! Mine is still languishing under the weight of deadline projects :-(

Sounds like a lovely weekend all told.

Bells said...

Oh it's lovely. Can we see an up close shot?

You know, if you like vampire novels, you should check out Amy Lane. She's a blogger and knitter - and she's got a series of them. She's at http://writerslane.blogspot.com/

Amy Lane said...

Oh but your knitting is gorgeous...and I've had the clapotis on my maybeknit forever... (I think I just like the name.) It's been so long since we all dressed up...I think Christmas photos are coming back around...oh the pain...

(Except maybe, this year, I'll have some snazzy cat-fur mittens to sport--yee haw!)