Bendi - the hangover.

Well, I'm home, the washing is done, the case is unpacked and most of the patting and fondling of yarn has ceased (mostly).

It's that awful feeling a week after you get home from a great holiday. That feeling that it almost never happened. You know you went. You had a great time. You finally got to meet some of your bestest-ever blogbuddies. You were child- and husby-free for 2 nights and most of 3 glorious days.
You were one of the Kewl Kids in the Hustler Street Posse.

And now you're home. And the washing-up didn't get done while you were away and neither did the washing. The floor crunches underfoot - in the patches were it doesn't stick to the soles of your shoes. Your family ate fish and chips from the local takeaway one night, and pikelets the other night.

My week has been normal. Went to the gym, did my monthly stint in the school canteen (it's only open one day a week, and the school only has 150 students, so it's not terribly onerous), sorted out a birthday party and present. Then the kids got sick. Both of them. Same symptoms. Sore stomach, headache, fever (Princess was 38.1 and Destructoboy was running at over 39). This meant Friday was all about high level mothering - which is something between pedeatric nursing and being a general dogsbody - one who prays under their breath ' please don't vomit - please don't vomit'.

Saturday was convalescence day and they are still not 100%. I know this because they have not fought, screamed at one another, hit, wrestled or had tantrums for 3 days. So today we made dried berry and orange brownies.

The goreousness in my suitcase -there have been one or two questions?

The butter yellow big balls?(How obscene does that sound?) That is 4 x 200gr balls of Bendigo Woollen Mills Cameo (angora/wool mix) 10 ply. From the fabled Back Room of the woollen mill is also some denim coloured Rustic in 12 ply, some marled Rustic in 8 ply, a ball of red luxury, and courtesy of the Divine Mandie at Ewe Give me the Knits, some Bendigo Woollen Mills fibre to practice spinning. There is also 700gr of red merino top for spinning and somehow I ended up with one of SpinningWoodie's drop spindles, made of maple and sassafras.

Also from EGMTK there is some dyed fibre and 3 skeins of sock yarn, from Charlie at Ixchel some cashmere merino laceweight, some camel/bunny, some angora bunny fibre and a bunny bling batt (this is wrapped up as the bling kept escaping and attching itself to everything and everyone in sight.

A couple of skeins of Pear Tree red 4 ply snuck in there too, and some of the gorgeous silk/optim from Shiloh wool. There's also some silk/Polworth from Wendy Dennis and the gorgeous Tom, some Lara Downs pure cashmere and some of their luxury cashmere/angora bunny/merino. There's some of Donyale's utterly gorgeous baby alpaca in Sir Walter, 2 skeins of Jitterbug and I'm almost sure there are other yummies I've not named.

In addition, I had presents. Donyale gave me Norah Gaughan Volume 5, Knightly Knitter passed on a birthday present of Mason Dixon Knitting, Zephyrama gave me Feminie Knits and I have no idea how Knitting Ganseys ended up there. After a while it became a euphoric haze.....

And yes, I did manage to get clothes in there too. In fact, I bought 2 tops and a knitted cotton dress. i thought the tops were cotton rayon stuff until after I had put one through the washing machine (on cold luckily) and discovered that this shiny silkiness was in fact - wool.

So thank you to the amazing blogpals, the awesome organisers, the remarkable Ravellers and ecstatic enablers. I have already booked the husbeast for childminding for next year. I am so ready.

I don't even mind the post-Bendi hangover, as long as it means I can do it all again next year!

Carton of Delights

On Friday (I should also add that was Kate the Knightly Knitter's birthday - waves!), I had 5 minutes up my sleeve on my way to work, so I thought I'd check the post box - as you do.

I left behind all the Accountant's work mail and grabbed the registered parcel card lying in there oh-so-innocently! This is what was waiting - nearly 7kg of yum from BMFA! I have dropped my shoe near it so you can get an idea of the scale. This carton of delight was notified as posted last Saturday - so it apparently reached here in 6 days from Oregon. Considering my mail often takes longer than that to get from Sydney, I was pretty impressed.

Inside the box was some serious yarny goodness. Sock yarn, twisted, peru and lace, all lying innocently inside, as if butter wouldn't melt!

I hasten to add, that despite all reports to the contrary, I am not a yarn pig. This gorgeousness was not all mine. Several friends (you know who you are! Don't act all 'Who me?' - you are just as guilty as me!) piggybacked on my order - given that I had to use a discount coupon before the end of October.

I managed to do this order while the Aussie dollar was sliding - but before it tanked completely. Of course, I wish I had done it while the exchange rate was over 90 cents, but there you go, you can't have everything! And it has slaked my need for a yarn fix for some considerable time.

Now, there was a certain level of slow hand clapping for me to display the yarn which might be called stash by people unfamiliar with the Rules of Stash as outlined by the High Priestess of Stash. By these rules, I have 2 jumpers worth of Bendigo, which fall outside the rules and therefore can be considered my only stash. Unfortunately, I also have a 'yarn collection'. We do not have bandwidth to show the inhabitants individually (and I know my Rav stash pages are woefully behind - I will get to updating them at some point, I promise), I though I would give you a bit of a glimpse of the inhabitants in their natural surroundings.

This is the main collection area. It is approximately 2 metres wide by 3 metres deep and runs to about 1.5 metres high.

This is the ancilliary collection area. It keeps growing and consists mainly of 50 litre tubs, but other sizes and boxes and such have also been pressed into service.

This is mainly sock yarn, although some malabrigo seems to have crept in. There is also a collection of patterns and downloads catalogued and stored on the right hand side of the area. This is down staiors for petting purposes.

This is the knitting library (and a big thank you to the Book Depository here, please - the benefit if paying no shipping is the ability to buy more books!).

Just to let you know, there are also 3 jumpers worth which are in bags with their patterns waiting to be cast on, and around 40 pairs of socks worth, also in project bags with their patterns, ready to go (my own private sock club.) They do not appear in these pictures, but would like to make their existence known.

So there it is. My guilty secrets exposed. No more handclaps (slow or otherwise, please). If you want to meet the inhabitants individually, you'll have to come and visit. I'll put the coffee on, and make a cake if you do!

And a big hallo to Toni, who popped in to visit the other day. It's always lovely to meet new knitters and fellow Ravellers. She brought Ravelry Badges with her (2 of which my offspring are proudly wearing ( just in case I forget their names!).

Bearing Gifts We Traverse Afar......

I’ve been a little tied up recently (you can just stop thinking what you’re thinking, right now!). As you are probably already aware, the man in the (Coca-cola promoted) red suit (or if you’re into Victoriana, blue or green suit) is not far away. The Pre-Christmas frenzy of excitement is well and truly here.

I am basking in the virtuous glow of a woman who has done virtually all her Christmas shopping, posted all distant presents (one still needs to be posted – but it’s closer to home) and knows that goodwill and happiness will arrive in mail boxes soon.

I have not, as yet posted the overseas Christmas cards. Every year I swear I will do them in November and every year it doesn’t happen until I well and truly feel that Christmas is only just around the corner. How anyone manages to feel Christmassy enough in September to sea-mail cards, I have no idea.

Tasmania has been desperately dry – even here on the usually damp North West Coast, but the other night we had a belter of a thunderstorm and a most satisfying downpour and everything’s greened up again. My tomato plants are growing baby tomatoes, the herbs puffing away, local strawberries are on offer at the local fruit and veg shop, cherries should be ripe next week and raspberries can’t be far behind. I saw the first Australian grapes available at a price which didn’t involve selling my children to white slavers, and there’ll be mangoes for Christmas. Life (or at least, food) doesn’t get much better than this!

I have been working hard on editing Amy’s new book (which is just great and I am enjoying reading it as well as working on it – makes the job MUCH easier).

One or two things have slipped through on the yarn front – I did a swap with a fellow Raveller – some Rowan Yarn for a Rowan Studio book and was rather sucked into the vortex of gorgeousness generated by the Jolly Jumbuck. Some Fleece Artist Somoko sock yarn in Pinata, and some Hand Maiden Casbah in Rainforest seemed to have fallen into my hands.

I also have the most recent Red Bird Knits sock kit – which is in the loveliest yarn (I think I mentioned it last post – wool, silk, cashmere). I received a parcel from America containing a skein of Helen's Lace, for the purpose of knitting a Juno Regina Wrap (definitely the next Clapotis).

I also fell rather off the wagon because I put some Patonyle on layby at my local LYS and when I went to give them some money I slipped and fell onto some Zara being cleared and put that on layby too – in a dark forest green (10 balls) and a sort of eggplanty colour (10 balls). These have not actually entered the portals of my house yet, so they don’t count on my In/Out list!


I’m still waiting for my Bendi order (nearly 2 weeks ago), and I’m thinking I may be forced to do another order (before the sale finishes). I’ve been following a thread on Ravelry which insists that sale yarn, sock yarn, gift yarn and overseas yarn doesn’t count as stash. So by that logic, my stash has been reduced to about 2 kilos of Bendi in various forms. I feel much better now. It’s rather like the reasoning that broken biscuits and food eaten after midnight don’t count on diets (thanks for that tip, Ms 2Paw).

I had one dieting theory that food of the same colour had the same calorie count (but I’m not sure that was entirely true). Therefore, Top Deck chocolate had the same calories as mushrooms, green iced fairy cakes were the same as broccoli, white chocolate went with potatoes and red lollies worked the same as capsicum. As theories went, it wasn’t a bad one – unfortunately it bore about the same relationship to reality as the flat earth theory or ‘intelligent’ design.

I have almost finished the Silk Garden jumper – which looks lovely and I’m sure the Noro yarn must give obsessives who want to colour match their sleeves or the fronts and backs of their knitting conniptions. I enjoy the randomness – some of my balls had emerald and teal and some were only the fire/metal colours – one had several metres of the most glorious opalescent purple hiding. I tried to keep the balls with the emerald and teal for the front and sleeves and other than that made no attempt to match. I did check out a Noro group on Ravelry and one person spent ages turning her Noro into 36 perfectly colour matched balls, leaving aside some where no match was found.

I think I have too much going on in my life for that – I’m enjoying the fire colours living on the back of the jumper and the dashes of greens and purple on the front and sleeves – Gosh – I can’t control any aspect of my life right now – why on earth should knitting be any different?

Go with the flow, I say, go with the flow!

Always Take the Weather With You

Hurrah for Carolyn – who remembered what I had forgotten! – I could see in my mind’s eye a pair of gorgeous red lacy socks with a balck beaded cuff (and due to the fact that my brain disappeared at about the time my daughter appeared I didn’t know whether it was a fabulous design idea of my subconscious, or if I’d seen it somewhere). A cursory search of the usual suspects (own books, Knitty.com, some free internet patterns) didn’t turn it up, but she did! Of course, the Yanr Harlot made one from a kit!

So here’s to Carolyn and her functioning brain! – mine gave out years ago! I’ve emailed the kit supplier, and asked if it would be possible to buy a copy of the pattern, and am awaiting their reply. I really hope they say yes, because otherwise I am going to have to design my own, and we know what that will mean! Nightmares and a probably unwearable sock! Not to mention copyright issues, unless I make it entirely different. Ay me!

For those of you who have signed up, the Southern Summer of Socks starts today!!! – Unless, of course, like me, you have a handicap because you started early! So my SSS starts tomorrow – Yay etc. I will probably try to finish my Clapotis before I continue on the socks though – because having too many WIPs is slightly stressing me – I am so close to finishing Juno and the Clappy has 4 repeats to go before I start on the decrease section.

I really like the Happy Clappy. And I think I may make a wool one next autumn, but next on the needles are several pairs of socks, some Christmas presents, Black Dog’s swing jumper in Silk Garden and Bella in the Amerah silk and Bendigo cotton. That’s more than enough to keep me occupied until nearly Christmas.

It’s been a very blustery and changeable end of September. We’ve had gales, huge amounts of rain, hail, some sunshine, snow in the mountains and yet, spring still marches on.

You’ve got to love the way nature goes “Nup – don’t care about the weather. This is spring, and I’m going to wear my best clothes!”.

My Princess is currently sick – she went to the cinema for the very first time on Saturday with her best friend and best friend’s mother and came home complaining of a headache and sore eyes. She’s been running a fever since then, along with general down-ness and complete lack of appetite (most unusual for the Princess). She’s better today, but still somewhat demanding, so I’ll leave this now.

But as I leave, just a thought. KMS was discussing the’Friend’ thing on Ravelry. I’m with her, in that I don’t think that Ravelry’s a popularity contest. But just to make me feel better, all my blogpals are Ravelry friends, right? Have I missed anyone I should have invited? If I have, it’s because I haven’t had a chance to spend much time there, but I really don’t want to feel like Sleeping Beauty’s mother – let me know if you’re feeling overlooked and sad, because trying to exclude people is not the aim (despite being elitist and invitation only!!). Remember, it’s about yarn and knitting and the size of your stash!!!

And the Answer Is........

Well, in answer to the question posed in a recent blog, most of you seemed to think there was rather a dead heat between knitting and sex, but that knitting while talking about knitting (and eating Kate’s orange and dried cherry brownies) was pretty darn good (notice how I get my ‘G’ rating). There was some thought that knitting during sex was probably NOT a great idea, but that crying out ‘Yarn over, mohair oh mohair!’ during the throes of passion may also cause a little trouble in the marital bed!

On the plus side, life has remained fairly good, as although the Accountant is away on business, my wonderful and entirely un-evil stepmother is staying which means I have an adult to talk to during the day and, as she knits, I have an adult knitter who loves my children to talk to during the day – a wonderful state of affairs.

The Princess finally went to her first class at Circus School and thinks it is wonderful. She’s the littlest one in the class, but was trying to hula hoop while spinning herself (don’t bother trying it – it really doesn’t work!), doing forward rolls, balancing on a board on a cylinder and suspending herself upside down from the uneven bars – heaven in fact!

Destructoboy has used his powers moderately wisely in recent times – not destroying too much, but is enjoying Grandma’s visit.

I have knitted on my Clapotis, popped some pictures up on Ravelry – made a mistake about when SSS was starting and fallen off the wagon in both the yarn and shoe departments. Oh, and the book department, too – just in case I forget later.

I have ordered some Neon from Bendigo, received some glorious sock yarn from Donyale (Rosered and Burnt Butter – too, too gorgeous – I had to snap them up, and now I feel like a yarn pig but they’re mine, mine I tell you hahahahahahahaaa… Sorry – just lapsed there for a moment).

The mistake was casting on a sock for a party, and then knitting a bit while chatting to the Knitting Knight. What? Of course you take a sock when you go to a party. This meant I jumped the SSS gun, so, while I did consider frogging and starting over, I have decided I would offer a compromise. As I have spent around 2.5 hours knitting this sock, I offer the option of taking a handicap. I suggest that I don’t start the SSS KAL until the 2nd of October, which would make me about even with the 2.5 hours of knitting I’ve done and therefore, fit into the spirit of the KAL and salve my conscience.

What do you think? Would honour be satisfied with this solution?

In the throwing myself wholeheartedly off the wagon department, while roaming childlessly through our local CBD, I saw, fell in love with and bought these:

These are very high and very narrow red polka dot wedges which I couldn’t resist. I also bought 3 bras on sale, so my ‘IN’ count in the de-cluttering report will be rather higher than I was thinking. (And my ‘OUT’ count not as high as I was hoping).

Visit SSS and sign up – even if you think you might only knit one pair – it’ll be fun and I am looking forward to it. For those of you who think I’ve rather stuck my neck out on the personal challenge front, consider that one pair of socks could satisfy nearly all my challenges – if I, for instance, were to knit a toe-up pair of fairisle cotton socks with a cable! (I’m not really planning to but…)

I also think that Donni’s Rosered yarn demands something very lacy and sexy (perhaps that I cold wear with high polka dot shoes?). I’ll get back to you on that one.

Oh, It's a Beautiful Day!

Hurrah for school! Princess is back at kindergarten today, I have the house to myself this morning and all is right with the world.

It is a beautiful day, so what am I doing? Well may you ask. I am uploading photos to my Flickr account, blogging and playing with Ravelry!!! Yay – I’m also intermittently looking out the window and deciding that I’ll take Destructoboy out to play when I bring him home.

So while my photos upload, I thought I’d update you all.

The Happy Clappy has been making progress – to the detriment of Juno – I’ve had a couple of evenings when I haven’t been able to concentrate much on the pattern for cables, so I’ve been working on the Clappy instead. I’m enjoying knitting it, although last night I frogged a row four (get that – four) times because I’d been so tired the night before I’d left cryptic instructions as to where I was up to when I finished for the evening. The instructions were SO cryptic I tried four times to get the counts right until I finally realised that my note meant I had FINISHED row 6 – and NOT THAT I WAS ABOUT TO START IT!!!!



Once this minor problem was sorted (and an hour of knitting time wasted) we were all fine. Now, I should have picked this up before – and, indeed, most people with half a brain WOULD have done so. The problem was compounded by my suddenly getting distracted (Look – something shiny!!! What was that again?) and attempting to knit row 6 of the next section. When I finally realised I needed to knit row 8, it was all plain sailing! (Some days I am soooo dumb!)

In the middle of all this, I realised that I would need some simple knitting – OOOOOOHHHH way back on Friday night – so I head-started myself on Summer of socks and cast on a Feather and Fan sock in The Knitting Ninja’s Tulip colourway. This is sooo pretty – dusty rose, spring green, pastel blue and wine. I have been knitting a plain sock in Patonyle blue faux fairisle, but I’m very bored with it.

Casting on a new travelling sock is breaking a number of self imposed rules. This brings my WIPs to 4, makes me put the Patonyle’s into hibernation, slips Juno down my list – and enrages the Accountant – mainly because I took Tulip to a party on Friday night, evangelised about knitting and chatted to a lovely Grandmother about the best heels!

I decided on another Feather and Fan for a travelling sock, because I have knitted so much of this pattern that I find it easy to knit in cars (or at parties), and I wore my other F&F socks in my Mary Jane’s the other day and was entranced by how pretty the pattern looked!

So, Southern Summer of Socks Challenges:

These are self imposed and I’m quite looking forward to all of them:
1. Knit at least 5 pairs of socks (in addition to normal knitting)
2. Knit at least 2 pairs of Red Bird Knit Sock club socks (yes, the September parcel has been posted and I have knitted no kits)
3. Knit at least one pair of Toe-up socks
4. Knit one pair of real Fairisle socks
5. Knit at least one pair of cotton socks
6. Knit socks only from stash (or socks kits) with one exception – I am allowed one ‘Get out of jail free’ card providing it is to meet one or more of the requirements above (eg. a purchase which assists me in knitting a fairisle, toe-up sock in cotton – well , maybe not, but you get the picture!)

If I meet all these challenges, I will do something nice for myself, like buy some more Cherry Tree Hill sock yarn or something – the reward needs to be thought on a little.

I’d also like to ensure everyone notices that (apart from the socks) all knitting is being carried out by Knitpicks Options needles – quick plug – don’t forget Donyale’s competition and the fact that you can get Knitpicks from her – including the new options later in the year in the lovely wood – but get behind me because I said I wanted some first!!!

Speaking of Donyale, I was a total Yarn Pig yesterday, and bought two of her lovely Yarn Cakes – remind me to stick them in my ‘In’ list at the weekend. I also threw myself off the wagon in order to purchase a Turkish Spindle from Yarn Magazine – who have their Spindle Special on again.

That’s more than enough for today – most of you are probably so bored you’ve already left.

I will have pertinent, witty and amusing stuff for you tomorrow – or the next day – bah!! Who am I kidding? It’ll be the same stuff – you know – wool, yarn, knitting, that stuff – see you then!