Deja Vu Strikes Again!

Welcome to Plague Central!

We have been badly affected by various lurgies and winter germ fests here – so my apologies for not posting the competition results for my blogiversary sooner. But you’ll still have to wait just a bit for the results!

I notice that my very first blogpost dealt with the joys of parenting, specifically the joys of dealing with – umm – gastric upsets - through the long cold watches of the night. To date, we have been spared this (except while on holiday in Fiji), and instead have varied our viruses this year by adding strep throat (me), colds (the Accountant), cold and grumpiness (the Princess) and our very first ear infection (Destructoboy). After 2 sleepless nights engendered by a throat apparently filled with shards of glass, I almost had some sleep, only to be woken by screams from the boy's room at 2am. This meant being up and moving from then on and getting him in to the doctors surgery as a sobbing, tired and crumpled mess (and that was just me) at 9am.

Luckily, our local health centre has a system on Saturday of ‘first come, first served’. Which meant we were second cab off the rank. Both the boy and I are much better now thank you, we are being very good about taking our antibiotics, especially as we both get jelly beans afterwards.

In the knitting stakes 2 baby parcels have been posted and the knitting in them was actually finished.

The first went to our friends who had their first child nearly 3 weeks ago – a little boy.



The second is for Georgie’s liitle girl, Grace, who was obviously drawn out by the yarn fumes generated by stash enhancement at Wollmeise while her mother was in labour. You have to be a really dedicated yarnie to be trying to buy hard-to-get yarn while in labour – my hat’s off to you, Georgie – I understand that QuiltingMick also helped a bit.

Now I’m just knitting WIPs and for the Cover Youself swap.

OK. Back to the competition.

And the winners are (from a random draw involving small bits of paper with everyone’s name on and a bucket – because I am far too technically inept to manage a random number generator – and besides – that way the spammer might have won!):

Drumroll please:

Bells and Geek Knitter.

Bells, I have your address; Geek Knitter – I will email you for yours – prizes will be sent when I get organised! (Soonish)

Thank you all for leaving a comment - see - all these sci fi and fantasy fans out there who knit and crochet and cook and read my blog - it makes me happy that I have met you in the last year and enjoyed your company - long may it continue!

Hurrah – all done until I next feel the urge for a competition! Hope to give you knitting updates soon – the Gathered Sweater is having its sleeves knitted, and when I can manage to count to 14 again, I’ll do some more on Juliet!

Why are people so cruel...?

Well thank you all for prompting some memories!!

How could I have forgotten Blake’s 7 or Red Dwarf? Or Space 1999, or Lost in Space or any one of the others you've reminded me of? One of my earliest memories is watching Doctor Who (the very first Doctor) while recovering from a mump and measles in 1964! (That memory and the one of waiting for the blue balloon I had swallowed to *ahem* reappear are my very earliest).

On the knitting front, stuff has been happening – friends of ours had a baby 2 weeks early and I’ve knitted a top down seamless baby Kimono for him and a certain Canberra Blogger had her bump early on Saturday morning and I have something on the needles for her – will post photos after blocking!

I am always convinced that I have heaps of time (especially for baby knitting) and that it will actually take me no time at all to knit baby stuff (knitting fairies, anyone?).

This is, of course, always wrong. This attitude of mine will explain why the recipients of these baby gifts will get them in the next week or so. Mind you, having a baby 2 weeks early is just inconsiderate, because I really thought I had heaps of time, and I’m sure baby stuff takes no time to knit…..

I must learn to spin. I must learn to spin because I won Mandie’s ‘What’s Ewe Name?’ competition and she sent me gorgeous fibre as the prize. She also sent me some fabulous sock yarn which she had custom milled and has not yet dyed all of. Immediately harass her, because the stuff she sent me was absolutely gorgeous and was indescribably beautiful colours. Here is my loot!

In addition, I had a brain explosion and bought some Wollmeise from a lady who was de-stashing Until I received this skein I thought it was completely mythical- like dragons and people who can knit lace without looking at it. It is real and lovely!

I also suffered some sort of breakdown and bought more Malabrigo – just in case sheep go bald – or it takes them months to build up stock after their fire.


And then my LYS had a 40% off everything sale!

I have no defences against this type of cruelty. How can I resist!

Remember – keep those comments coming- you’ve got three days until my blogiversary deadline. There will be prizes!

Oh – and I think Firefly and Serenity were wonderful, and Angel and Buffy kick ass!

The Alien Weirdness of Kniters (Yay!)

Almost from the very beginning of reading knitblogs I have been amazed at the number of knitters fascinated with science fiction and fantasy. During my childhood, adolescence and rather loooooong maturation, I found it almost impossible to find fellow SFF fans and readers.

I was indoctrinated by my mother into SF at a very early age – in fact, I spent 3 years absolutely terrified of the dark after reading Andre Norton’s Starman’s Son (also published as ‘Daybreak-2250AD) when I was 7. (Don’t judge me until you have read it yourself – the scene where the man is tortured with a rat – and then.. – Brrrr!)

Throughout my teenage years there were no real sci-fi people about. I was considered deeply weird at the rural schools I attended – not only did I read (strange!) but I READ SCIENCE FICTION (geek city!)

Mum and I watched ‘The Champions’, ‘Star Trek’ (the original series), ‘The Guardians (about a dystopian Britain with an exiled royal family, run by its security forces), ‘Out of the Unknown (a very scary British answer to the Twilight Zone – which we also watched), and any other sci fi, alternative history, slightly off beat television series we could find.

We went to any Sci Fi movies which came (briefly) to our local cinema. I still remember going to see ‘Star Wars’ with her when it first came out (not long before her death).

I have never given up my addiction to SFF. I was a regular mail order customer for Galaxy Books for many years, spending chunks of my salary (well, the bits not earmarked for wine and cigarettes) on feeding my vice. But rarely did I meet another person who revelled in my personal favourite genres. I had to make a massive effort to force my husband into reading my library – which he now happily does.

Fast forward to 2 years ago, when I discovered knitblogs. The weird paradox of people engaged in an ancient craft revelling in alternate futures, fantasy worlds, paranormal adventures and weird aliens confronted me. It also made me very, very happy.

Not only did you knit, but you knitted and read and watched the same things I did! (Many of you are also Jane Austen Fans – and that makes me even happier!! In fact, someone mentioned Georgette Heyer recently in their blog – and that REALLY made my day.)

I still primarily read SF – though more slowly now my reading time is curtailed by mothering and domestic duties. I love to watch SF – though I am disappointed the Sci-Fi channels seems to only screen Star Trek and Stargate and their spinoffs.

So as my first Blogiversary approaches, leave a comment to tell me your favourite science fiction or fanatasy (all paranormal subjects included) book, film, and/or TV series (now or in the past). Please, Lurkers, come forward and drop me a line. All commenters between now and midnight on 3 July –Australian Eastern Standard Time (the day after my blogiversary) will get an entry into a random draw. There will be prizes. And I will finally get to meet yet more people who share my addictions!