Yarnivorous

G'day all! Now firstly, I hope that noone out there has been badly affected by Katrina - looks like she had one helluva big partay in New Orleans and she's also trashed Mississipi and lots of the rest of Louisiana, so hopefully you and ya'll are ok. We've had a very windy day here, on both a personal and local level. The wind was so strong this afternoon it nearly blew me off the train platform! One thing that most people can say about me is whilst my head is in the clouds, my feet are pretty firmly planted on terra firma. I am not wispy or delicate in build. Today though, that wind was gusting at gale force and it is really hard to stay upright then. Gusts have been clocked at around 100kmh or 63mph. There are warnings for Storm Force winds tonight (I had to capitalise that cos it really needs to sound Important). Storm force is stronger than gale force, so lordy knows what that means - probably we'll find either our roof gone or someone else's in our yar

G'day all! I declare today to be the day of stinging. Why so? Well I have a little nick or cut on nearly every one of my fingers (I did lots of dishes too despite the stinging and cut up onion as well), I have a finger nail that is broken into the quick and I topped it off nicely by being bitten by my car - I forgot that if I stand on the curb, the back hatch is no longer higher than me.... We got a taste of summer today - temps aren't that high yet just in the low 20s with a rampaging northerly wind. The wind is so strong that it bounces my car as I drive along. OK, I have a tinpot little thing but still I thought I had a flat tyre or four the way I was bouncing. Knitting content? Umm the thecond thock progretheth theth Igorina ( Knitty in Pink knows her Pratchett). I also have a really simple wrap on the needles in some yummy hand-dyed silk. The silk is in bluey tones and just doesn't photograph well under artificial light (and it won't do it well in daylight e

G'day all! What a weekend! I was going to show you lovely pictures from my weekend, just a few highlights but dang-it, my image server is down because wierd things have been happening with the power supply at Monash, so no photos. Yet. Be warned. Quick summary of my weekend - took boy out for dinner on Friday - he could choose whatever he wanted. What did he want? chicken and chips from Pinewood chicken shop. LOL Saturday morning - much running around looking for a me-friendly birthday cake and new bathers. New bathers v. depressing. Never been much of one for swimming anyway. More potting mix supplies for my roses, repotting of more roses. SIX loads of washing done during the day. Argh. Almost tshirt weather. Evening - v.pleasant - much sock knitting and possibly my favouritest (that's not a word, btw) ever movie: Star Wars. Still not impressed with the addition of the stupid CGI reptilian critters - much better without. Sunday - treeplanting. Very windy but oh so

G'day all! The second thock continues apace. It helps that I had to wait for half an hour for my fortnightly desensitisation injection this arvo. I am finding that I can do just over one full colour repeat in half an hour. That means in the last two days I have done nearly 6 rounds on it. I am nearly up to the heel placement already. This is the first thock, not the thecond thock: OK, the pic is a bit fuzzy cos I took it at sunset yesterday but the daffodil came out well. The thock does not yet have its heel cos I find it best to do the afterthought heels after finishing second thock. (Terry Pratchett fans - who am I talking like when I thay thecond thock?) I now get garbage bags in the mail And I ain't talking junk mail either. Can anyone guess what this bag is? I guess I should have rotated that pic before uploading it. LOL A random diversion on *things* I was thinking in the shower today - yes, very unusual, me thinking but not so unusual me having a shower since that

G'day all! Still no pics of my only, lonely current knitting project. The sock is only about one colour repeat from the top now. HOORAY! -- OK, I have about 10 projects I haven't worked on in ages in a my "current project" trolley and two second socks to knit up but they don't count if I haven't knitted them in several months do they? Yes I really do have a "current project" trolley. My idea was that I could stick all the yarn I needed in one spot for my "current" projects and make that spot have wheels so it could easily follow me around the house (picture Lynne with a little lamby chrome trolley following her around of its own accord). Well the "current project" trolley has been stuck in the loungeroom between two chairs since ummm, February I think. LOL In the mean time, things are getting less and less current. Like the lurid, clown coloured scribble lace wrap I was making myself. The monstrous secret project that I re

G'day all! I don't think I've been so faithful to one knitting project since I was a kid, when knitting two things at once was outrageous, mainly cos I had one set of knitting needles.... LOL The sock is a good 2/3 of the way up the cuff now. I have two more colour repeats before I do the ribbing. Hooray! I am getting mighty sick of the sock though and am starting to have unfaithful thoughts about a bit of polygamy, maybe with a Clap or maybe even getting the long abandoned pink top back on the needles with a new pattern on top of the lace edging. Photos? Sock photos? You want sock photos? Egads! Too hard to get good shots cos it is getting too long to fit under the light of the terrarium (where I took the pics of the spinning I did the other day). I've spun up the rest of that lot of rainbow tops I did the other week. When I get enough light, I'll take a shot for you to show you there really are three lots of brightly coloured very soft handspun yarn. If I

G'day all! This blog entry is a montage of thoughts, or maybe a stream of consciousness. I don't know what I've done to deserve this week - not planned well enough I suspect! This is promising to be another week! I carefully planned out what I need to do, then got into work today and realised that I had totally forgotten about a course that runs tomorrow from 8:30 to 5:30. Plus tonight was drinks for the recent Big Work Thang that was launched. I missed drinks cos I was prepping and let's face it, I can't drink alcohol so what is the point? Unless it is to laugh at the people who take advantage of the free booze.... Today I spent prepping for the Workshops of Doom on Thursday, Friday, Tuesday and Wednesday, tomorrow course - I lose one full day of work that I really needed to have. Wednesday more prep for the Workshops of Doooom, Wednesday night - SnB unless it is next week. Thursday - final prep and run the first Workshop of Doooooom, craft night. Friday fi

G'day all! Wow, my second year of blogging. Thanks to everyone who has sent me a message - much appreciated. It's been a very busy weekend. Yesterday morning I visited the handweavers and spinners' guild, and saw a demonstration of nalbinding. I'd call it a cross between embroidery and crochet. It uses a needle with an eye, you increase and decrease like you would for crochet but you use the needle with the yarn threaded through to create stitches. Very interesting but the lady running the demo was more interesting - she is in a Viking re-creation society, and an Arthurian one too. Did I come away with more stash? Of course, but only a wee bit of fibre, unless you count the silk thread I've been told is great for plying thicker yarn with. Do you agree that the silk thread at least looks pretty good for plying? It was sooo very nice to sit down at my wheel tonight and spin this up. I've been spinning almost laceweight oatmeal alpaca for DAYS and DAYS and D

Happy blogiversary to me! Happy blogiversary to me-ee! Happy blogiversary to me! (I won't now go on to the birthday song of the Volga boatmen - may the cities in your wake, burn like candles on your cake....at your age you ought to learn, first you pillage *then* you burn!..... hear the women wail and weep, kill them all but SAVE THE SHEEP!... oops, sorry!) Well it has indeed been a year. A year in which I learned to spin. A year in which I developed a few more connections outside my own immediate sphere. A year in which I got married and lost my father. A year of fanciful daydreams and terrible realities. A year of reconnecting with family and losing family. Seeing and experiencing new things (it snowed/sleeted on my car at Christmas, in summer!!! I had my first colonoscopy - how sweet! NOT!). Revisiting the old. It's been a ride. Wonder where I'll be this time next year? Thankyouverymuch.

G'day all! There seems to be a little case of the blogging blahs going about down here. Katt's got them, I've got a mild case too, if you hadn't noticed. I seem to remember that around March or April, depending on where the northern bloggers live in North America in particular, people were totally sick and tired of winter. Over winter! Had enough of winter! Well I think we are at the same stage now, only we get it earlier and probably less hard cos at least we have green grass to mow, and weeds to pull out and flowers to admire. Speaking of flowers, today is Daffodil Day in Oz. It is a major fundraiser for the Cancer Council. They get a few $$ out of me cos Mum and Margi did die of cancer (and most horribly too). I used to be the Heart Foundation charity captain at work, which means I had to razz the troops up and get them to support heart foundation fundraisers and Daffodil Day and lots of other charitable stuff at work. Then work reorganised its charitable p

G'day all! Today is brought to you by the number 10. Yesterday was brought to you by the number 4. Tomorrow? Who knows? Yesterday the lift at work stopped at level 4 for me on 6 occasions out of 8. Today it stopped on level 10 on 4 out of 6 occasions. My pretty sock? Frogged! Only back to the toe. I was up to the heel but I figured that I needed a little more room in it. The yarn is a bit thicker than normal so I used fewer stitches but nope, I need at least 64 stitches to keep my foot happy instead of a bit snug in the sock. It is such pretty yarn (as y'all have said). I like it more than any other sock I have made so far, plus the yarn is quite soft. Some of the sock yarn I have used is quite rough and tough stuff, meant to last but if I don't like the feel of the sock against my foot I won't wear it. My feet are tender little blossoms and need to be coddled. LOL. BTW, sock was frogged at 4:45pm back to the toe and 9:15pm was almost back to where I was this

G'day all! I was going to show you a pic of my bee-yoo-ti-ful new sock in progress but after changing some settings last night so that I can access DH's computer, now the camera and the computer won't talk to each other. Sigh. Instead, take yourselves along to this site . It's a bit clunky as yet cos I am still working out a few details and some layout stuff. Plus I have by no means got photos of all the yearn, oops, yarn I could sell. Plus I haven't done a page for the neutral coloured stuff. NEWSFLASH. Managed to download pics, though I haven't shut things down properly... so you get a sneak preview AND a sock pic in one post! You so lucky! I so have to learn how to dye yarn like that! Not that I want to take someone's livelihood away from them but it is soooo purty! The pattern is based on Sockbug's lava flow - that is the bit closest to the toe but it was overdoing the pattern too muchf or me so I modified it. Frog the sock back? No way!

G'day all! I am a bit of a yo-yo today. Up and down. Had to run through the rain (nb it only rained for 12 minutes and I was out there for 8 of those minutes) to get to the station this evening. I had left my brolly at work. At first I was peeved but then as I ran down an alleyway almost totally blinded by rain in my eyes, a splat of half melted hail on my cheek, water on my glasses and the sun reflected into my eyes, it became FUN! So what if I was getting wet and couldn't see 2cm beyond my own considerable nose? It was FUN! But now I have come home to a house with a STRANGER in it. There is someone IN MY SPACE! It is wrong, WRONG I tell you! Yep, our new housemate has moved in. And the stove is already filthy and there is too much crockery in the cupboard and it is WRONG! So I take solace in my new brightly coloured socks. And I blog the WRONGness that is everything but the socks. The socks are very right. I think I am going to call them my rainbow lorikeet socks

G'day all! Thanks for sending warm. It was quite pleasant today until the cold north-westerly got up (we only get cold northerlies in winter - other times of the year they are hot!). Indeed a few plants have decided they had better put on their spring dresses The cherry-plum street tree across the road from us. This one is a full two weeks later than one I saw about 20 minutes drive away. The little magnolia next door. Magnolias have been in bloom for about two weeks as well. Some of the first daffodils at my place Looks like spring is not so far away after all! What do you reckon this could be? It has been a good week or two for finished objects. Not so good for spinning - it was too cold in the loungeroom to spin for more than about half an hour at a time. I still managed to get a little done - another 50g of purply/bluey/black merino with a little silk slubby action for A2 made up: Here's a little bit of sock action: See, there are two of them - distinctly different

...you sit by the little halogen bedlamp to graft the heel on a sock and the light makes you feel warmer. G'day all! It has been a week. Most definately been a week. But now it is the weekend here. Hooray for the weekend! I am most pleased to announce that one of the pastel socks is FINITO! Yay sock! It has taken me almost exactly a month to knit these beggars, yet I've done the cuff of one in the last four days. Weird, huh? Normally the second sock drags. Pics? Maybe tomorrow if you are lucky. I want to have both socks finished before I take a pic. Plus I should be able to get pics of the not very mystery mystery large FO. I modelled it for the craft night mob last night. It isn't perfect but it looks pretty darn good. I have to block the front bits - the rest is snug enough that it doesn't matter. Many thanks to those of you sending warm our way. It seems to be working - it was a bit warmer today and indeed at the moment (9:30pm) it is warmer than it was

G'day all! Happy birthday to my next up sister. How would you feel if you got this box in the mail: Ratty nasty looking thing isn't it? You can even click on the picture to get a bigger picture of a ratty box! It is very very cold here at the moment. It has been around 6-8 degrees all day and when I went out at lunchtime, in the warmest part of Melbourne, aka the City, it was 8 but it felt like 4 degrees. That is fridge temperatures, folks! Outside right now it is like being in a fridge and feels like ZERO! Brr! No wonder why I am having difficulty breathing when I go outside - my poor lungs are getting really cold air (cos I can't easily nose breathe and warm up the air through my crufty sinuses). Even inside it is cold - the heater can't keep up with the loss of heat out the walls and gaps in the house. We are wearing hats and coats and scarves! But not thrummed mittens cos you can't type with them on. The unheated part of the house is about 7 degrees.

G'day all! I have worked out why I am being so slow to set my yarn webpages up online. Not because I am worried about it. If I want to do it properly, this is what I have to do: categorise each skein/ball, weigh it, measure its length, work out what needle size to use, price it then spreadsheet all the details then get them onto the website with a good picture Crikey that is not easy. Especially when I can't get good shots during the week cos the sun is setting when I get home. Plus I have to set up stuff on Paypal so overseas buyers can pay me instantly and I can send off their stuff quickly rather than having to wait 4-6 weeks for cheques to arrive and clear. Each skein needs an individual number so I send the right thing to any buyers. I need to set up inventory control and logistics, and that requires a lot of organisation. How me is that? Or I could just say all these yarns are about this weight and this length, if you want full particulars email me. All of these skei

Come again another day. G'day all! Today's forecast said fine, 16 and late showers. So why oh why did I wake up to grey skies and drizzle? Possibly because I wanted to do a photo shoot and also fix up some more of the garden. Yesterday was such a nice day - Nathan got into one of the worst areas and started turning a weed and rose in pot bed into a raised bed. Yep, those are foam boxes - one of Nathan's favourite building materials, plus they can grow plants too! It is very good that we are getting more rain but it was verra annoying too. You see I have finally finished something I've been working on for a while - a couple of months? I spent hours last night and this morning crocheting, undoing and redoing and undoing and redoing (four times on the right front) - yes I am now a happy (??) hooker. Couldn't figure out why crocheting wasn't grokking for me last year. Now I get it - I learnt how to crochet left handed, being a leftie, but was trying to do it

G'day all! Anyone got any suggestions for a little spinning pack I could put together for my sister? I was spindling at Christmas and she got a bit wistful about her spindle that she had in the mid-70s (we didn't see it when we cleaned the house out? Umm, errr, don't remember seeing it). Anyway, I bought her a student spindle at Bendi and now for her birthday on Wednesday want to send her a selection of fibres to play with. I have available to me in my stash: finn merino polwarth some silk blended with merino finn/cashmere (haven't played with that myself) pencil rovings in ?merino alpaca mohair merino/alpaca blend merino/soysilk blend silky wool If I go delving more into the drawers I will undoubtedly find more. She isn't getting the cashgora, cashmere, pure silk or "luxury" stuff. Note that we are a bit limited in what is easily obtainable in Oz - what is this cormo stuff? Wool, obviously. Colonial - none of that here, though we were long a colony

G'day all! Thanks for the messages about horrible drivers of white delivery vans. At the time I was too busy avoiding a prang to get busy with gestures and impolite words. LOL It has been an interesting couple of days. Yesterday was the coldest day we've had in ages - probably a month. It rained a lot - we got an inch of rain overnight. That was excellent, but we need at least another two inches this month, preferably three to make up for what has been a rather dry, warm winter. The thrummed mittens certainly came in handy because I have the world's coldest fingies. Nathan often calls me Coldfinger, especially when I torture him with my fingers from the crypt. Of course spinning in the cold loungeroom doesn't help. Today was a bit warmer, like 13 instead of 10 (you North Americans are probably splitting your sides laughing). So what happens when you follow these instructions (have a look around the Southern Cross Knitting website whilst you are there - you mig