What is it?

G'day all!

What on earth is this weird thing?


And what could this be the start of?


A hint on the latter. It has two strands held together, one of sock yarn and one of in my version a recycled angora yarn:


It is cold here today. We had a humdinger of a change come through - yesterday got to about 28C, today it reached six degrees Celsius, and is heading rapidly for 0C and below. Our first proper freeze!

What is it?


As it is cold, I am glad I am really getting moving on the cold weather gear. This picture helps out a bit with working out what the grey thing in the first photo is.


Yep, it is a face mask/neck warmer/whatever for wearing whilst riding the bike. This one is for Nathan and is too big for me cos it has to go over his beard. I've tried it out and it really made a difference. It is made out of cashmere. How on earth can someone with my budget afford cashmere? Recycled cashmere from a thrift shop sweater (or in Oz parlance an op shop jumper) costs say $5 for the sweater, a bunch of my time and a way to ply up the yarn into something handknittable (eg my spinning wheel).

I started with 120 stitches on a 4mm needle, the yarn is about DK to worsted weight. Working in the round, I did about six rounds of garter stitch (pita when working in the round). Then I did 6 rows of stocking stitch. Next round I decreased every 10 stitches. Then I worked another 4-5 rounds of stocking stitch. Then lots of rounds of 3X1 rib. When the ribbing was about 5cm long, I started doing short rows across about 2/3 of the stitches, working in one set of ribbing each time (ie doing the wrap and turn on the purl stitch on one repeat earlier each time). This made it longer on the front than the back. I had to do a second set of short rows to make it long enough in the face/front neck to get over Nathan's beard. Then when it was 4cm from being long enough, I made a little nose dimple with short rows and finished off with about an inch/2.5cm of 1X1 rib. In other words, I fudged it.

The thing that amazed me most with that pic above is I saw it and realised that I really do look like my brother. And my next up sister. (My next next up sister has a squarer face.) It could be almost any of us being amused behind the mask. Various of our cousins on our father's side look like us too.

Linkmania


How about a dalek pumpkin for Halloween? Their website is generally amusing. I found this pic on their website very disturbing. I'll never see lego in quite the same light.

Who else remembers ED-209? (Read the comments. Some are hilarious, if disturbing...)

Anyone know if the Dinosaur Diamond in northern Utah is any good? It looks pretty....

A knitty link - how come I only just heard of the Mobtown Review?

So Aussies (OK, me at least) thought Magnums (the icecream, not the Dirty Harry gun) were Australian? Have a look at this Italian icecream sign!

For the Lovecraftian Mythbusters out there. I know you are out there.

An article about composting toilets that amused me. I feel sorry for (?the unclean caste of?) people who have to "carry human excreta on their heads." I reallllllly hope they do so in containers and don't just dollop it on.

On that charming note, I bid you

anon!

Comments

  1. it's a neck gaiter! with mods, lol. i actually just knit one for caps for kids (you know me and my charity knitting!).

    i LOVED the lovecraft mythbusters cartoon (my boys are HUGE fans of the real mythbusters show, so i see it at least twice daily (yes, that was daily, sigh))

    there aren't very many good sweaters at my local thrift stores right now, but i'm gonna keep an eye out!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I did much of the dinosaur diamond before it was called that (was a long time ago when I was a kid) - and it was awesome.

    dinosaur Natl Monument is something I tell my kids about to this day - it really made an impression :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Isn't it interesting how you get to experience two winters in one year? At least you got a little bit of the warm weather before it swings into winter here!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous5:48 pm

    What a clever thing to knit for cycling! My husband has a store bought one but I bet yours is warmer.

    I hope DH's job situation is improving. You sound cheerful in your post so that is a good sign!

    ReplyDelete
  5. How did you know I love Mythbusters? That's hilarious.

    The pumpkin robot is awesome too.

    Your neck/beard/face warmer is really clever.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous3:37 pm

    Being a lover of ice cream myself, you'll find the same logo across the world, but often under different names. Afraid Street's didn't get there first - perhaps Wall's (from the UK)was the original? But the parent to all is Unilever (anyone fancy a dash of detergent atop their cone?).

    ReplyDelete

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