Hip hip

The last mittens: All You Need Is Love





Knitted in MadelineTosh Sport (white) and the yarn Kelly sent me all the way from England (blue). They didn't look that great until they got a good blocking. I massacred one of Byron's foam alphabet squares, turned them inside out, shoved the high tech blockers in, and steamed them over a pot. I would have given them a good soaking, but the blue was coming off on my left finger as I knitted, and a steam block worked fine.

Obviously, I couldn't decide which color I liked best for the background/pattern, so I did one of each ;) Now I think I like the right one best. More color, and a 'cleaner' pattern, I guess.

Now I've finished my OWL, which was 4 pairs of mittens in the three months of the Harry Potter game "school year". And when I've finished just one more project (which is nearly done) I'll have done 18 classes, as well as doing pretty well as a Quidditch chaser.

Next month is a break from Hogwarts, so I'll be doing a few old WIPs, and a little bit more of this...

Thankyou for taking too much tax, Julia, because giving it back in a chunk means I have enough spending money to buy a Knitter's Loom, and one can never have too many yarny toys!

Tour de Fleece

2,923 yards (2,672m) of singles. Phew!

It's 1am. Click for more.... Yaaaawwnn

Bendigo!

Hooray! The 15th of July is a day I've been looking forward to for months, and not because my little brother turns 34 (Happy Birthday, Simon!). No, today is the first day of the Bendigo Sheep and Wool Festival weekend.

It was a difficult and boring drive for 2 hours... :)

They hold the Wool Festival at the showgrounds, and it's a pretty big event, the biggest wool festival in Australia, I'd say. There are big tents and sheds full of fibery goodness! I bought a few things from Mandie at EGMTK.

(Spent about 30 minutes sorting through the piles, with an armful of ever-changing fibre selections. So long that other customers started asking me questions... lol)

There are three merino/bamboo/silk ones there, and one merino/seacell (number 4) and one merino/milk (number 2).

Also chose some fibre from Ixchel. L-R they are BFL(blue faced leicester)/glitz(?)/angora, merino/angora/tencel and cashmere/tencel/glitz/bamboo. (Touching that last one was deadly. I warned off two other customers). I'm noticing I picked a few similar colors, but there's nothing wrong with that ;)



This is SpinningWoodie (on Rav) who makes knitterly woodcraft. I bought the niddy noddy and the darning mushroom from him, and asked if I could take his photo. He said his wife knocked up the knitted Viking gear.

(The fibre there was from Kathy's shop, but since it's called "Timber" I thought it belonged)

Here are a couple of things from the display cabinets I liked: a woven scarf whose ends were twisted and plied, a crocheted-hearts scarf and a hexagon-lace knitted scarf.


I also bought a book on weaving with Ashford knitter's looms (as I plan to buy one with some tax return money, having not spent enough today) and a jumbo flyer and bobbin for my wheel, which will make life easier in my spinning universe.

Pretty soon, though, it occurred to me that I'd spent a fair bit of money without buying any yarn!

Top left is some laceweight silk from Ixchel, and the top right is DK possum/merino/alpaca/nylon from Fibreworks. Also from Fibreworks, some DK merino in a color I loved. Bought three, because I can't always do one-skein projects.

Here is the other color (merino/silk) that I got from Kathy's, as well as a matching fibre called Sparkle. LOL. I don't know if/how I'll spin them together, but I might find a way.


Somewhere in amongst all that shopping, I grabbed a mini pumpkin pizza from the brick pizza oven, watched a fashion parade and chatted with strangers about my hat and gloves and their spinning wheels and dyes. I looked at the baby animals (the black baby piglet was so cute but would not stand still), wandered around the sheep tents, watched the dog herding, and didn't get in one single stitch of knitting... (I did compare my half-knitted Proposition glove with a shopkeeper's completed pair of Propositions, though, so it was worth carrying it around.)

Then I headed out of the showgrounds and straight down the road to the Bendigo Woollen Mills bargain room. Just got some Luxury 4ply (green and middle-grey) and some cotton 4ply (left and right greys).

I stopped in at the Lansell shopping center for a bit before driving home. And now I have 5 minutes left of the day to do some spinning for TdF, or I won't be able to say I spun every day...

ihasta luego!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Gorgeous girl!


I don't know where she gets her utter girliness from. Not me. She loves bags, shoes, dolls, dresses, fairies, dancing, makeup, jewellery...

...so today she was a very lucky little 3-year-old. She got a new doll (with a bottle! lol), a doll house, a tea set, a toy guinea pig, a toaster, a fairy costume and some other nice things. (She really likes the bug-keeper, which is a funny twist on the girliness, and went bug-hunting with Daddy, but it was too cold to find any today.) And, of course, the Weasley Sweater.




Now, I loved this green, but my Mum bought her a light pink sparkley acrylic knitted top from KMart which (dammit) suits her much better! LOL! But making this was a pleasure, and I finished it on time. Love that back cable...

Not a lot of love for the white buttons, but I can replace them at my whim. And it still hasn't had the blocking it needs to add a smidgeon of length to the sleeves.

But she's very warm and happy in it :)

Love you, baby.

It wasn't my day, today.

It wasn't my day, today. The baby is sick. And snotty. My back hurts. My ball winder broke. The laptop is broken. The other computer thought seriously about breaking, too. The house is a mess. The cake for tomorrow is not made. The fish came out of the oven half-raw. The internet refused to connect. The kids fought. And I couldn't find buttons I liked for Jasmine's new jumper, so it didn't even get blocked.

Nope. Today was somebody else's good day.

But I did finish this. The Wurm of Awe!


1. It looks like a plain tube. And it is.
2. But it is the best, warmest hat ever
3. and it's the thickest cowl.
4. See, it has a folded over top edge, with an icord tie
5. which you can tuck into the inside if you like.
6. It will come in handy for those bank robberies or too-cold-to-breathe-outside mornings
7. but right now I'm wearing it with my hair hanging out the back, like a super headband.


My friend, Telly, just rang to organize a movie night (HP next week) and I'm going to add some Slytherin silver to the hat somehow and wear it to the movie. Also, Nathan fixed the ball-winder and the internet. And now that the kids are asleep, it is very quiet and peaceful. I'm drinking cocoa and eating some dark dark chocolate. After that I'm going to make a chocolate cake, blow up some balloons and get cracking on the OWL gloves, which I'm getting rather behind on!

Yes, a bit of cake and colorwork is just what I need.

Tour de Fleece Day 4.

I've been doing a little spinning each day, and this is what I finished on Day 2 of the Tour de Fleece...


120g of 2-plied merino/bamboo/nylon. The fibre is from EGMTK, and it's called "Hermione", so I made it my DADA assignment (Craft something inspired by a member of Dumbledore's Army). It's 251m, making it about worsted weight, maybe a fraction thinner. (It's 10 yards per 100g longer than Cascade 220).

This one might beat it, though.
This is the yarn so far at the end of Day 4. I'm aiming for sport weight, which will have to be about 300m per 100g after it's 2-plied. I've only snapped it twice so far, which is not bad for me, but this little bit is about 20g or so. It'll take me forever, but I'm looking forward to seeing how long I can get it.

Some of the daily posts on the TdF group are amazing. They're so good; some are as thin as cobwebs. Sigh.

Went to Knit Night tonight, and worked on my Jasmine 3. It's been a bit neglected, especially considering Jasmine's birthday is on Friday, but I've been at work the last 2 days. I have one button band and a neck to do. Also working on the Wurm, which has 22 yards left (to be the required 300y for Quidditch :D). Hope to finish both tomorrow, if I can get a little bit of car-knitting in... Ü