First Day of School

My littlest son Danny had his first official day at school today. I say ‘day' but a half day is more like it. When he knew that he had to come home for lunch he was very dischuffed

"Well I'll go back in the afternoon then" he said. Little pippin.

He ran straight to the dressing up rail in his new classroom and looked for an outfit to wear. He's so pleased that there are more dressing up costumes at school than we have at home :) He had a good morning, enjoyed his first day at school and was awarded a sticker for his hard work. Well Done Dan!


I spent all yesterday afternoon stitching in goodness knows how many name labels into school wear, and putting kits of one kind or another together for school today; I had sewers cramp at the end of my stitching marathon! I did however get the baby cardigan sewn up to pop in a parcel for my friend's baby, and here it is along with a baby rattle/soft toy.

I've been working away on a new project seeing as some old WIPs are completed or near completion. In the quietness which was this morning I've drafted a block for the back and fronts of a neat little cardigan that I'm intending to whizz up in 4 ply merino for my Mum, and I cast on for the back rib this afternoon. Not much to show though, just a line of cast on stitches so far!

Shoes for School

We went shopping for school shoes for the boys yesterday afternoon, and they had their feet measured in Clarks. Matthew’s feet hadn’t grown at all, so he didn’t need new school shoes, but he did need a new pair of trainers as he has to take trainers to school for PE this year rather than plimmies. He’s taking his old pair of trainers for running up and down a muddy footie pitch and keeping his new ones for ‘home’ wear.

Danny’s feet on the other hand (or other foot!) Have grown one and a half sizes since his shoes were fit checked eight weeks ago..... ONE AND A HALF SIZES!!! I was stunned to say the least. So he’s had new school shoes and new trainers, and new plimmies for school too. The whole lot cost me £91. And that’s a lot of school shoes.

My knitting is cranking itself out very well at the moment, and I completed the first sleeve of my mohair cardi over the weekend. Only one more sleeve and the bands and it’s done - hurrah! I seem to have got over the feeling of complete exhaustion and unwellness from my two bouts of strep throat that I’ve had recently, and the glands in my neck are finally down and staying down, so I’m feeling like getting some knitting done. (In the week the GP thought I could have Post Viral Syndrome, but I very much doubt that :-?) I don’t know how anyone else fairs with their knitting time, but I fit mine in around the family, work, house, husband and children, and sometimes knitting doesn’t feature very high on the agenda.

I’m thinking of finishing the back of the Tide cardigan though, and then putting the project on hold for a few months. I don’t think we’re going to have an Indian Summer judging by the cooler weather we’ve been having recently, and I’d like to get some cosier cardis and jackets knitted for the Winter months. Something with longer sleeves might be good and I already have some ideas floating around in my mind :)

Glossary of Terms

Just for Denver Jon I give you a glossary of terms from the previous posting:

Lairy - overly confident, arrogant, cheeky, loud; especially applied to youngster or adolescents

Rucksack - Could also be called a 'backpack' but a large bag wot you sling onto your back when walking in the wilds to hold all your essentials such as flask, knitting books, knitting, waterproofs, snacks, etc. But mainly for knitting purchases at large knitting exhibitions and trips to Chester, etc :)
Others are designed to carry a baby or small child, see here:

baby carriers

*NB - No longer required in the Melody household*

Fell walking - walking on the fells. Self explanatory :)

Knitterly Stuff
I had to frog 7cm worth of knitting on my Tide cardi as I could see a distinct mark where the knitting had been sitting idle for a few weeks on the needles. I thought it better to frog a few cms now than have it plagueing me for ever more. I think it was Maggie Righetti who said that mistakes in knitting are not like vintage wines - they don't get better with age.

Arguing over the Argos Catalogue

You can tell that it's getting towards the end of the school holidays - the boys are getting bored with each others' company and are finding it difficult to get along together without arguing or needling each other, even to the extent of arguing whose turn it is to look through the Argos catalogue. I ask you.

We have things to do over the next few days, such as visits to the dentist, collect school uniform, sewing name labels into articles of school clothing and finish off bits of work before we go back to our respective schools, so that should keep us busy and out of mischief.

Danny has his first half day at school on Wednesday next week, and I'm actually looking forward to it although I didn't think I would; it means that at last this holiday I may just have a couple of hours of peace and quiet. Bliss.

Nah then - knitting related thingos.....

A cyberfriend of mine, Jackie - I do hope I spelled her version of Jackie correctly, there are so many ways to spell it, and I always forget who has which version - bagged herself a scrummy knitting machine from a charity shop last week, and she has set it up and knitted some plain knitting already. She got the main bed, ribber, knitting shaping device, table and a lace carriage and cost just twenty quid! Twenty quid I tell you!! What a superb bargain!! Spurred on by her amazing find I decided to unearth my standard gauge knitting machine from the depths of the cupboard. We have a huge walk in cupboard that is accessed via the ‘guest' room and all sorts of stuff is stored there including all my knitting machines, so I had to move rucksacks, rucksacks that you can stuff a baby into the back of and carry around when you're fell walking, boxes of the children's paintings and school work, sleeping bags, spare duvets, packets of real life photographs taken before we had the digicam and other assorted stuff. I had a great time last night looking through all the old photos of our oldest son taken when he was born up until he was around eighteen months old; he was always smiling and so happy and full of life, now he's a lairy seven year old . Happy memories.

I'll have to give the knitting machine a good overhaul before I can use it properly again, as it looks quite oily and yuck, even though it's been stored well since the lid was last put on it. I have plans to revitalise my wardrobe of woollies with some new ones, and the machine will come in very handy for that. Some fusion knitting is on the horizon methinks. I already have a fusion knitting project in mind for this machine I just need to get the yarn out of the stash and knit a tension swatch.





One last thing, I bought these amazing precious jade stitch markers from Claire at The Claire Knit Project and they arrived the other day. Aren't they just beautiful?

WIPs Wipeout

This is what I managed to produce on Saturday afternoon whilst my oldest son was obsessed with his new birthday PS2. I started out with two lots of ribbing and ended up with two complete sleeves for my cerise half ‘n' half jacket:







I've also completed the baby cardigan for my friend's new baby boy (saw him this afternoon - he's gorgeous!) so now I just need to sew the cardi up, and the front ribbing on the bolero is half done, so that will be finished this week too. It's great when you have several projects on the go as they all seem to be finished at once.
Prolific knitting or what?

The last piccies from the Holiday in Wales...

I give you:

Knitting on the tram going down the Great Orme in Llandudno, and knitting at the bottom of the Great Orme in the tram, just by the ticket office. Did you know John the Brit used to live in Llandudno? Bet you didn't. He and Helen from Stash had a chat about how they both grew up there when I popped into Stash in Chester to buy books *shakes head*








Ah yes... knitting outside Dolbadarn Castle. I sat and knitted in front of the castle while the boys climbed to the top:



Knitting on the miniature steam train at Betws-y-Coed:




Knitting on the Highland Railway from Caernarfon to Rhyd Ddu, then back again to Caernarfon




Don't suppose you've spotted the train connection yet, then?

You know I mentioned a little while ago that I was really, really bad at remembering birthdays? Melody strikes again as I forgot to post my Uncle's card off to him yesterday. It was a funny one too. He'll just have to have giggle on Monday morning instead.

Dongled At Last

I would have updated my blog earlier than today, but I've been waiting for John the Brit to dongle over holiday photos from his laptop. He finally got round to doing it last night *rolls eyes*.

I had a humungous migraine headache this afternoon, probably something to do with the red wine last night. As I don't usually drink because alcohol and I just don't get on together these days, I was amazed that I didn't have a dodgy headache this morning - so I paid the price this afternoon instead. Strange. I feel like my body is falling to bits at the moment, my birthday is on the horizon and I think I must be preparing myself for feeling the age that I'll be in two weeks time or thereabouts. It's on the 31st August if anyone wants to send me Ann Budd's Knit-Any-Sweater-You-Want book for a surprise pressie. No? Well, no harm is asking... *wink*

Okay, here are some knitting piccies from hols - you won't want to see the other holiday type photos, they're too boring for words!!

Knitting on the Llanberis Lake Railway - exactly what it says on the tin. Knitting a sock on the little train that runs round the Lake at Llanberis....



Matthew and I venture into Stash in Chester. This would have been a better photo except Matthew decided to dash into the piccie uninvited at the last minute, and I'm looking particularly chubby with a bright green bag for holding all my knitting projects slung over my shoulder. I have no clue who the lady is looking in Stash's window as the photo is being taken, but that little lad with the back of his head to the camera and in a bright blue top is The Dink himself. Here it is anyway:



And the final piccie of holiday knitting shots today - I sit and knit the holiday sock by Gellert's grave at Bedgellert. I wondered aloud whether if we were to move the stone, would we find the remains of Gellert the noble and brave dog underneath it. John the Brit dragged me away before I could hop over the railings to find out..... spoilsport.




More pics 2moz maybe.

On to more home based stuff.....

I went to Dunelm Mill again this morning on the way back from an appointment for our youngest The Dinkster with both the lads in tow; I bought six cushion innards to make some scatter cushions for our living room along with 2 metres of tasty, ‘non-gender specific' (the NVQ3 rears its ugly head again) fabric to make a few more story sacks for reception class at the boys' primary school, so I must get the sewing machine out.

So, What Did You Get Up to on Your Holiday, Melody?
Holidays didn't start very well...... my strep throat started to reappear on the second evening of our holiday, about 36 hours after I took my last penicillin tablet, and although I tried to ignore it, a high temperature, a vicious sore throat and swollen glands, and an inability to swallow yet again threatened to ruin the holiday before it had begun. I realised I was plummeting downwards when I could hardly swallow a bacon sarnie at Pete's Eats so a swift trip to the local medical centre in Llanberis on Tuesday afternoon and a prescription for yet more penicillin sorted the nasty little strep bacterium beasties out and I was as right as rain after that.

And talking of rain...... this is what we woke up to on our first day of holidays:

The weather did perk up a bit eventually though and I managed to get a bit of colour on my shoulders whilst I knitted at Dolbadarn Castle. There's a piccie of me knitting with Dolbadarn Castle in the background, but it's on John the Brit's laptop at the mo and I have to dongle piccies across from the laptop, so piccies later on of that.

I Visited Stash!

I continued my Stashalonging in exceptional style, only buying a few balls of sock yarn when I visited Stash in Chester. We travelled to Chester so that I could buy Rowan magazine 40, and I phoned them beforehand to check that it had arrived in stock.

Steve at Stash explained on the phone that the shop could be closed at some point as they were expecting a huge delivery of Rowan yarns which had to be put in its respective places in the shop, but added that if the shop was closed I could knock on the door and explain who I was and what I wanted, and they would open the shop so that I could buy the mag. Top marks to Stash for offering brilliant customer service to a holiday maker/tourist to North Wales and Chester!! They've been added to my linky bit at the side there for special endeavours with respect to holidaying knitters in Cheshire... *big thumbs up*

Not only did I buy Rowan 40, but I also bought these luvverly books and needles from Stash - the first photo shows what I bought on the first visit, the second photo what I bought on the ....um... second visit to Stash the following week:







We only went back to Chester a second time so that the boys could visit the Dewa centre in the city centre, honest.... a ‘hands on' archeology/ Roman museum which the boys and I thoroughly enjoyed. *big grin*

A line-up of the sock yarns that I bought at Stash. I bought the grey/blue one second from the left to knit Dad another pair of socks but as it's cotton/wool mixture I think I'll need more than one ball. Hmph!

I also managed to track down a copy of Debbie Bliss' "Easy Knits" book (which I've been looking out for for months)in WHSmith in Chester, so I had a good shopping trip all told. Trouble is that now I'm too tempted by all the new patterns in all the new books I bought to contemplate even looking at my' old' list of things I wanted to knit before I bought the books, if you follow my drift.....

Vacation Knitting Progress

On the evening before our departure, I still couldn't decide which new projects to take with me and in the end took a load of half finished projects that I thought I could give my full attention during the fortnight. In the two weeks in Llanberis, I all but finished the bolero knitted in James Brett's Marble DK with just one part of the front band to pick up and knit, finished Dad's first Opal Magic sock with just the second one to complete, and knitted a good part of the double moss stitch yoke on the back of the half-and-half jacket that I'm fusion knitting.

My knitting had a rather eventful time in Wales, as I challenged myself to knit in as many touist-y places as I possibly could. I think I did quite well under the circumstances, and managed to knit on the Tram going up and down the Great Orme in Llandudno, on the Llanberis Lake Railway, on the Welsh Highland Train from Caernarfon to Rhydd Ddu, by the grave of that very brave Medieval dog Gellert *ahem*, and under the watchful eye of Dolbardan Castle. My knitting and I had fun. Enjoy the piccies as I stick ‘em on the blog over the next few days....