Birthday Booty

I was finally allowed to opened my pressie from my wonderful friends Murdo and the Pirate Purls and this is what I found inside:

Wonderful knitting luxuries from Knitpicks, Boyes and the Yarn Yard, and some other little luxuries for me. Thank you so much Murdo and Pirates!!

I had such a bad headache on my birthday that as soon as I'd taken the boys to school and I'd had some breakfast, I went back to bed to try to sleep it off - so many apologies to the wonderful Murdo and the two Pirates for seemingly blogging late about my wonderful birthday gifts - they really are appreciated.

On birthday afternoon I logged in to see if I could pay my student tuition fees online again - this time it worked!! It's stressful having to shell out £1,535 to pay for the first half of my tuition fees - my next installment for the other half is due in January 2008. Thankfully my parents had given me money for my birthday and Mr Melody always gives me a sum in the bank to spend on what I want for me, but I can see that it will be no yarn purchases for me for a while nevertheless :( as I spent my birthday cash on the books and yarn in Wales this year (see previous posts!!)

Birthday and resolutions.

As it is 2nd September today I'm took the pledge yesterday to join Wardrobe Refashioning as from now, although officially I won't be able to join until 1st October. I just cannot afford to buy any new clothes anymore for myself unless I absolutely need them; the boys of the family are excluded from this of course as they will need new items for school uniform and work I should think.

I really need to sort out the old clothes that won't fit or I won't be wearing anymore and either get rid of them or pack them away somewhere. Having worked in an environment with small children and paint and glue for three years, I'm used to wearing casual stuff for work and clothes that could be mullered and I wouldn't be bothered about it. I can still wear jeans and combats for Uni of course, but I'm assuming not for Teaching Practice in schools. Besides, I want to look half reasonable for school and jeans just don't cut the mustard do they?

And I really have to lose some extra poundage. Sitting around on my fat ar*e all summer and not doing any exercise, plus all the goodies I've been eating, has added inches to my thighs, hips and waist. I'm positive that when I start walking from home to the train station and then from the train station to Uni each day the extra weight will start to drop off, but I can't wait that long. I walked to pick the lads up from school on Friday, and then round to my friend's house later in the evening and all told walked about 2.5 miles. Not bad for a start anyway.

I sat in bed for a wonderful hour yesterday morning, in a quiet house whilst the boys were at football practice, and read about a quarter of Jacqueline Wilson's ‘The Illustrated Mum' as part of my summer reading list. I'm about a third of the way through already and sat this morning with a box of tissues by my side, tears rolling down my cheeks. It's an excellent and thought provoking book; I'd highly recommend it.

A Bank Holiday Full of Challenges

I set a Bank Holiday Challenge for everyone on the Crafty Theads ‘n’ Yarns forum - to cast on a project on Friday afternoon/evening, and to have it completed by midnight on Bank Holiday Monday.
I was hopeless as usual, as despite actually setting the challenge, didn’t know what to knit or sew to compete *rolls eyes*

I decided to knit a dolly clothes set for a little friend of Danny’s who is five this week, rather than spend money buying a pressie. I knitted a size 12" chest preemie size cardigan in Brett’s Shimmer 4 ply (as I have a small mountain of it left over from my now-closed eBay shop), and the little hat to go with it. I’m still knitting it, so you’ll have to wait to see the finished dolly set.

I also set myself a non-crafting challenge to actually go out to the local town to find some long, knee-high boots for this winter as I’ve spent the last one or two years trying to find boots that will actually zip-up over my calves. I’ve got small feet, and muscular calves as a result of too much dog-walking and running, and boot manufacturers don’t cater for my shape of leg or smallness of foot generally. I can’t find boots that come up to my knee and actually fit over the bulgey bit of my calf muscle.

I tried all the usual suspects, but found either no boots at all or none that would fit :( So we went out on Bank Holiday Sunday to Marks and Spencer at Fosse Park to check out the boot section.




And lo and behold! Boots that fit!! I had to go up a foot size, but heck, they're fabulous boots!! The cowboy boots wouldn't usually be my first choice of style admittedly, but they look fabulous with a shortie denim skirt. And the high heeled suede boots are to die for and exactly what I wanted


Mr Melody was so fed up with traipsing round shoe departments and shoe shops that when I found two pairs that fitted, he insisted that I bought both pairs. I knew there was a reason for dragging him with me.....

Holiday Stashing - Part Deux

This is the final instalment of my Holiday Stashing piccies, taken before I stashed all the yarn and books away in their respective places.

Books, books and more books from Stash in Chester. Oh and 8 balls of Noro's Cash Iroha in a gorgeous mulberry colour to knit Agnes from Noro Knits, two pairs of Brittany Birch needles and two balls of Regia sock yarn:







And four more Colinette books and some cotton DK for dish/facecloths at bargainous 50p a ball from Ar-Y-Gweill in Llanrwst. (Notice that I managed to pick up the discontinued Portmanteau book from here? Yippee!):




I bought so many books on holiday that I had to tidy up my shelves in my crafting room today to make room for them all on the bookshelf *chuckles*
On a positive note though, I now have more free shelf space to store the yarns-that-I-want-to-knit-next rather than sticking them out of view in the guest wardrobe :)

This weekend is Bank Holiday weekend, so I'm planning to get some crafting stuff done - there are so many things I want to do, so hopefully a few will be achieved. I've set myself another Bank Holiday challenge to either knit Eve from Femme Fatale using the new Giotto yarn that I won on eBay last week, or make a start on a fusion-knit. Or sew myself a new top Or maybe make some new cushion covers for the cushions our sofa - I have the fabric and I have the cushion innards, so I really should put the two together :? There are so many crafting projects going round in my mind, but at least the crafting mojo is back :)

My Wardrobe is Out of Control!!

My wardrobe is full to bursting with clothes. I have lots of pairs of shoes, boots and sandals. I also have a large yarn stash and a fairly large fabric stash.

At one time, before I had children, and I went to work in an office for a living, I sewed all my own clothes, even my suits. Just before I found I was having my eldest son, I attended an evening City and Guilds Tailoring course but only went for a term and a half as I quickly realised that I wouldn’t be able to tailor stuff to fit my ever-expanding tummy! My mum was an excellent seamstress in her day, and still prefers to tailor her own clothes as she is able to attain a custom fit.

So I am able to knit and sew my own stuff without resorting to shop-bought clothes.

I saw an interesting entry on someone’s blog over the weekend - Don't Talk, Just Knit - about the Wardrobe Refashioning blog that aims to refashion clothes to reduce the amount of money spent on new clothing and textiles, which suits my reducing, reusing and recycling ideal very nicely.

Just one last visit to M&S and I’ll join up, I promise....

A Week of Unexpected Parcels

You expected Part Deux didn’t you? LOL! Well I’ll do part deux next I promise!

Our postie regularly delivers packages to our house (no surprise there then), but this week I’ve had one or two surprise packages arriving at Chez Melody, and I have to tell you about them cos they are so scrummy. Three surprise packages turned up in all, in amongst the ones I knew were being delivered, so I’ve had a busy week answering the door to Mr Postie.

My first package arrived on Monday morning - my one skein swap parcel from my swap partner on the Crafty Threads ‘n’ Yarns forum. Just look what Granny Smith sent to me:

















A ball of Opal sock yarn in lilac Magic, and a skein of undyed sock yarn with a set of Kool-Aid dyes. And an Apple room freshener as her clue! Perfect in every way! Thank you Granny Smith!
Then two surprise packages arrived on Wednesday, a squishy one and a heavy one, and just look what was inside!



I am knocked out by the utterly superb Tess Dawson yarns , and I've been stroking them ever since..... the Baby alpaca yarn is to die for it's so soft, and the colours are stunning! I want to knit the Boutique cardigan from one of the Jaeger books, JB30 - the cardigan that has all the buttons sewn over it, I'll find a piccie if I can - and now that Jaeger have finally closed their doors on their yarn spinning operation, the Tess Dawson Merino 4ply is a perfect substitute. A Very Generous Yarn Fairy sent these yarns to me, as she knew that I'd been drooling over them - a huge thank you to you, you know who you are *wink*; you know that I'll have so much fun testing them out.... I have plans for the Alpaca DK already!

In the heavy package there was this mysterious parcel wrapped in pink birthday paper, but I was warned not to open it until my birthday at the end of the month. I do so hate waiting to open presents, and patience isn't my strongest virtue where brightly wrapped gifts are concerned.... *sigh*

Holiday Stashing - Part Un

I was a very good Melody on our holiday to North Wales and was very restrained where yarn shopping was concerned - honest!

On our way up to Llanberis we stopped at Abakhan Fabrics for a picnic lunch. The boys were able to stretch their legs on the adventure playground and swings with Mr Melody, while I dodged into the yarn shop for a quick reccie. I came out without buying any yarn, but did buy an open-ended zip! That's totally unlike me.

On our first proper day in Wales we popped into Craig-Y-Don to do food shopping; boring, I know, but someone's gotta do it. I went looking for the Wool Post as last year the shop had moved to smaller premises on the opposite side of the road to where it had been previously. But this year? It had disappeared completely I’m afraid :(

Probably the best yarn-shop-stop this holiday was the day trip to Colinette to visit a few of my forum friends who were attending a workshop there, and to actually visit the Colinette shop in person. I had a list of the yarns I wanted to buy in my head, and had taken the only two Colinette books I possessed with me, you know, to consult in case I forgot what I wanted and how many skeins I needed.

However, fairly soon after arriving my list went out of my head completely, and so I set about chatting to Jackie, Joy, Christina, Linda, Carola, Diane at Colinette, and the ‘Pirate Purls, Knitting Girls’ (who were the Colinette Paparazzi for the day), whilst idly fondling yarns and oohhhing and aaaahing at the colours.

I bought a stack of pattern booklets from the Colinette shop, three skeins of Parisienne from the millshop itself and ordered seven skeins of Zanziba to be dyed in the raspberry colourway to knit Rachael from the Portmanteau booklet. The book is now unfortunately discontinued, so Diane kindly gave me a copy of the pattern with my yarn. I also bought skeins of the new Iona aran weight yarn in a lovely denimy blue colourway called Slate, to knit something from the new Iona book, which will probably be the Ula sweater or cardigan.

The books:

I also bought a couple of pairs of Brittany Birch straights - which have recently become my straight needles of choice - and a set of five Prym bamboo sock DPNs which are probably the slinkiest and smoothest bamboo DPNs I’ve knitted with. THe DPNs are not in this piccie though cos they're in a sock!

My haul from Colinette:


The Melody Family had to run like the wind to catch the 1pm train to Welshpool on the Llanfair Caereinion Steam Railway I can tell you!

More stashing exploits later.....

In which Melody Finishes More Items and Casts on Two New Projects

A few more finished items to show you.... first, Tide:



Knitted in Patons 100% cotton DK with Brittany Birch needles, using Louisa Harding's ‘Tide' cardigan pattern. I fudged the sizing on this as I used a different dk yarn with a different stitch tension. This fits so well and was interesting to knit, and I have the yarn out of stash already to knit another! Again in Cotton DK but a lovely mid-lilac shade this time

Next up, Vanessa:



Knitted in Sirdar Denim Tweed DK yarn with Pony Pearl needles and using RYC's Vanessa pattern from RYC Art. I knitted the size 36 size, without fudging anything except maybe the row tension which I knitted as is. I absoutely adore this! I also have yarn for this out of stash and want to knit another one, or maybe two, three, four.... LOL! I have taken some Patons Coral DK in the Vanilla shade out of stash holding, which is a cotton mix yarn, and will look fab knitted up as Vanessa I think. I thought about knitting another Vanessa in Brett's Kool Kotton, but wanted another sweater with that summer melange kinda look.

For my next trick - I cast on for the Drops short sleeved jacket using Garnstudio Paris cotton aran in a gorgeous colour called Heather, and also cast on stitches for one of the cardigans Alva, in the Colinette Banyan booklet:



The Paris yarn is a superb dark cerise-pinky-purple in real life, and it's easy to knit in one piece on Addt turbo circular needles, much to my amazement as I don't like circulars or metal needles generally. The stitches are nice and even, and there's none of that nasty rowing out business that happens when I use bamboo needles as it did with the Grace jacket I finished earlier this year. Which just so happens to be next on the list to sew up!

I'm also knitting Alva in James Brett pure merino dk, and it's an absolute joy to knit with. I chose the merino because I don't possess any Colinette AT ALL! Hopefully that will be rectified on holiday when I have promised myself a day off from Knitting from Stash to visit the Colinette millshop in person. I quite fancy some Cadenza but which shade? Who knows!

A Good Day's Work

It's been raining pretty much all week except for a few good sunny days, and I've been able to get the laundry down in the laundry basket to an acceptable level again. All this rainy wet weather means drying the washing inside though except when it's been sunny! I still have TONS of ironing to get through though, but I've been able to do almost three hours' worth of ironing in the past two days amongst everything else, so thank goodness for days off work!

The boys have been doing some cookery this week - they made twelve cupcakes before lunch today. They are both really quite good little cooks, and made excellent cakes! They love messing about in the kitchen, which as a mother of two boys I'm really pleased about and give them every encouragement. Hopefully they will be able to cook themselves a healthy meal and not have to rely on takeaway junk food when they finally leave home in years to come!



Just to tempt you, here are a few cakes that the boys decorated....

Totally Finished Objects!

Yay! As promised, a couple of totally finished objects. I've obviously had the sew-up bug this week as I've finished sewing up three knitteds. The third - Louisa Harding's 'Tide' cardigan - still needs a button and button loop, so until it has that it won't appear on the blog as a TFO.

Here are the two totally finished items:



A wrap cardigan in peacock Sirdar Country Style double knitting yarn that I fusion knitted on the knitting machine and by hand, and the Valentine sweater in Red Sirdar Denim Chunky that I knitted in February this year. The sweater has turned out really well, and I'm glad that I didn't throw it into the textile recycling bin as I had threatened! The wrap cardigan is okay and I will wear it, but I'm not sure that I'll ever knit another :? However, I'm already planning Valentine sweater number two in vintage, black, chunky yarn ;)

Officially Unemployed

It was officially my last day at preschool yesterday - so I have officially joined the ranks of the unemployed of Great Britain until I become a student again in September.

I had an amazing amount of leaving gifts from parents, children and other staff and teachers, and I'm still overwhelmed by their generosity. I had a few pieces of beautiful jewellery, a great Scholastic Circle Time book and a children's music and rythmn book for my teaching practice, chocolates by the boxes, plants, flowers, a stunning gemstone keyring to promote success (which knocked me for six it is so beautiful), a lovely mug and bowl set to warm my teaching practice food and drink in, pampering gifts such as bath bombs and lavender salts, pens, and loads of cards and warm wishes for my future.

I am, indeed, officially unemployed.

I've been asked to cover at preschool for a day in September though, before my preliminary teaching week starts - so I shall be revisiting quicker than I'd anticipated!

Knitting stuff - I've been sewing stuff up madly this week, probably due to the lack of enthusiasm for knitting and my general feeling of unsettled-iness. I have managed to sew up two garments, and they look fab! Even the rubbishy Valentine sweater that nearly went into the textile recycling bin doesn't look all that crappy after sewing it up! Piccies 2moz I promise....

Last Day at Work

It's my last day at work tomorrow :( and I'm feeling very sad at the prospect of not going back to preschool in September.

We had our summer party this morning for all the children, and it seemed so surreal, the fact that I wasn't going back next term.

I'm feeling very unsettled at the moment.....

Closing the Shop

I have made a decision about the eBay shop that I've been running for a number of years and have regretfully come to the decision to close the shop at the end of July. With all the new things that are happening in September, I just won't have the time to wrap and post parcels like I do at the moment, and the doors of Melody Yarns will close permanently on 27th July.

I will still be stash busting and listing yarns in auction listings though, so don't forget to pop by and see me, will you?

Alexandra Palace

I have made a decision not to buy any more yarns until I go to the Alexandra Palace knitting show in October this year. If I keep buying yarn at this alarming rate, I won't be able to buy anything while I'm there cos I just won't have the dosh!

I shall save my weekly yarn allowance, and sell my destashing items on eBay to hopefully raise some more cash, and we shall see how much I can raise to spend there.

In the meantime I will make a wishlist for Ally Pally and any yarns that I want, need or just plain fall in love with, shall go onto the list. And then I'm going to buy the lot at Ally Pally :))

The only exception I will make is new books in August (I can't live without inspiration!) and any new needles that I need to start or complete projects.

I already have a wishlist that I keep on an Excel file on the computer. It's not that long that I need an Excel file you understand, but it makes me happy knowing that it's there *wink*

Check THIS Out!

I hadn't realised that my blog is now one year old - Happy Birthday Melody's Blog!

Time to confess my yarn splurge I think:





Rowan Cotton 4 ply in a beautiful shade called Aegean to knit Kitty from Rowan magazine 27 and a couple of balls of bamboo sock yarn from Hartmuth Wools in Germany. I also bought five balls of Sirdar Pure Cotton 4 ply in navy, cream and sand from the clearance sale at Kemps, and I won a pack of Rowan Cotton 4 ply in a bright and perky shade of Cheeky from eBay. Plus I won some Sirdar Luxury cotton 4 ply in raspberry to knit a cotton cardigan with 3/4 sleeves.


Garnstudio 'Paris' pure cotton in a scrummy raspberry colour, two shades of beautifully soft Fabel sock yarn, and the most delicious Alpaca you've ever squidged or sniffed in your entire life. All this little lot from Scandinavian Knitting Design :)

I forgot to mention that Danny's socks are now complete and on his little feet:


How could you not adore those titchy feet and squidgy knees?

Holiday Knitting

It's the time of the year when I start to think about which projects I'd like to take on holiday with me so that I can spend two entire and glorious weeks knitting to my heart's content. Not that it ever happens of course.

I've already started to think about which projects will be packed and taken to North Wales to keep my fingers busy. Maybe I'll start on a Central Park Hoodie? Maybe I'll take the yarn to knit
'Violette' from Louisa Harding's 'Gathering Roses' (shown in the picture, right) collection? Maybe I'll take some yarn for socks? Well yes, socks definitely then.....

Last year I gathered up all my current WIPs and all my yarns, needles and patterns for projects in waiting that I just *might* knit on holiday and ended up taking a fair few of them with me as I couldn't decide which ones to take; I spent some time shoving them into any available space in the Landie. It was only when we got to our destination and unpacked our clothes that I put all my WIPs and knitting supplies into our empty suitcases for storage purposes, only to find that I could fill two suitcases

The words 'over' and 'optimistic' spring to mind....

Destashing

I opened my eBay account in October 2004 with the intention of trying to destash some of my yarns to good homes and hopefully recoup some of the money spent on the yarns in the first place.

Almost three years later I think I can claim that I have rehomed a huge amount of yarn in that I have probably destashed half of what I originally had, although I've probably managed to spend most of the proceeds on more yarn :)

I have four large cardboard boxes and around four large sacks of yarn to rehome, and then that's it - all gone.

I might have to rummage through my stash to find more yarn to rehome when this last lot has gone though *wink*

Hello Sunshine :(

I was supervising the games stall at the school summer fete on Saturday and really enjoyed myself - so much so that I didn't notice how strong the sun actually was and have ended up with searing sunburn on my arms, shoulders and the back of my neck. Ouch! I lay on the sofa on Saturday night with two paracetomol and a cold drink :( I felt fairly sick yesterday, but I shouldn't complain as it's totally self-inflicted! The boys had suncream applied liberally to their ams, legs, faces and any part of them that was exposed. But in my hurry to get out of the house and down to school, I ....errr....... forgot the sunblock for myself *rolls eyes* Silly Melody.


Anyway - knitterly stuff! After my bout of frogging I decided that I had just enough space in the cupboard for another WIP and so I cast on for this ribbed chunky cardigan in Sirdar Denim Tweed Chunky that I just happened upon in my stash last weekend. I probably won't be wearing the hat with the jacket though..... not my style!

A quick, clockwise round-up of current WIPs reveals a 2x2 ribbed cardigan in black, scrummily soft James Brett merino DK, Danny's socks in 4x2 rib, the start of the second sleeve of Vanessa from the RYC book Classic Art which has a deep 2x2 rib on the body, a 2x2 ribbed cardigan for the warmer months in an gorgeously soft, bright turquoise Sirdar pure cotton wot I fished from stash, and at the top of the piccie pink Kim socks with a lacey pattern up the sides. And of course the new 2x2 ribbed chunky jacket in the previous piccie.

Spot the common denominator anyone?

Another Bout of Frogging

When you start to frog it just goes on doesn’t it? I frogged the red mohair lacey thing yesterday and boy did it feel good. Hmmm, what to frog next?

Oh yeah, I was on hand yesterday to help out with First Aid on a baby who needed emergency medical aid in Asda. He went blue and couldn’t breathe. I didn’t do much to be honest, a midwife had got there seconds before me and had the situation under control, but she looked relieved when I said I’d hang on for the ambulance in case the babe needed CPR. He didn’t, thank goodness, and was whisked away in the ambulance as I trotted round the supermarket with my trolley. It’s a skill I don’t have to use it very often, but being a Paediatric First Aider does have its uses occasionally.

3rd of June already. Where does the time fly to? I’ll be thinking about knitting winter sweaters soon.

More Members of the Melody Household

In addition to Mr Melody and myself, and the two Melody children , we also have a doggie named Max. Or Max the Dog as the small Melodies call him. He's an old doggie, he's twelve and a half and quite doddery on his legs, and he's recently had an ulcer on his eye had his third veterinary appointment this afternoon to check on its progress. We saw a different vet than usual this afternoon, who also took a look at his back legs.

All is going well with the eye, so far so good. Max the Dog has had dodgy legs on all four corners since he was a young puppy and had osteochondrosis in both his elbows at eight months of age for which he had two big operations and months and months of physiotherapy; he also has hip dysplasia in both hips and has medication for arthritis in his hips. I said he was doddery didn't I? Today, the 'different' vet recommended glucosamine for his dicey legs.

"It only costs as much as the Metacam. It will make a vast improvement to his mobility" said the vet, so we agreed to take it to try. Bear in mind that Max the Dog will be taking glucosamine for the rest of his life.

John and the boys took Max back to the car while I went to reception to pay the vet bill for the ten minutes we were in the surgery - £78 odd... gulp!! I questioned the total, and was told the glucosamine tablets were almost £60 for just over a month's supply.

Did I take them? No. Sorry. Our dog has been doddery for several years now and no-one has ever suggested them before. To pay out £60 per month for tablets in addition to the medication he's already taking (At £30 a month) is ridiculous. The same vet also recommended that we take Max swimming in a doggy swimming pool to improve his legs and told us that there was a specialised doggy swimming pool in the next village. Errr - no, I don't think so either thank you.

I think next time we'll make an appointment to see the vet who has her feet firmly on the ground :?

And finally - the newest addition to the Melody Household - Matthew's plant that he has grown from seed at school during the science project this term. Matt has named his plant 'Speedy McJunior'. I know what this plant is, but do you??

Knitting from Stash

Anyone who knows me well will already know that I have far, far to much yarn to ever knit in a lifetime and recently a few of my friends on the Crafty Threads 'n' Yarns forum have decided to knit from their stashes for a while. I decided that I'd like to try to achieve the same thing, and so far have managed to resist buying yarn for three weeks. It is necessary though, as after the end of the last Stashalong, that lasted for four months, I went a bit bonkers and bought lots of yarn!

I've made my list of garments I want to knit over the next twelve months, and taken yarns out of my stash and stored them in the guest room wardrobe; I have already cleared the extra yarns from said wardrobe and it needs to be catalogued and stored this morning so I can do the ironing!!

One of my planned garments is the Central Park Hoodie that was popular with knitters last winter. I have the magazine and thought that I could knit the CPH from some Charisma Supreme Heather Aran from stash which I purchased from the Yorkshire Mohair Mill some *ahem* several years ago. It's a lovely cream pure wool yarn with little brown bits in it - perfect for a CPH hoodie I thought.

I dug the yarn out of stash yesterday to and it is a CPH failure already. I knitted a tension swatch and hand washed it as it is pure wool. On 5mm needles the tension is 15sts x 20 rows which is chunky if you ask me :evil: So I have to find a chunky pattern that I'll want to knit this yarn up into - not a problem in itself but in my mind it was destined to become a CPH. So now I have to find a substitute yarn.

I do have three 400g balls of Sirdar's long discontinued Highland Aran in a gorgeous Autumn Berry colour that was ordered specially to knit some garment or other - again more than several years ago, before Matthew was born - and it will make a superb CPH. It won't have those super little flecky bits that the Debbie Bliss Aran Tweed would have, but I'm knitting from stash. Right?

Deserted!

What a poor old lonely blog this is turning out to be - I neglect it so badly don't I? Probably due to the fact that I don't have much free time to knit, never mind blog!

The 'Tide' cardigan is now finished, but needs sewing up :? so it's residing in the 'needs sewing up' cupboard at the moment along with all the current WIPs, one of which is a fusion knit wrap cardigan that I started last Bank Holiday weekend and is now nearly finished. The plan was to start and finish over the three day break, but as usual, family life and blocked sewer drains got in the way and I only have a titchy bit to complete.

It's 11.25pm, I've just finished my weekly plans for preschool and it's time for a few rows on the wrap cardi ties before bedtime.

Night, night xx!

This year I made a knitting New Year resolution to knit at least one large item and one small item per calendar month. This month, I may just finish my Louisa Harding ‘Tide' cardigan that I started last summer but then couldn't finish before the cooler weather in the Autumn. The smaller project that I aim to finish this month should be Danny's socks, but I think realistically that they could be finished sometime in May. I'm also past the armhole shaping on the back of RYC's ‘Vanessa' but considering that I spend most of my free afternoons in Class 1 at the moment, and my mornings working at preschool, I don't often have time to sit and knit! Anyway, here's the progress on ‘Tide' :

I did place an order for my celebratory yarn purchase however, which arrived today from Get Knitted, my online yarn store of preference. In addition to my two sets of Brittany Birch short 4mm needles which I want to use to knit sleeves and fronts of cardigans, I received 12 balls of Diploma Gold DK in Berry which is a gorgeous shade of deep reddy claret, 12 balls of Diploma Gold DK in plain ordinary black, and 12 balls of the same in Natural. I do have plans for this yarn, but it really is boring and you probably wouldn't be interested. Suffice it to say that I need sweaters and cardigans for teaching practice (hee hee!). I was unsure whether to choose Berry or Plum, but I think I made the right decision after all as it is a GORGEOUS colour. Diploma is a lovely soft yarn to knit with and is easily washable and I would say mid priced; after spending this week seemingly covered in orange, brown and green paint and mixing up several bowls of Plaster of Paris in Class 1 yesterday, this is the exact specification of the yarn I need for the classroom!!




I also ordered 9 balls of Sirdar Luxury Cotton DK in Venetian blue for Matthew which you can see in the picture above, as he wants a knitted something in cotton. It's a very pale denim blue, so not something that I would have chosen myself, but as Matt chose it he must like it! I've already done the ‘rub test' on the back of his neck and it was awarded the thumbs up Matthew seal of approval! Get Knitted also sent me a packet of Love Hearts (bless ‘em!) A Get Knitted pen, and Get Knitted notepad and a small bar of lovely smelling soap.

Now that's Fantastic Customer Service indeed! Thank you, Get Knitted.

I have been a bit naughty though, and despite publicly announcing a yarn lockdown on the Crafty Threads forum have succumbed and bought a few balls of Sirdar Spree chunky on special offer at Ekemps Woolshop. And a few balls of Sirdar Breeze DK. Well they were only 69p per ball and at least 60% cotton. Bargain! All for teaching practice sweaters of course, so Natalie-Who-Knows-These-Things says it's not officially stash in the true sense of the word, and I'm not one to disbelieve her ;-)

I'm Better!!
The ten days' worth of penicillin worked and I'm back to my old self again , and many thanks to everyone who wished me a speedy recovery, I'm sure that it helped the getting better process

Here's a few things I've been up to in the past week:

Galaxy Truffle - A rich chocolaty merino 4 ply cardigan that I finished and sewed up at silly o’clock on Saturday night so that I could hand it to my mum on Sunday morning when we went to visit my parents.

Mum has tried it on and proclaims that it’s ideal in length, sleeve length, neck depth, yarn weight, ..... in fact EVERYTHING!! So much so that she wants several more cardigans and several sweaters worked to the same block. A true indicator that something is appreciated and well liked I think.

I went to a crochet course at Wool in Stockport on Sunday and met several ladies there who I’ve chatted to online for ages but never met! I thoroughly enjoyed the day and came home with this goody bag from the workshop complete with five balls of Debbie Bliss Angora cotton yarn and a hook in a yummy pink bag, amongst other things *wink*


I have been so enthused by the workshop that I've been able to start, and finish, two granny squares in James Brett Supersoft aran baby yarn for a baby crib blanket that I shall call Stockport as a tribute to the workshop. I want to add a few more colours to the blankie, and think I'll do this by making some two colour squares to intersperse between the white ones:

Holidays?

Why am I always ill during school holidays? The only time I actually get any time off from pre-school and school itself and I'm ill again. This week I've been really quite unwell with another bout of pharyngitis which left me with a temperature of 38.9C and the shakes, along with the usual symptoms of not being able to swallow, feeling nauseous, aches and pains and general lethargy. The doctor prescribed a double dosage of penicillin over double the usual amount of time, so it must be a particularly nasty bug this time round. He did say though that he'd seen quite a few of 'these' throats recently, so it's obviously doing the rounds. I have even closed my little bitty eBay shop for a week so that I can rest and get over my infected throat before I have to start chasing round to the post office again. I couldn't bear the thought of that at the moment.

You'd think that I would have had loads of time for knitting, but I haven't :(
I have frogged my ChicKnits Ribby Cardi though because... well... I'm a bit bored with it and there's too much to do on it to even put it aside until the cooler months, so it's been frogged. But I have managed to get round the heel of Danny's first beigey brown sock (the colour choice is unbelievable for a five year old, but he has something in mind I assume) and so I'm now chasing down the foot to the toe.

On a more positive note, I literally only have a few more rows to knit on the collar of my Grace cardigan and it becomes a finished article. Hooray!!

More Progress


The never ending march into finishing WIPs continues as I'm just finishing off the collar of the Grace jacket that I started last year. Suddenly the jacket has regained its appeal when there is only a small amount to knit and finish!


With one WIP almost down, I cast on the stitches to knit Vanessa from RYC Classic Art this evening, so there's a new WIP waiting in the wings to take Grace's place once she's done:




It's another case of an unplanned project taking over, but I took some Sirdar Denim Tweed DK out of stash to play about with and possibly cast on to knit Tulip from the new Rowan magazine 41, and ended up looking through summer pattern books this afternoon. I had the needles free, I had the pattern in front of me and the yarn to hand; how could I resist such temptation?

Two Finished Items!

Two WIPs finished this week! A mohair jacket cardigan that I sewed the buttons onto, and a textured cardigan for my friend’s new baby boy:

Progress indeed!

Next on the list to finish off completely is a cerise jacket that I completed months ago but it needs to be sewn together. Only a bit to do and I can wear it.

I’m off for the next two weeks on Easter break, so we should see some progress on WIPs.

I hadn't blogged for such a long time that I forgot my password and username!! Oh dear!!

Well things have been happening at Chez Melody that I can't share in Blogland just yet, but will soon.

A couple of WIPs down, but more added! I finished the textured cardigan for my friend's new baby and I just have to sew it all together. I also bought the newborn a couple of little T shirts as I couldn't see me getting any more cardigans knitted for him this side of Easter. They are sweet though.

I started a new pair of socks in addition to the Kim socks for the Sockamonth challenge, as Dan wanted a pair of socks too. He chose BROWN, which is a little unusual for a small child, but he knows his own mind I suppose.

I also started the tank top from the Twilleys Freedom Spirit booklet, but noticed that I was supposed to decrease on the rib if I was knitting the longer version so it had to hit the frog pond I'm afraid. Never mind, it's another WIP down isn't it? LOL! And the Valentine sweater only has a few rows to be done at the top of the sleeve and that's finished too! Hurrah!!

I feel particularly guilty about letting my links in my sidebar fall by the wayside, and know that I should have links to important people's blogs. I hope to get around to it over the Easter hols, so please bear with me on that *wink*

Keeping Count of the WIPs

I’ve got so many works in progress at the moment that if I list them all here I might actually get some of them done! Here goes:

a) ‘Grace’ jacket from Rowan magazine 27 in lavender All Seasons Cotton
b) Chicknits ‘Ribby Cardi’ in navy Jaeger Merino aran
c) A textured baby cardigan for a friend of mine. She went into hospital this afternoon, hopefully to have the baby, so I’d better get a move on with this!
d) ‘Bonbon’ summer top on a vintage Patons Cotton Soft DK
e) The fitted V neck sweater from Louisa Harding’s ‘Modern Classics’ book in lilac variegated Wendy Supreme Cotton DK
f) Jeanie Townsend ‘Kim’ socks in pink Online 4 ply sock yarn for the Crafty Threads ‘n’ Yarns Sockamonth Challenge
g) A half finished Valentine sweater in red Sirdar Denim Chunky
h) A lacy cover up sweater in dark red Sirdar mohair

and finally....

i) The Louisa Harding ‘Tide’ cardigan from last year.

NINE Works in Progress! Yikes! I’d better get a move on with some of them although I’m very tempted to cast on the stitches for a roving rib hoodie that I have the pattern for, which I want to knit in a cotton DK for the summer. Well, I would if I could find any spare needles.....

Valentine



With Valentine's Day fast approaching I cast on the stitches to knit this red sweater.

I'm using Sirdar Denim Chunky yarn instead of Click, but the yarn is knitting up nicely nevertheless. The yarn is knitting up rather loosely on 8mm needles, but I'm assuming that it should be, and it's creating a nice soft effect. It's quick to knit too - I cast on on Thursday evening and I've already finished the back this afternoon. It'll be a cheap knit - the back only took one ball of Denim Chunky.

Feeling Poorly

In my previous post I said I might wear my vest at work tomorrow... but I never went to work tomorrow as I've been off with this horrid respiratory virus ever since.

Ho hum.

In my poorly state, I decided to call it a day for my charity Stashalong for Breast Cancer Awareness that I've adhered to stringently for four months now. I've been getting serious withdrawal symptoms from not being able to buy yarn, and I succumbed and bought two lots last weekend, probably a result of me not feeling too chipper. I bought one 2kg lot of blue Kilcarra Aran Tweed from a lovely eBay seller, and twenty balls of Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora aran in a gorgeous hyacinth blue colour from a member of the Crafty Threads ‘n' Yarns forum. But having trawled through several bags of stash this afternoon, I have still have yarns to destash so maybe my Stashalong should entail destashing yarns rather than a ban on buying any.




I have however, in true Stashalong style, cast on the stitches during the week to knit Bonbon from RYC Classic Holiday (shown in the piccie above) which I'm knitting in a vintage yarn from stash - Patons Cotton Soft DK in white; so the Stashalong will be with me in spirit for yetawhile longer. I also finished the Ocean socks for my January Sockamonth knitalong, which Matthew is proudly wearing here, and will be my entry for February's gallery! I changed the type of toe closure on these socks and opted for a three needle bind off on the outside of the sock as Matt hates anything knitted that is remotely tickly or itchy.



And woohoo!! The new RYC, Rowan, and Jaeger books are out now along with the new books from Debbie Bliss and Louisa Harding. Now, where did I put my purse?

Frogging Results

The Celandine vest is now completed, with contrast trim around the neckline and armbands. I really like the way it turned out. I snapped it here before it was washed and blocked, and I shall probably wear it to work tomorrow:

And the textured baby jacket has now become a textured baby cardigan with a twist instead of miles of knitting:

Frogging Along

There's been lots of frogging at Chez Melody this week. Not only did I run out of grey yarn to finish my Celandine vest with only one armhole band to complete and had to frog the neckline trim and the one completed armband, but I also decided that I didn't want to knit seemingly miles of textured fabric to produce one small baby jacket.

I had some black country Style DK in my stash which is destined to become an Action Man hoodie for youngest son Danny, so on the advice from the members at the Crafty Threads 'n' Yarns forum I knitted the neckline and armbands in the contrast colour on the vest. It's looking pretty good with the contrast trim, and it will now be completed instead of languishing with a tidgy bit to finish and no more yarn!

I frogged the textured baby jacket in favour of a little cardigan with cabled twists. It might be knitted now instead of staying firmly shut away in the cupboard.

I've also been doing some very important stuff for me this week, but it's not knitting related. Maybe I'll tell you about that in a couple of weeks or so *wink*

Knit, Knit, Knit Like the Wind

I’m knitting like the wind at the moment ~ I have a smidge of yarn left to finish off my Louisa Harding ‘Celandine’ vest that I decided to knit in Sirdar Country Style DK instead of Kimono DK as I’m using yarn from stash.
I have to complete the shoulder and neck shaping on the second side of the neck and knit up around the neck and armholes. Will I have enough yarn to finish??

And it's really cold here today ~ brrrrrr!!

Another Baby Jacket

Yet another one of my friends is expecting a baby (in mid-February), and so out came the knitting needles again to knit the expected newborn something to wear whilst they are teeny and the weather is chilly.

I asked my friend whether she would prefer lemon or white, as she doesn't know the newborn's gender as yet. She replied that she'd like lemon, but added that she'd also like mint. As I had some very pale mint baby yarn in my baby yarn stash I cast on straight away for a little baby jacket with a collar, in a lovely textured stitch pattern which I think is suitable for either a boy or a girl:




It's lovely to knit, except at 42 rows to 10cm using double knitting yarn, there's a heck of a lot of knitting to do in such a tiny garment :-o

When I went to visit my knitting friend Wendy on Wednesday, she showed me how to crochet a square blanket. Here is my progress so far:

Progress Pics

Just a few pics to show you my knitting progress this week:

The Ocean sock, almost up to the toe on the first sock. I'm lovin' this Sockamonth Challenge, although some people have finished their first pair already!!



And my new project that I cast on yesterday for the ‘Arsenic and Old Lace' knitalong on the crafty threads 'n' yarns forum. A lacy sweater in dark red Sirdar Mohair that I dug out of my capacious stash. I'm knitting this to the tune of this Sirdar Blur mohair pattern:



In all a good week's knitting methinks, since I was back at work on Wednesday, and there were new children in the setting after the Christmas break

Oh dear, oh dear! What a plumbing disaster we had yesterday!

When John was getting boys out of the shower before bedtime, I heard a shout "Deb, I need you" The shower just wouldn't turn off and there was water gushing out of the shower head. Hot water at that. We had to turn off the water at the stopcock to stop the shower, but it meant that we had no running water at all. It was a nightmare! We couldn't flush toilets, we couldn't wash our hands, we couldn't do any dishes, nothing. Nicht. Nada. Nowt. I had to ring an emergency plumber this morning to come out to the problem, which took a whole 15 minutes to fix. How people manage without running water is beyond me, and even more so clean water. So let's not forget those people who don't even have clean, parasite-free water in which to bathe and to drink, let alone to use their bloody dishwashers and washing machines.

Okay, on with knitterly stuff. My sock progress for the Sockamonth Challenge was severely hindered last night due to my stopcock duties *roll*, and my progress thus far is this:



I'm about two thirds of the way down the cuff. I'm knitting a sock for my seven year old son on DPNs (I've given up with the bloomin' two circulars method for now) in a lovely yarn Four Seasons Hot Socks. Matthew chose the colours because they reminded him of the ocean, so they will officially be known as the ‘Ocean Socks', and rather aptly too, I feel, after last night's fiasco with water *rolls eyes again*

And progress has been made on the milk chocolate merino cardigan. After washing and blocking, and then steam pressing, the front and back of the cardigan look like this, you can just about see the sleeves blocking in the same photo:



It actually looks like I picked up the right number of stitches on the front bands now, instead of looking like I picked up too few and the cardigan fronts looking runkled up. That's because I knitted the cardigan to the tension I had after washing and steam pressing, rather than before the blocking treatment. Sneaky huh?