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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!!