The Wool Palace

Coming Attractions

Getting ready to Flash my Stash tomorrow.

Is it a bad sign that I'm worried the batteries on the camera won't make it through the whole session?

Thanks for all the DC suggestions - I think we can safely say a visit to Knit Happens will be on the agenda!

I have always depended on the kindness of strangers

Mind you, I shouldn't be calling my lovely readers strangers should I?

Anyway, here's the thing.  I'm off to Washington DC next week to visit my parents.  They live there, but I haven't been there since I was 12.  I should stress that they haven't been living there since I was 12 and I do see them regularly, just not in DC - this is just a trip to see them, not a reunion after no contact for 20 something years. 

Anyway, this is a trip for me, no husband or children coming along.  Very exciting!  No doubt I will miss them all terribly after about 2 days but I am pretty excited about it all at the moment.

So what I'm looking for is any DC readers out there, or indeed anyone else who's been there recently.  Give me the low down - where should I go, what shops/restaurants are good?  I know about all the tourist stuff - museums, monuments etc and I will be doing all that with my parents and sister I'm sure.  What I'm want from you, gentle readers, is the inside info and anything wool related of course!

I wait with baited breath...

Hopping Along

I hope everyone had a good Easter break.

We went to Somerset for a few days to stay with Toby's family, which is always nice.  So much more space and fresh air than in London.

We had an Easter Egg hunt in the garden.

Success feels (and tastes) good!

We went to Dartmoor.  Sam and Toby did some rock climbing.

Josie and I stayed closer to the ground.

Dartmoor is one of my favourite places in England.  My father is from Devon, as was his father and their love of the place has definitely been passed on to me and my sisters.  I love taking my children to places that I was taken to as a child, remembering stories my father told about being taken to the same places by his parents.  It was very misty when we were there this time, but I still find it so beautiful.

 

Toby and I are back at work today.  Sam and Josie are staying on in Somerset for a few more days.  I don't think they'll miss us too much, as they have seven of these to play with.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, I didn't do any knitting.

Happy Easter to those who celebrate.  Happy springtime holiday to everyone else.

We're off to Somerset in the morning for a few days R&R.

Gemma and I are still on a break, but I'll bring her along for the ride.  To give you an idea of the level of neglect going on; I picked her up from the coffee table to show a friend yesterday, only to find that the bag she was in was covered with the remains of a child's breakfast.  Luckily it was only the outside, or else there would have been ructions.

I'm still doing some heavy sock loving.  So heavy that I ended up knitting an extra inch on the foot before the toe shaping.  I just couldn't stop the stocking stitch thang (and I was watching Make me a Supermodel).  So one sock is done.  I find the car journey to Taunton is the perfect length to get a sock done, so I may have a new pair to wear when we arrive.

Right, must remember to pack the Easter eggs.  There's going to be some serious hunting going on this Sunday.

Refreshed and fruity

I have put Gemma aside for a couple of days; it's not her, it's me, I just need some space.

To keep me going I've started a sock.

Oh, stocking stitch sock I love thee, shall I count the ways?

I can knit you on the bus and stop whenever I want, as there's no pattern repeat to remember.

I can do sneaky knitting at work on you when I'm on my own because I can stuff you back in my bag at a moment's notice.

I can knit on you all the way through Desperate Housewives and realise that all 7 inches of the leg are done and it's time for the heel flap.

Because I don't have to look at what I'm doing, I can watch all of Make Me a Supermodel and not miss any of the juicy bits, while still doing my heel flap.

Oh, stocking stitch sock, I love you.

Playtime

No knitting tonight; I've been out with my sister.

I came across this link on another blog - go and have a play, it's beautiful.

Tell me why I don't like Mondays

Warning - grumpy post alert.

Bad, bad Monday today.

It was a lovely weekend here at the Wool Palace, beautiful sunshine and warm temperatures.  Perfect for our planned weekend in the Peak District with 10 of our friends, doing lots of climbing and walking.  Perfect also for Josie to come down with tonsillitis on Friday morning at 6am.  Perfect for me & Josie to stay in London while Sam & Toby went off to the Peak District.  They had fun and Josie is better now.  Oh well, I didn't really want to get out of the city into the lovely countryside, or see friends I haven't seen since New Year.  Josie and I did get to go to Clapham Common in the sunshine, so I shouldn't complain.

I had hoped for some pictures of the boys doing their climbing thing, but Toby was more occupied with keeping ropes and harnesses and things safe than taking photos, which is how it should be.  He tells me I would have been scared by some of the things they did.  Since I suffer from an extreme, almost crippling, fear of heights that isn't hard to believe.  Come to think of it, it's probably good there are no pictures to scare me.

Knitting wise, I'm pretty grumpy too.  Here's Gemma.

That's at least a week's work - knitting on her for at least an hour a day.  Can we all say slooooowwww together?  She looks and feels wonderful but I am feeling a bit fed up with the speed of progress.  I think the Calmer lulls one into a sense that it will be done quickly, while the 4 ply cotton definitely slows things down.  Still, "On, on, never look back", as my grandfather always used to say.

For a small diversion, I got on with a Buttonhole Bag.  I swatched some of the pulled out Silk Garden, but it didn't felt very well.  Instead, I got out the ball winder and some odd skeins of Magpie and DK Tweed I had lying around and wound up some balls of various yarns doubled, to approximate bulky yarn.  I then used two balls together in random variations.  Here it is before felting (unfortunately I forgot the all important coffee cup for size comparison).

I put it through one 60 degree wash, but wasn't entirely happy with the finished result.  So I got really grumpy and put it in a 90 degree wash.  Here it is afterwards (sorry for the flash photo; it was evening by the time all this was done).

Still quite a lot of stitch definition, but a very firm fabric.  I think I will do another one, but use slightly thinner yarn, which will hopefully felt more and show the stitches less.  However, I do like the tweedy look of this one.

One good thing about this weekend; I've discovered the joy that is 'Make me a Supermodel' on (shh!) Channel 5.  Lots of highly strung wannabe models, catfights between the posh ones and the East London ones, plus Rachel Hunter overseeing proceedings.  Brilliant!  Only problem, tonight it clashes with ER.  What am I going to do?

A Cautionary Tale

For those who may be thinking of over indulging this St Patrick's Day.

In our little council estate community we have our fair share of alcoholics, young and old.  Mainly a friendly bunch, they keep themselves to themselves.  The shops across the road serve most of their needs - an off licence (of course), a Chinese takeaway and a betting shop; they hardly ever need to go to Sainsbury's or the High Street.

Our flat looks onto the shops, so we get to see many of the comings and goings.  The other day both the children were out at friends' houses and Toby & I were shooting the breeze in the living room.  I happened to look out the window and see one of the locals navigating the (fairly busy) road, with his greyhound.  He was walking in the very slow, precise way that one only uses when one is very very drunk.

He made it across the road and then had the job of tying his dog up.  This took a while.  Once that was accomplished, he was able to head for the Chinese takeaway.  This was in a straight line from where he'd tied his dog up, so he managed that without too much trouble.  There was a little wobble when he pushed on the door and it moved away from him, but he recovered well.

Order made, he exited and proceeded up the parade towards the off licence.  However, he was interrupted in this task by the site of his dog, who had freed itself from the obviously ineffectual knot and was busy doing its business in front of the restaurant which Lambeth Council set up to provide working opportunities for people with learning disabilities.  Cue much incoherent shouting and flailing of arms.  The dog was retrieved and very carefully tied up again.

I guess as he was closer to the takeaway than the off licence, he decided to go back in to pick up his food first.  Exit carrying one portion of chips.  A little bit of a tricky manoeuvre to untie the dog without dropping the chips, but it was masterfully done.

At this point Toby went off to pick up the children and I went off to do some blog surfing.

A couple of minutes later I glanced out of the window to see him making his way towards to the off licence with the dog on its lead.  Coming in the opposite direction was a young girl with a very cute puppy.  What happened next seems inevitable to those of us who'd seen things from the beginning, but came as a very great shock to the girl with the puppy.

The greyhound, being a friendly dog, wanted to say hello to the puppy.  However, the owner was in front of his dog and was intent on the off licence.  His control of the dog was also somewhat handicapped by the bag of chips.  Anyway, the greyhound jumps in the opposite direction to say hello to the puppy; the leads then become entangled as the puppy jumps around excitedly; the girl tries to disentangle everything; the owner of the greyhound suddenly realised he's being pulled in the opposite direction from his holy grail and turns to see what's happening; at that moment the greyhound jumps forwards ...

A desperate sort of yell, 'Ay, ay, ay',  goes up, followed by an awful dull, 'thonk'.  The girl with the puppy suddenly realises she's involved in a lot more than a few tangled dog leads.  Now she has not only a large greyhound tangled up with her puppy, there's also a man lying at her feet, bleeding from his head.  The alcohol had lead to a severe lack of reflexes kicking in during the fall, meaning he had fallen flat on his face.

People rallied round.  The off licence owners came over and took the greyhound and tied him up.  An ambulance was called.  A doctor was passing on his bike and was able to use the off licence's first aid kit to clean things up.  Our hero was able to walk to the ambulance when it arrived and was seen on the High Street the next day sporting a fetching bandage.  The greyhound went home with someone else for the night.  As for the girl with the puppy, I hope she's OK.

Sockapalooza'd!

I went back to work today, reluctantly.  If I hadn't been off for the last two days and had only just fallen ill I would definitely not have gone in today, that's how bad I was feeling.  Add to that the fact that the heating was jammed on high and my desk is right next to a radiator, well, let's just say it wasn't my best day at work so far this year.

But hey, on the plus side, it was a beautiful day today.  I went out with no coat on to buy my lunch!  I can't remember when I last did that.  And the sun was shining.

And then I came home to find a parcel with a US postmark.  I ripped it open, to reveal...

my Sockapalooza socks, from the lovely Kim.

Not only had she sent me socks, but also a cute ornament, a Sigmund Freud card and the left over yarn in case I need to do any repairs.  Thanks Kim - it was a great package!

Coming tomorrow(maybe):  I have an awful tragi-comic (is that a word?) story involving alcoholic pensioners, dogs and head injuries that I'm itching to share.  But I feel bad too, am I laughing at another's misery?  Answers in the Comments section please.

Still

At home again today.  This being ill thing is getting a bit boring.  It's reached that stage where I'm too ill to go to work, but am well enough to feel bored and restless at home all day.

Toby decided to be very kind to me last night and sleep in the living room so as not to disturb me.  The fact that he felt the need to come and wake me up to tell me this at 3am should not detract from the sentiments behind the gesture.  Yes, I think he had been drinking.

No knitting as yet today.  I have been ripping instead.  Carrying on the with Feb Fix-it theme, I took a long hard look at Klaralund and decided it was not to be.  I don't know what I was thinking when I bought this colourway of Silk Garden (204 in case you were wondering) as the colours don't suit me at all. 

One cup of coffee later, it was all over.

Except for a quick bath.

'So what's the plan?', I hear you cry.  Well, the 8 balls I haven't used have been retired to the stash chest while I contemplate their future.  With the ripped back yarn, I'm thinking about doing a Buttonhole Bag (link to pdf file of pattern is in right-hand sidebar).

Look out for felting fun at the Wool Palace, coming soon!