What do you do when your husband is in the rainforest of PNG, for a whole week with no communication?

1) Eat chocolate cake at stupid times

2) Go to your knitting group and watch someone with their new spinning wheel

3) Buy very adult books

4) Drink a glass of wine at night because it's cold without another person in the house and it's the only thing that warms you up

5) Get a job (woohoo!!)

6) Finish all the paperwork of the second stage of your visa (how do you describe your commitment to one another without sounding like a total sap?)

7) Go to homeware sales and buy new pillows and sheets that aren't beige (god I'm sick of beige!!)

8) Get in your cats face

9) Knit

10) Do loads of laundry but ignore the dishes

Things completed, and not…

Since we last talked (well, I talked you read) I have completed a few projects.

The sock on my head hat: perfect in its’ sloppiness and the colour makes me want to wear it all the time. The pattern is pretty simple and not too boring to knit, although I did stop just before the decreases started for about a week.

(crappy phone photo taken in our old place, The A keeps taking his camera with him so I can’t use it)

Granny square blanket: as big as I wanted it and the colours look great. Useful when our friend came to visit from the UK as she found it a tad chilly at night and we only have one duvet.

Missing Link socks (not completed) a pattern I made up and knit in a wonderful ruby red Patons Sock yarn. These are for The A and I have shown great example of second sock syndrome, the second one is ready for a heel flat but I have shoved it to the bottom of the knitting bag.

Sock in Progress

The A wearing said sock (ewww look at the nasty carpet we USED to have)

The Two Tone Shrug is an example that you should not only knit in the round as you forget how to purl properly and end up with a funky looking Stockinette stitch, but fear not, I have re-learnt to purl and am currently knitting up and entirely red Two Tone Shrug with a proper stockinette stitch ‘look’.

Still sleeping off winter is the Cobblestone jumper but as my good friend Mitzy Knits says, it will be completed some time after March 2010 ;)

What else? Oh yes! I am steaming ahead with a baby project for a family friend. It’s the Ribbed Baby Jacket (Rav link) I thought she was having a boy, but I was mistaken. I bought a brown alpaca mix wool so to make it more ‘girl friendly’ I will trim the bottom and the sleeves with some red. The mum-to-be has banned all pink so I think it’s just lucky that I thought it was a boy!

Must get back to my knitting now. Next week I shall be starting on the wedding invitations (for real!) so tune in as I get my hot glue gun, printer and sewing machine out after work and cross your fingers that what I have in mind works!

Craft update

An update in pictures:

Also on the needles: a drop stitch scarf and more granny squares!

Contemplating a stash enhancing click to the Bendigo Woolen Mills website for the Bella mittens and Owls jumper.

Tweed obsessed

I think I have become a little obsessed with tweed type yarn. This came with the addition of some Jo Sharp Silkroad DK Tweed, one ball in a beautiful icy blue and one in a wonderful pinky raspberry. I already have 4 balls of light blue Grignasco Tango and 4 balls of the same in red, and of course the cobblestone jumper for The A that is also a silk/wool tweed.

The wonderful thing about these yarns is how soft they are, not the typical scratchy tweed of yesteryear. Now made up of wool, silk, cashmere and alpaca tweed is something that I can now wear with joy (I hate scratchy things near my skin)

I have no clue what to knit with these yarns but the Jo Sharp will probably become a cowl, wristlets or beret/hat.

(Aren’t the photos great? I used natural light near the couch and backed the yarn with some white paper, I love how well the colour comes out!)

Talia Vest

A bit late in posting about this but here are the finished photos of the Talia Vest.

It still needs buttons on it but in all it's a great quick knit that will look great when it gets cooler over long sleeved shirts or a pretty top.

180

On Monday evening I had just finished talking to my mum on Skype when there was a loud knock on the door, which freaked me out as the post man had already come in the morning, so I ran to the door and checked the peep hole. Standing there was the Archaeologist! He was back a day early as the people he works with had to leave a day early dues to an emergency and they can't work without them. Was so shocked and happy!

He had the day off yesterday and we got to discuss some wedding stuff. I showed him some other invites that I made thanks to iDiy and he likes them a lot more than the red swirly ones (hence the title 180 - opposite direction!). I won't show them until after they are finalised and sent out (which will be in November, hahaha!) We also looked at suits in some magazines I have and we settled on a 'sort of ' style that we both like and think would look great on him. I browsed online to find some examples:

Suits from Banana Republic and J Crew

We think that getting a nice suit that fits really well (even if it needs alterations) is a good investment, not only for the wedding but in the future. He does work outside and has little need for suits at the moment, but you never know in the future. We both also vetoed the 'monkey suit' option, we would have to rent one and the rented ones are often ill fitting and the material could look shiny.

We also went to the library yesterday and I got out a Photoshop book, Jamie's Italy cookbook and the financial freedom book that the Archaeologist has been reading for 6 weeks. I love going to the library and because of the turnaround, there are often books there that I hadn't seen before. Going there is often better than going to a bookstore. Which is something that we both used to do in the UK, spending an hour or so in Borders on a Saturday just browsing and not buying anything, then having a hot cornish pastie for lunch (even in the summer!). It never got old.

On the knitting front I almost finished the Talia vest, I have done the edging of the two armholes but found out I bound off too tightly so it needs re-doing. :( Cobblestone will be picked up again when the Archaeologist goes away again and it's getting cooler so it's easier to have on my lap.

The view...

...of the city. Taken yesterday while walking along the highway. That's the Swan River there, and on the left of the city it looks like there is a hill... that's Kings Park. Perth city itself is quite small, it just has a lot of surrounding suburbs.

It's cooler today and raining, thankfully I only got caught in it for 2 mins when I walked home from the veg shop. The cooler breeze coming through the flat is really nice and refreshing. I joined Twitter the other day and I am following Martha Stewart (who actually posts loads of pics of her and what's she's doing) Ellen DeGeneres (who doesn't) some knitterly folk and people I know in real life. I don't think I will become one of those people who posts from their cell phone (how much would that cost me??) but it is fun and you find out a lot about people, for example Martha is eating Moroccan food. I know... how fascinating! Hahaha!

Progressing on the vest and I noticed how scribbly I am:

Bad Knitter

I did it... I cast one for something. I now have 5 WIP's on the needles, one of which is 5 mins away from being finished (!!) Another which needs to be sent out next week and is only 60% done.

The new project is the Knitty Talia vest from Spring 08 issue. I mainly wanted to do this one as it looks flattering on every single person who has knit it. I think I did one row of the lace pattern and decided that I wanted a quick knit and have just continued in Stockinette stich, I will be putting in the garter waist row just to give it some structure. I'm using Naturally Harmony in the dark brown. I bought 2 skeins ages ago and when I realised that it was the correct ply for the vest I went and bought some more. I'm knitting it on 5.5mm needles and knitting the S size, fingers crossed as I didn't do a guage swatch (I will only slap my hand if it turns out the wrong size, untill then I am soldiering forward in the blind belief that all will be ok)

Normal Sunday morning here, drinking coffee, watching a Coldplay special on Video Hits, and idly looking at wedding stuff. I was going to go to the beach today as it was predicted to be 37 degrees here today but it's 22 at the momnet and cloudy so will stay in and get through the WIP that is only at 60% (if I can put the Talia vest down)

Missing the Archaeologist, especially in the evenings. I didn't even change the channel when the sports came on out of habit.

Yarny goodness

Last month I went and bought 6 balls of Grignasco Tango in a lovely tweedy red colour. The buzz on this yarn is that it is made in the same factory as Rowan Felted Tweed and is made up of the same components, but is about half the price. This would annoy me if all I could get was the Rowan but as I can get the Grignasco, I'm not so annoyed in fact I'm a happy bunny!

The new Spring Knitty came out today and I found some great patterns, including a great halter vest that is knit with cornes then one side is sewn. The new issue also has loads of socks and some great lace patterns.

Location, Location, Location!

We had originally thought that we would get married in the Perth Registry office. Something simple and no fuss. Since getting back from New Zealand though, the Archaeologist has had loads of new ideas that make sense (but budget and esthetic wise)

The Perth Registry office is located in an office block in the CBD, here is a non inspiring piture of the waiting room and ceremony room:

Yes, very meuh!

The cost is pretty meuh as well, putting in the notice of marriage is $135, the celebration is $160 and getting a copy of the certificate is $45. We would of course have to pay something similar for the legal documents but we baulked at having to pay $160 to get married in that dark, manky carpeted room.

So instead we are looking into having the ceremony at Kings Park Botanical Gardens. The cost of having less than 100 people is $60 ($180 in some of the pavillions) that fee includes being able to get photos taken there. We would of course have to find a celebrant that suits our style at a good price, but from a quick look at the listings there are loads of celebrants out there (some of which come with their own chairs, Woo!! haha!)

Having our ceremony in such a beautiful setting would make such a small (the Archaeologist says that by industry standards we are having a 'micro wedding'!) less traditional wedding something a bit more special for us and those invited.

And to include some knitting and craft in the post here is some wedding knitting I am thinking about:

New Zealand goodies

The Archaeologist got back late last night after 20 hours of travelling! Glad to be back and insanely tired, he did take the time to give me some goodies he'd picked up for me while there. One of which was an original glazed donut from Sydney airport, eaten before a photo could be taken of its yummyness so instead here's the wrapper:

He then opened a bag with this inside:

I will probably make a simple rib scarf with them, a really long and colourful one for winter. With the wool was this little guy:

He's hanging from the mirror in our bedroom with the Nessie he got me in Scotland. Today I had to get to the library to renew two books and return some, I was lucky enought to pick up two knitting books that had been returned before anyone else got them:

Twinkle's Big City Knits and Wrap Style. I have them for three weeks so I should be able to get some use out of them, if not I can scan the patterns I like and use them later on (just for me, no copyright infringement here! I won't be handing out copies!!)

Options

I'm musing over which winter item to knit for myself (once the Cobblestone is off the needles and on the Archaeologist) Just thinking about what pattern/colour/yarn to use is just as exciting as casting on! That's a good thing, I can't cast on for something else until I've finished my works in progress.

Option 1:

Eva Raglan

Calls for DK weight yarn which is good as Spotlight does a great basic range in loads of colours at about $2 a ball.

Option 2:

Owls

Calls for bulky/12 ply which i would need to source at a reasonable price. The bulkier yarn would make this a quicker knit.

Option 3:

Sweater with cables Ravelry link (free on Rebecca website, you need to put it into your cart and go through check out to be able to download it) Saw this on Stephanie Dosen's Ravelry notebook (pictured above) and fell in love, maybe it just looks great on her but the other ones on Ravelry look just as good.

Calls for 10 ply yarn

Option 4:

Welt and Rib Raglan (Ravelry Link)
Interweave Knits
Calls for DK/8 ply
I have this magazine so no need to source the pattern somehow. Could be a long knit.

Knitting!

People often wonder why I knit, especially as I'm not old and living in a retirement village! Well for a start it's something to do while watching tv instead of eating, it keeps me from fidgeting, you get really great stuff like hats, jumpers, gloves etc from it and it's mentally challenging.

Or you could just watch this and have a laugh!

Yarn shops

I love going to any shop that has yarn. I always feel that you can't really invest in a yarn until you have picked it up, squished and sniffed it, I mean why buy something that you will make into a garment if it's scratchy, the coulours fade or will pill?

There are a few shops here in the greater Perth area. Spotlight is the closest to me and although many people might squirm at all the novelty yarn (think weird colours and feathery stuff) they do have a great basic line of pure Australian Merino in a great line of colours, ideal for mittens, scarves or hats.

Another shop that I really like is Calico & Ivy they have a great line of fabrics and stock more of the 'luxury' yarns like Noro and Rowan. Yesterday I went and bought some Kaffe Fassett scraps and a ball of Supersocke yarn.

There is a yarn shop in Fremantle that is ok, quite overpriced and not very helpful but they stock good notions if I lose a DPN.

Even though I love going to the smaller, independently owned shops I always feel like the people behind the counter watch me while I look through their stock. If I ask them if they have something, they look at me like I shouldn't know what I'm talking about and dismiss me in an offhand manner. Maybe it's beacause I look a bit younger than I am, but surely a customer is a customer and they wouldn't be there if they didn't seriously want to look and maybe buy? I can't imagine how bad it would be if you were just starting out and looking for yarn to make your first scarf with!

Which is why I believe in online shops. The online shops here stock a lot of the more specialty yarns (from the US) you can browse at your leisure, people won't couch if you click on something, and even though you might not be able to touch and sniff the merchandise, in the online world of knitting a yarns' reputation often means that you don't need to (for example Socks that Rock, Cherry Tree Hill, Manos and Malabrigo)

Online shops can often be go to places if you are looking for something really specific and special. One web shop in the UK did just that. Socktopus specialises in sock yarn and accessories, when you order something it arrives in a silver package with logo printed tissue paper and often comes with a gift. The owner is Canadian and certainly knows about customer satisfaction! She has been so successful in fact that she has opened a shop in just a year of being in business.

With the influence of Ravelry I often hope that the snooty yarn shops might learn that they need to think before they snub people and that knitters talk!

FO's WIP's and other knits

If you check my Ravelry page you can see for yourself when I started this project (I can't remember) but I'm slowly getting on with it and hope to get it done by the time winter rolls around here.

Why yes... I have arms!

It's currently too hot to knit with the bulk of it on my lap, which means it's going quite slowly. But at least the arms are attached and I'm getting toards the end!

My other FO from 2008 are the herringbone mittens that I knit for my SIL birthday:

Herringbone Mittens

It was my first time doing colour work and I really enjoyed it. It's not as fiddly as it seems and doing these mittens inspired me to knit some other colour work mittens, but I can't show them as it's gift knitting.

My other WIP is the charade socks that almost everyone has already knit. I've finished one of the pair and started the other, this sort of knitting is much better suited to hot weather but to be honest I have been itching to cast on for one of the great floppy berets that have been cropping up on Ravelry. I only have laundry and tidying to do today so I might just cast on!

I go on feet!