Saturday 23 April 2011

Owls, tadpoles, dragonflies and Pebbles


It has become a tradition that I make Dottie a new school bag when it's her birthday so 8 months later here's a photo of part of last year's bag with its rather confused owl - inspired by Walter Pigeon (the owl heatpad/cushion I made her a year ago).  The last three bags I made for her can be seen here, here and here.

I haven't photographed all of the bag because I always find it difficult to get decent photographs - basically it is a very large messenger bag with the owl on the front flap.  It is lined in a selection of the fabrics used on the owl and has several zipped and poppered pockets.

I think I was more pleased with the folder that I made her out of a couple of Paperchase tea towels.

It's my own design and I keep finding new ways to improve it - like the in-built pencil case which isn't actually as wonky as it looks in this photo!

Dot uses it every day and it has taken some pretty hard wear and tear as it is usually stuffed with notebooks, planners, reading books, papers, pens and pencils and a million other things - so I'm relieved it's still in one piece.  I just wish there was a better way of photographing it to show you.

In knitting news I have been busy with my Tadpoles ..............


.........and I'm now on to the foot of the second sock but I have also cast on some Dragonflies in this gorgeous wool specially dyed brightest of bright oranges by Barbara at Ring-a-Rosie.


She named the colour Juicy Lucy!

But my most interesting piece of news is that yesterday the Lockets had another fabulous day out at the seaside with the Pebbles - the only thing missing was the sun!  In fact it was absolutely freezing with thick fog and we could barely see the sea! But another brilliant sandcastle complex was built and we all had a lovely time - unfortunately there are no photos because I remembered the camera..........but forgot the memory card!

Hopefully NEXT time we meet up the sun will be shining and the camera will be in action!

Saturday 2 April 2011

Missing in knitting action

Sorry I've been gone so long.........I've been busy knitting socks and haunting Ravelry forums and my blog has been neglected.  I haven't been reading blogs either so I'm sorry I'm so far behind on commenting.  I think I'm going to have to start afresh from today rather than trying to catch up.

Because I've only been  knitting socks I didn't think it would make for a very interesting blog read but I'm going to show you what I've been doing anyway:

First of all, how's this for a PAIR of lovely socks?


Knit as part of Sock Knitters Anonymous' March Mystery sock Knit Along and designed by Stephanie of VeryBusyMonkey. (Moogsmum managed to knit TWO pairs before I had even finished my first sock!)

I really enjoyed knitting these and waiting for each clue to be published - I even knit both socks at the same time - something I've never done before! And I love the colour - it was christened "Primrose" but I have renamed it Sherbert Lemon.

And I found a better pattern for the lovely wool from Quinn


It's called Cherry Swirls and is a really easy knit - but it's not a "flowing" knit - by which  I mean it doesn't flow easily from the needles like some patterns -  so it has been stuck at this stage for quite a while because I have been distracted by other more interesting patterns. But the wool is lovely and the colour is gorgeous.  (Moogsmum managed to cast on and knit a pair of these in about 5 seconds flat so it's probably just me that has a problem with the pattern! We've come to the conclusion that she is a Knitting-Robot so I no longer need to worry about not being able to keep up!!)

Yesterday I cast on a new sock with some lovely handpainted yarn by Barbara at Ring-a-Rosie - my lovely local wool shop (I've spent a lot of time there lately too!).


I did the ribbing yesterday evening and then spent a lovely afternoon today knitting 5 repeats of the pattern - I'm nearly onto the heel already.  The pattern is called Tadpoles which is nicely-Springly-appropriate - even if I don't have any tadpoles or frogspawn in my allotment pond (I've been spending time up there too!)


And in the evenings I have joined the hoards crocheting an Attic24 Granny Stripe blanket with a gazillion different colours

So I have been immersing myself in woolly goodness and spending more time smiling and a lot less time crying.  All good.

Lucy xxx