A bit of knitting and a bit of crocheting

Yesterday a friend and fellow Knitting Nora called to see me and pick up her crocheted shawl. As Eadaoin is an avid car booter and loves to browse I met her at the metro station to introduce her to the delights of our 5 charity shops. We had a real giggle looking around them and even tried on a couple of wedding or Ascot style hats. When you see some of the heavily beaded and sequined creations I often wonder what frame of mind were the ladies in when they bought them originally. Had they been watching too many episodes of Come Dancing? I think now she knows where the shops are she may visit again sometime especially as one of them tends to have some lovely china, bric a brac and trinkets from time to time. Yesterday there was nothing in particular that caught her eye but we did enjoy the good browse. I always check to see if they have any craft books but apart from a Kaffe Fassett book which is a bit intricate for my taste there was nothing that caught my eye yesterday.

The gorgeous sunflowers are a gift to me from Eadaoin. She said they looked happy flowers and I must admit the bright display of colour brightens my mood every time my eyes light on them. They were admired in every shop that we called in. She also spoiled me with the Thorntons chocolates and a magazine to browse. Do I have good friends or what? I think she was pleased with her shawl so that made two happy bunnies yesterday.

I repaid her generosity by locking her in my bathroom. Well not intentionally of course. Ever since I had my new bathroom fitted I have meant to sand and repaint the bathroom door and replace the door handle but spine and knee operations have got in the way. In the meantime my door handle is a piece of tape threaded through the hole in the door where the lock should be and as I live alone I don't close the door. After an absence of quite a while I decided to call up to Eadaoin to ask if she was OK and had she closed the door. She had closed it and so required rescuing with the aid of screwdriver. I really must make more of an effort to sand and paint the door if I want guests to visit me otherwise I will have to hand them a screwdriver if they want to visit the smallest room!

Last night I started knitting a baby cardigan for Sylvia and was quite disappointed that the cables don't show at all. Today when I spoke to Sylvia she said that when she made it she had put a purl stitch either side of the cable to make it stand out more.I have only made one front so far so I started the second front using a purl stitch either side of the cable and I think you can see there is a big difference. I am going to undo and re knit the first front. Can you see the tiny green cable needle? That is one that my Dad made for me years ago. I used to have quite a few but over the years have lost all but one. I love the tiny size as it is ideal when I am only cabling over 4 sts.

My Dad was a make do and mend kind of guy and hated anything to go to waste.He was "green" long before it became fashionable. He would reuse anything and everything if he could. He was a master at repairing the seemingly impossible.They might not always have looked very pretty when they got repaired but they always functioned. My mother could only knit on plastic knitting needles because of her arthritis and of course they used to snap a lot. My Dad would then patiently make points on sections of the broken needles to make little cable needles for us both to use.

When I was very young we never had a lot of money and so his skills came in very handy to repair toys and furniture etc. He made me a wooden dolls house complete with working (battery) lights, carpets, curtains and hand made wooden furniture. I must have been the only small girl with a wooden bathroom suite for my dolls! He made my brother a fort with a drawbridge for his soldiers when he was small but that had been passed along to someone else long before I arrived on the scene.

I am still crocheting the squares for Kath's sweater but as mohair is not the easiest of yarns to crochet with I can only do a couple before I run out of patience when the yarn super glues itself together. If I go wrong it tests my ingenuity trying to unlock the row.