If I AskYou Nicely - Will You Play Ball With Me?

The crochet has stopped altogether and the knitting is limping along. How can I resist this face especially when he lays his head on my knees and pleads to me with his eyes to play ball with him. Can you see part of his ball collection at the top of the second photo? He likes to scatter them around the house so that he is never far from a ball should the opportunity for a bit of throw and catch occur.

We have already had a couple of games in the garden so he is not exactly deprived of any exercise but he thinks that I am his sole playmate and here to amuse him all the day long. I suppose it is because he usually has the other dog to wrestle and play with.

I think that I have told you before that he goes slightly mental when he hears the ice cream van chimes. Today the van stopped further down the street and when I let him out he was sitting next to the van gazing upwards at the serving hatch long before I got to the cart. He is very single minded when he hears the chimes. He won't stop barking until I get my purse and go and get him a cornet. Not only does he eat his cornet in record time he also demolishes half of mine. He is very greedy when it comes to cones of soft ice cream.

I have managed to get a few more rows done on the knitted baby coat. I still have a sleeve to do and the neckband. I would like to make the hooded version but I am not sure that I have enough wool for that. I will make the neckband and make a start on the hood, If I run out of wool then I will just have to unravel it back again.

I got tempted by the Texere site today and ordered some of that Creative Yarns Reflections but they only had two colours in the one with the lurex in it. I ordered those and a couple of balls of the Reflections without the lurex. These should make some mini shawls or lacy scarves for Christmas or Birthday presents. I know that I said that I was not stash increasing but I did manage until August without loading up with wool for me and even now the wool that I have ordered is destined for presents and I said at the beginning of the year that wool for presents doesn't count. I will let you see what I have bought when it arrives next week.

A friend of mine has just said on Facebook that she is tidying up her craft room and it is making me feel a bit guilty. I tidied mine up and it was all organised but since then I have rummaged in it so many times that it is all over the room again. I need to settle down and stash it tidily. I really should catalogue all what I have and what it was bought for. It would probably save me a fortune when I am looking for wool for presents. I probably already have wool is stock that would be suitable instead of buying new. I know that I have nothing like the Reflections in stock though. Most of my stash is quite plain. Nothing really exciting in it.

I am looking forward to when I can mill visit with Sue and when PurlCity from Ravelry (the same friend who is reorganising her craft room ) opens her wool shop in the Northern Quarter of Manchester in a couple of months time. I will let you all know once it is open and give you the link to her web site. I can't give you any clues at the moment as to what she is going to be stocking but as soon as I find out then I will let you know. At the moment I have to rely on friends to get wool for me or buy my wool online but it isn't quite the same as seeing the ball in the wool and having a good old squish and fondle is it? I have often been disappointed when I have ordered online and then found it was not the colour that I thought that it was.

Funny old day today. One minute the sun is shining and the next minute the rain is coming down hard. Buster seems to have gone to sleep or at least he has settled down so maybe I can get a few rows knitted before dinner.