Blue Curacao finally finished

I am very pleased to announce that the Blue Curacao shawl is finally finished. Sadly I had to unravel 2 balls worth of crochet this morning as I had thought I had enough wool for another set of pineapples only to find that I didn't and could not finish the edging so I had to unravel yet again. Because I have added extra sets of pineapples for length I haven't finished up with one pineapple at the centre back like Doris but I really cannot face any more modifications so I just hope that Vicky likes it as it is. It has taken 8 x 50 gram balls of Sublime cashmere merino silk DK Shade 011. I will post better photos of the shawl if Vicky takes them after she has blocked the shawl. I don't think it needs much blocking as I prefer it as it is when I look at some of the overstretched over blocked versions on Ravelry.It just needs a bit of gentle blocking to get the edges to lie straight but that's just my opinion and I won't be the one wearing it.

I am looking forward to returning back to the Cinnabar cardigan and a simple 2 row pattern. I might make a set of the 4 different granny squares for the shawl first just to double check that the colours are OK before I plough on with all of the granny squares. I can't exactly undo granny squares and re-use the wool if they are wrong.

I had a good night's sleep last night. I think I only woke up once. My back is still sore but not painful. Sometimes I forget all about it and do something silly and then I feel it for a while. At the moment it feels like something inside is pulling. I have the sensation that everything is sewn too tightly inside. It's probably just another stage of the internal healing. I have no idea just how long it takes the internal scars to heal. The specialist just said to me "much longer than you think" when I asked him.

There was no sign of the King's Arms knitted chandelier or any of the knitters in the M.E.N last night. Maybe they are waiting to use it in the ladies section of the paper on another day. Someone did mention the Salford Advertiser free newspaper but if that is the case then I may never see the article as I get a different area version of the paper where I live.

I was going to try another walk but as it has not stopped raining since I got up and I really cannot muster up enough enthusiasm for it although I probably need the exercise.

Knitters in the News

Last night I managed to get to the Kings Arms Knitters Club thanks to the very welcome lift from Charlie. I went, armed with my cushion, as sadly the Arms does not boast the comfiest of seating for my recovering back. It felt so good though to be out of the house and back to a bit of normality again. The big ocassion was the official unveiling of the knitted chandelier. I can't take any credit for this as the ladies of the club made this totally without a single contribution from me - oh shame on me! Last night a photographer from the Manchester Evening News came to photograph the chandelier and all of the knitters. We had a very good turn out and he took several photos. There will be an article appearing in the paper, possibly tonight, but you can relax as he didn't point his camera in my direction at all. (Maybe because I was crocheting?) The article has apparently already been written from a telephone conversation with one of the ladies so I have no idea what has been said until the article appears.

I also got news yesterday from the Bolton Knitting Noras group that I joined quite a while back. Lisa has been organising the knitted garden and if you have read my blog then I have mentioned this joint effort in the past. Several Noras made fruit, veg and aniumals for the garden and have been to festivals lately and taken the garden with them to display. Once again I was a sad participant and only made a few crochet mushrooms. The ladies have been offering their services (relax - purely as knitting tutors) to anyone at these festivals who might be interested. Apparently there was an article in the Guardian newspaper mentioning the merry band of knitters.

Pick of the week: Rock and pop
The Guardian,
Saturday August 16 2008
Article history
Solfest
South Bay Beach, Wigton
Friday 22
Strangely wonderful mix of hula-hooping, knitathons and willow-making workshops among the likes of Supergrass and Róisín Murphy. Not at the same time, mind.

I have not made it to any of these festivals as I am allergic to camping under wet canvas. That's my excuse anyway. In actual fact I am just too flipping old for tents and hard ground. I have a millionaire's taste in holidays on a pauper's purse and if my camping doesn't involve a luxury caravan with hot running water, clean shower and toilet then quite frankly count me out! I am old and therefore I am allowed to be pernickety! I haven't been away for years but until I can afford to go in style I will join the fashionable stay at homes once again this year. If I ever get that winning lottery ticket then luxury holiday here I come!

If anyone is interested in viewing photos of these festivals and the knitted garden then visit Eadaoin's Flickr site (where you can also view her beautiful hamd made jewelry)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/eadaoinflynn/

and the Bolton Knitting Noras Flickr site with photos of the ladies and the festivals.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/815584@N24/pool/

I am still progressing with the Blue Curacao shawl and I have hopefully made no further mistakes since I completely restarted it. I have had to add more rows of pineapples than stated on the pattern. Doris used much thicker wool in her version so this one was lacking in length when made exactly to the pattern. I am working out if I have enough wool for another set of pineapples plus the fan edging as it does need to finish on a pattern repeat or it will look very odd. I am sure that Vicky J will block it down to a better length once it is finished. I have seen the before and after blocking photos on Ravelry and the shawl does "grow" considerably. I think that it would look nice semi blocked as some of the shawls pictured have been very overstretched but I will leave that to Vicky's judgement.

Today is another wet miserable day. I know that I need to keep up with my little walks for exercise but it isn't very inspiring when the days are so wet. Half the channels on my Sky TV are still missing so it looks like I might have to give in and call an engineer sometime soon to sort it all out. I think I will tough it out though until I get the tree sorted out first. I still have plenty channels to watch just not always the nature, home improvement and documentary programmes that I like to watch. The junk channels are all still there - typical!

Too many loops on my pineapple

The Blue Curacao shawl has been unravelled and restarted. I could not understand why I kept going wrong and had to keep unpicking almost as many rows as I crocheted. All was well for the first few rows then it all went pear shaped. After my 4th or 5th unravel I decided to bite the bullet and restart with a new ball. I sat quietly with the pattern and counted and counted every stitch and every row and realised that in my original shawl I had one loop too many on each pineapple! I must have kept misreading the pattern over and over in the same way but by starting again I read it differently ie. the right way. I am hoping now that the pattern will make sense and that my pattern sequences will all match up this time.

I had said today to Vicky J when she called that I couldn't understand why I was finding it so difficult when loads of Ravellers had no trouble with the pattern. In my own defence I do struggle with Doris Chan's way of writing patterns out. She is not the easiest of people to follow. Too many * to " and ** to ** repeats on every row it is so easy to miss the odd * or repeat the wrong bit.

Vicky J brought me the crochet hook roll that she has made for me. It will be so useful. I had intended some time back to make one for myself but if you remember the disaster when my sewing machine blew up. I have not got around to getting it repaired as I won't be able to lift it onto the table for quite some time.

The tree in the photo is the holly bush that grew and grew. You can get some idea of it's size by looking at the garage roof which is to the right of the tree. Now perhaps you will see why it is creating such a nuisance to my Sky satellite signal.

The other photo shows my little regular morning visitor. He is quite bold and comes up to the window whilst I am in the chair you can see if you look carefully in the plant pot. Mr or Mrs Squirrel is under the spiky plant looking to see if there were any nuts buried in there. He/she is quite unfazed by my presence and comes right up to the window and looks at me.

Landmark Day

Today marked a landmark in my progress since my operation. I managed to walk as far as Marks and Spencers in the village. I had to stop in the cafe for 10 mins with a Cappuccino when I got there as I felt a bit knackered. I could only buy 2 ready meals as I not supposed to be carrying anything but it was such a sense of achievement. My back was sore at the operation site but my legs worked fine ( a little wobbly but no sign of numbness) and I had no severe pain on walking which was something I wanted to test. I am in more discomfort since my walk but I am sure that it will pass. I feel very pleased with myself and the surgeon today. Now I can start to believe that the pain will be gone forever soon. The operation site was red hot when I got home and I had a very strange sensation of hot water trickling down inside my back so I hope all is well underneath the skin. Time will tell I guess.

I have not abandoned the crochet cardigan. I decided to leave it at the stage it is at until Vicky J can try it on. The beginning rows for quite a few sizes are exactly the same so I would only have to undo a few rows and increase a little more if the size isn't quite big enough. I don't want to carry on and have it pulling at the bust line. The yarn I am using is still working up a little on the small size but I don't want to go up a hook size as I think it would spoil the look of the crochet. The tension looks good on the hook size I am using now so I would rather go up a bust size and stay on the same hook.

I have started the Blue Curacao from the Amazing Lace Book whilst I am in limbo. The wool is Sublime Cashmere merino silk DK. I am using a 5.50mm hook. I think Doris has used more of an aran thickness but it is so difficult to tell with the US patterns exactly what US 4 thickness is compared to UK yarns. It seems to be mid way between DK and Aran but I really prefer the DK for a shawl such as this. Many Ravellers seem to have made it with finer yarn and added an extra set of pineapples to get the right length. The shawl will be blocked and that will also make a difference to it's finished size. I am still on the first ball but of course I will get less and less rows per ball as the shawl progresses. I guess I will just finish off with as many completed pineapple sets as I can with amount of wool that Vicky provided.

I accosted the landlord of the house next door today and told him I was considering cutting down his holly tree as he was obviously not going to make any effort to do anything with it. I had discussed it with him last year and he hasn't done anything at all and has no plans to do anything. It is supposed to be a holly bush but it has been neglected by him and years of tenants and is now a huge towering tree. It sways alarmingly in the winds very close to my roof but more than that it is affecting the signal to my Sky dish. He looked rather startled and said I could trim it and cut a wee bit off the top. I told him not to be ridiculous as the tree was higher than both houses. I said it is going down to at least half size or down altogether. He finally agreed to half way when I said I would sue him if it blew down onto my roof and did any damage. The whole garden next door is like an overgrown jungle so how can he possible say that the tree is an asset to the garden? It's not as if the tree ever has any berries. All it ever does is creak alarmingly and shed loads of prickly leaves onto my garden everytime there is a breath of wind. Plus my poor lawn hardly sees the light of the sun in certain areas because of it's height. Timber! Oops sorry the chain saw slipped - I will have to buy you a new small holly bush as a replacement. I would, if I dared, tell the tree guy to just chop the whole thing down. Maybe he will discover some ghastly disease which means it is a danger to everyone. I can only hope.

I hope that my little walk today will ensure another good night's sleep tonight. At the moment I feel more enlivened by the fresh air but hopefully by bedtime the walk will have tired me out sufficiently so I will sleep.