14 in 2014

Now where did I leave off?

Posted on January 5, 2015January 5, 2015 by bekswhoknits

I’ve been on holidays for a bit. Both from this blog’o’mine and in real life.

We rang in the new year in Melbourne making new friends, and celebrating after our first live Boxing Day test (which was a draw – boo – but still a pretty awesome experience).

Overall the trip was a bit of a mixed bag.
On the way over I read Amy Poehler’s book ‘Yes Please!’ which I thoroughly enjoyed, but the oxygen tank needed to be called for the nervous flyer who looked like he was going to faint.
His new phone took brilliant photos of us and the view of the MCG from our hotel room, but only survived 5 days into the trip before the screen cracked and it became unusable.
The cricket was awesome, but there was a rain delay and it ended up in a draw (and Shaun Marsh dramatically run out on 99! We’re big Marsh supporters and want both the second-cousins to do well).
There was also a Max Walker sighting (the Max after which our Marron-Max was named) which excited the boyfriend no end!!!

The yarn store I had planned to visit was closed for the new years break.
BUT I stumbled on another one! which was was above one of the biggest book stores I’ve seen! Unfortunately we didn’t have time for me to explore both 😦
So I’m now a

So there was yarn, fireworks, cricket, cider, new friends, trams, shopping, and generally good times.

But it’s now back to work and ‘real life’.

Now bear with me while I bombard you with pictures of the wonderful time we had!!!!

Everything and nothing

Posted on December 8, 2014 by bekswhoknits

I feel like I’ve done everything but still done nothing in the last month or so.

I don’t think I’ve finished anything yarn related. My spinning wheel still isn’t set up although I have bought fibre for it.
I am working on my own hat pattern though. I’ve frogged it twice but it’s starting to look pretty good.

I bought some new glasses from firmoo.com. I have worn glasses since I was 8 and only now have I discovered the wonders of buying glasses online.
My last pair of glasses cost me $375 in out of pocket expenses.
I got three pairs for $130 from firmoo! I now have a pair of prescription polarised sunglasses. I’m not sure I’ve ever had a pair of prescription sunglasses before. It was also too expensive. So I’m pretty psyched that I now have 4 pairs of glasses with the same prescription. I’ve had just one pair of glasses for 3 years which I’ve been terrified of breaking or losing, so this is a really cool feeling.
Plus they’re really stylish and cool.

We have booked flights, accomodation and tickets for the Boxing Day Test Match!!! Our credit card is slightly maxxed but its worth it. I feel it’s been ages since we went away more than 3 hours from the city.

I’ve sent some things out in the post and got some things back in the post. Including a super awesome postcard from twitter lovely Megan and a swap package full of lovely goodies as part of the selfish knitters winter wonderland swap. I quite like putting something in the post and knowing that it’s probably going to brighten someone’s day.

I’ve been reading plenty. I actually paid money for the digital copy of Dragonfly in Amber because I finished Cross Stitch and was still awake so clearly I needed to read the second one immediately.
This is also the difficulty with December. I’m not sure where it all started, but Christmas Lists have always been a ‘thang’ in my family.
Mostly mine consisted of books. But it always meant that if I put something on my Christmas List then I couldn’t buy it until after Christmas.

Well that’s what’s happened again. I have a Christmas list which has this book on it, so I don’t want to order it, but I need to read it straight away. Yes I know – first world problems.

I’ve also had another needle in my neck. Yay! But I am feeling the best I have in a while. My twitter nagger Raves has been keeping me on track and making sure I go to the pool. I wasn’t a happy panda when I went on Saturday. All these people were there and the walking lanes were full. At least after work is mostly small children yelling. I think I put up with small children yelling, more than other people in MY lane. But I’ve felt better for going.

Oh well. Here are some photos from the last month or so.

Later taters.

So many capital letters!!! ALL THE THINGS!!!

Posted on November 10, 2014November 10, 2014 by bekswhoknits

I honestly don’t know what I’m more excited about**

That my shawl is finished, blocked, and looks more amazing than I thought it would.

That my tenth doctor yarn arrived on Friday!

AND I’m now the proud owner of a hand crafted spinning wheel!!!!

Oh and I made a tea cozy.

**Pretty sure it’s the spinning wheel. It’s going to take all and I mean ALL of my energy to not look at ALL THE SPINNING FIBRE while I’m at work!!!!
And all the spinning tutorials.
Seriously when my Grandma (in-law) casually suggested that she had a spinning wheel and would I like to use it as it was currently in storage as a decoration I don’t think she expected the excited shriek that followed. The tea cozy was made for her on Saturday in gratitude.

Yarn Collection – Blood Red Shoes

Posted on September 5, 2014September 5, 2014 by bekswhoknits

My blanket just keeps on growing!

It’s gobbling up yarn so quickly I was forced (at gunpoint) to go and buy some more. Fortunately it’s on special (yay!) and $2 a ball. So I grabbed all the white they had. Then I went on a dyeing spree.

This time I experimented with dyeing 3 skeins at once. It was a vague attempt at dyeing a cohesive collection.

I’ve named them after Blood Red Shoes song titles.

It's getting boring by the sea — It’s getting boring by the sea

Everything All At Once — The Perfect Mess

Night Light was inspired by this picture I took from the balcony one night.
We do get some gorgeous sunsets.

I also experimented once more with separating colours using jars. There’s probably more technical ways to do this, but I’m having fun figuring it out for myself.

Some of the yarns from my previous dyeing adventures have been knitted up and look awesome, if I do say so myself.

My only regret is that I used two variegated acrylics that I just had in my stash and thought I could use them up.
They haven’t got the same drape as the pure wool. It’s probably something that only I will notice, but I will have to accept it. There’s no way I’m ripping back all of that work!

I’m totally counting these as ticking off my ‘Dye a yarn collection’ goal for this year.

A no, a maybe, & a soft yes

Posted on August 1, 2014August 1, 2014 by bekswhoknits

When we moved out of the apartment I pressed a few flowers to remember it by.

Turns out I pressed a lot of lavender, which we have at the house, but I still want to make some sort of artwork out of the pressed flowers.

Things didn’t exactly go as planned.
Whatever way I arranged it, things didn’t look right.

I looked through my paper stash but nothing seemed right.

The plan was to modpodge the dried flowers and some pretty paper to a canvas and that would be that.

My original plan was to make a crayon artwork like McStabby’s nugget made for her. But that failed dismally.

I was however able to use the canvas to test how the paper and flowers would stick, so it wasn’t an entirely wasted exercise. Even if I don’t have anything to show for it.

So it wasn’t an entirely failed experiment.
Although I still don’t know what to do with the pressed flowers.

FO10 – SPARKLE SHAWL!!!!

Posted on July 10, 2014July 10, 2014 by bekswhoknits

Remember that gorgeous yarn from my lame attempt at video blogging?
Well I’ve made it into a shawl. and it is epically awesome.

The yarn is yarnvszombies Vampire (75/20/5 Merino/Nylon/Sparkle) Sock Yarn in a colourway inspired by the Fourth Doctor.
The pattern is 22.5 degrees by Martina Behm.

The construction is so simple it was my football knitting for many weeks. Something to keep my fingers moving and not stress drinking or eating, but simple enough that I could still concentrate on what I was watching and not take my eyes off the screen.

The row of scallops made me really nervous. They just didn’t look right on the needle.
Even though I had never made knitted scallops there was something about them. Fortunately I ignored that instinct because once I began to cast off it all fell into place and looked like it should.

I can’t wait to make another one and experiment with different yarn types and different gauges.
It would also be a great base for trying other decorative edgings.

Watch this space! – #KCBW5

Posted on April 7, 2014April 7, 2014 by bekswhoknits

The dates for the 5th Annual Knitting & Crochet Blog Week have been announced.

I will be participating for my second year, and I would encourage everyone to take part. I had so much fun last year posting as well as making new blog friends.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, visit Eskimimimakes for more information and to find out how you can be involved.

And you can check out my last year’s posts here

Jewellery inspired by gifs

Posted on April 4, 2014 by bekswhoknits

Whoop! Jewellery inspired by gifs.

Now if only the gifs came to life and we could put them on our walls and then everywhere would be tumblr.

Also a quick update on the Liz Lemon hat. It is now pompomless. The pompom decided that it no longer wanted to exist and so unravelled itself in a fit of rage.

My weekend in numbers

Posted on March 31, 2014 by bekswhoknits

1 – the number of times I got to pretend it was cold enough to wear my unicorn jumper

2 – Buffy fans made happy with a ‘walk through the fire’ bracelet
10 – geeky bracelets I now have
1 – hour spent searching for lost items
4 – rings found
0 – metal stamping letter Rs found

1 – PlayStation 3 which decided to not read discs any more
9 – hours to transfer all our data off our old PS3 to the new one
1 – heart palpitation when Hewhofishes suggested I could ‘just start over’ in Skyrim
3 – the number of times Hewhofishes pointed a laser pointer from the tv couch to the kitchen couch to annoy me whilst waiting for the data transfer.
1.5 – books in the Grisha series read despite such laser pointer intrusions

55 – points my team beat hewhofishes’ team by
15 – minutes hewhofishes sulked for after his team lost
infinite number of times I thought about rubbing in the fact that my team is better than his team but decided to be the bigger person

12 – episodes of Bobs Burgers watched
4 – quotes I tweeted from the show
2 – confused comments I had back from followers who were unaware I was quoting Bobs Burgers

1 – old but new to me china cabinet was delivered
7 – years my 21st birthday china waited before being unpacked
4 – years my tea cup collection has been waiting for a home that wasn’t constantly under threat of being knocked over.

but by far the biggest and most important number of the weekend
100 – the age of my Great-Nan who celebrated her birthday on Saturday.
6 children, 19 grand-children, 26 great-grand children (me!), and 2 great-great-grandchildren

(Numbers are from my memory and are approximate. It may have been more than 12 episodes of Bobs Burger we watched.)