status - normal

WIPs as follows by order of urgency:

1 pair Opal Elementale socks in a dubious colour choice, for close friend whose birthday was 24/09. 75% of 1 sock finished.

1 wrap-style baby cardi in “no weird colours at all” 50% finished

1 knitted kitty toy to test pattern…finished!

1 jellybean sock for Blaise – can’t even be bothered to frog it, let alone knit it

1 one skein wonder – 75% finished

Over the long weekend Flash realised that he was fighting a losing battle asking me to put my knitting away in the knitting closet each night when I finished, he went and bought me a rattan box/stool which suits the lounge nicely, and hides my knitting…win/win!

One of my current wips is a baby cardi, for a friends new wee girl, it is my own design, knit with 3 colours of soft baby yarn, blossom pink, white with confetti spots and pale blue. The other night I was knitting while watching House, always a mistake as the attention was drawn away from the knitting, and when the pattern changed from K2tog at the front edge on every row, to K 10 rows straight, the rythym didn’t change, and suddenly I realised that I had 10 sts less than I should have had at that point…what to do, usually I would have called this a “design feature” and knit the other side to match, but this time it was different, I was test knitting my own pattern, and really had to wrestle myself into submission, “knit the pattern as it is written” I found a needle, threaded it up with a shiny cotton yarn, and placed an afterthought lifeline, then ripped back 10 rows, and found it very satisfying, that I am finally going to knit a garment exactly as described by the pattern (unless I have made a mistake in the pattern, in which case I will edit it)
Flash had gone to bed and I got to thinking about the number of babies who have been born lately, whenever he sends me the first photos of a friend or colleagues new baby he always writes silly comments like:

John’s raisin
Love Flash

We are a little smug about new babies, new parents are always so precious, so we poke a little fun at them privately, because, I suppose it helps us deal with the (and I don’t know if grief is too strong a word) feeling s we have about the fact that we will never have a child together, we have raised and are raising heaps together, but when you think about the fact that we met later in life, when we had both thought our families complete (and had both had “the snip”) and have at least 3 children to put through tertiary education, having a new baby isn’t an option. So we pretend to each other that babies are noisy, messy, annoying little people with very few redeeming qualities, who should be banned from supermarkets and restaurants, to protect one another from the fact that it would have been very nice to have had one…and of course, she would have been the perfect princess.

Okay enough dwelling on what will never be ( unless we inherit a lot of money and have a baby created by micro surgical techniques, and hire a night time baby nurse...)

what I did last night...I have been working on some gifts for some people who can't be names, and was playing around on the sock theme, I always keep the item I make all of the mistakes on for myself...so here it is, a dpn holder, the 2 pockets towards the centre do have dpns in them, but they are shorties! There is also room for a needle sizer, I love this, it is so much smaller than my normal needle roll so I can just throw it in my bag with yarn, and know that I can knit any sock I like! The picture on the front was printed onto transfer paper and ironed on, a wee baby trying to put her own socks on, from this site - called "baby w/socks" (personal use) and the quotation is from Mother Teresa, and says "You can do no great things, only small things with great love" which I think is a particularly apt quote for sock knitters, you have to love someone to handknit socks for them.
The quote was ironed onto a seperate peice of fabric, which was then sewn to the main peice, leaving one end unsewn, lightly filled with dried lavender, and sewed shut, when the case is rolled up you get a lovely hit of lavender, the edges were then frayed. Pink ribbon sewn to the outside to hold it together, very pleasing!

(fabric Kaffe Fassett "Roman mosaic" in pink colourway, less than 1/2 a fat quarter, how's that for value! plain pink cotton for front pocket, and pocket lined with paisley flannel in pastel colours...yes I am still convinced that my needles need flannel to keep them cosy!)