Mouton-cadeau + Mouton-Cadet = Mouton: Cadet!

I thought I was having a grown-up day. Not entirely grown-up; but we bought furniture, and didn't buy too many pink things, and most of the pink things weren't for us... (and do pink Pyrexes count? I think not...)

BUT then I went to Ely (despite one of Stagecoach's better moments, where the bus driver went straight past me despite my being at the stop, with my hand out, in broad daylight... and the subsequent dash for my bike and to the station...); and although I was meant to be giving presents (and EJ, can you take a photo of Miss M in the jumper when it fits? I've just realised I have no record of it whatsoever), I also received one... After an evening comprising wine, cider, deep-fried goats' cheese with onion marmalade, some very good chips and some extremely bad punning, I introduce Cadet the sheep...

Here, in "across the bonnet" Motor Show pose.

Here in relaxed "I'm glad you asked me that, Jeremy..." mode

And I think this is some sort of homage to Dolores.

A bit of a sort out

Thanks to a very kind friend (thanks, Suzanne!) I made it to the glories of Dunelm Mill at Huntingdon this morning. They didn't have quite what Suzanne was wanting, but they did have a lot of other interesting things - her girls are going to love their PVC ice-cream-pattern aprons when they're done - and when we eventually found it (having given up), the chest of drawers on their website looked as good close-up as it did on the site. After an unnecessary amount of to-ing and fro-ing, we got it into the car and brought it home... I am a bit of a fan of the FLYLady, although you really wouldn't guess it from the normal state of my house; but I do like her dictum that you can do anything for 15 minutes. I went for 15 minutes on that, and 15 minutes on finishing up something urgent... and it seemed to work - here are the stages starting from 0 minutes...

And because this sort of thing always fascinates me; the things in the drawers...

1: the ballwinder, underneath that is a spindle. When I find my yardage-measuring-thing, I'll put that in there as well...

2: a purple box (thanks, Jan!) containing my smaller DPNs and a small number of circular needles which haven't made it to the Big Purple Circular Case, which is squished underneath it (thanks, Nina!)

3: the next half dozen sock projects

4: skein of laceweight (Cherry Tree Hill in Fall Foliage) I can't bear to consign to the lace box in the loft; three balls of DK weight self-patterning - maybe a Baby Surprise Jacket?

5: the current Guilt-Inducing WIP bag, and a bag of oddments of sock yarn...

6: the next two blankets. The Hemlock Ring Blanket hit me hard...

7: St Brigid. She will be finished this winter. She will, she will...

Anyway I'm really pleased with it; and it was as a result of a bit of a windfall (thanks, parents!)

The question Not To Ask around here at the moment, though, is 'what happened to all that crap you took out of that corner'? Because I'm going out to knit at the Lamb with EJ (who is living rather than blogging at the moment), and I still have a very belated birthday present to sew up, and I've only got an hour, and I'm not listening, anyway!!

The aim with the chest though is to finish up the WIPs which are out in the living room in baskets, and start on the ones in the chest, and gradually getting to store WIPs in the chest. Bwaahahahaahahahaha, I hear you cry. But I have an ulterior motive for this. Have for some time. I just can't tell you.

August knitting II

The second finished object in August was another Pink Lemon Twist stole, the famous Mystery Stole 3.

It was a lovely thing to knit and these blocking photos really don't do it justice... I fell behind for a couple of weeks in the middle because I was teaching at the Summer School, and that also coincided with the 'pas de chat' lace in the middle section (on the left here);

but I was ready for the last chart when it was released, and short-rowing the wing at one end was lovely...

Then the poor thing sat around for a week or so waiting to be blocked...

The whole enterprise seemed more than a little mad, particularly once I'd roped myself in for proofreading Mrs R.'s Special Charts and was having strange conversations about abbreviations at odd hours of the day! But it was great fun imagining all those people knitting along at approximately the same time; and Melanie providing the beautifully-charted pattern, and an immense amount of support, to thousands of knitters, was a superb act of generosity...

I used Knitpicks Shadow in the Vineyard colourway - would have got away with two skeins but I lengthened it during Clue 4 so needed a small amount of a third skein... and 3.5mm needles. I started off on Bryspun straights, but couldn't resist the urge to spread the thing out and look at it at every opportunity, so ordered myself an Addi lace needle... The yarn was utterly beautiful to knit with - spongy and fine at the same time...

August knitting I

Some knitting did get done in August - and was blocked - just not blogged. Both were designs by Melanie Gibbons





First up, Hanami - in a not-exactly-cherry-blossom colour. I was puzzling over this one - I wanted to make a birthday stole for my mother, but she's not a pastel person. Then I noticed the pierced-wood wastebasket by the PC, and wondered if it would look like that at one end,
and like lotus-wood at the other...



I was pleased with the results, anyway! The only modification I made was right at the end - somehow the frill didn't feel extreme enough to me, so I did an extra set of increases to give 4 times the original number of stitches, and beaded the cast-off. You can just about see that here, but it's pretty subtle.

I did have one small disaster - half-an-hour into blocking really isn't the time to find that dropped K2tog a couple of hundred rows back!!

But ten minutes with a crochet hook and some judicious darning have rendered it almost invisible...

Happy Birthday, Bug

The Bug (officially Jarrahkatt Aimee, unofficially Jarrahkatt Amelia Peabody, Amelia, Mealybug or Bug) is 6 today. Which means, I believe, that she's (just) overtaken me in cat-years... She wears them well...

The fun thing about Norwegian Forest Cats is that they change so much with the seasons. Here's Amelia in full winter fig in early March ...



... and here she is in the Summer Short-Haired Version, this evening.


Some of my neighbours are convinced I have two similar cats...

Happy Birthday, Bug.