Jam and Cat (or cat in a jam?)

I`ve been off a whole week now (I`m so happy I work term time only) and the time has just whizzed by. The garden is tidier, the house is cleaner, I`m more relaxed and I`m enjoying being domestic.


I`ve made jam , and prepared 2 carrier bags of runner beans and what seems like 100`s of pounds of french beans for the freezer, all courtesy of my Dad. He has an allotment, and conveniently, I live part way between it and his house, so I regularly find fruit or veg on my doorstep - a bit like the organic box schemes but so much cheaper!

On the crafty front, I have been doing some more lace (yes, the horseshoe in my last post is bobbin lace) and also a bit of crocheting. I have knitting plans but I am waiting for the yarn and needles to be delivered, how dare the post office have another strike when I`m waiting for a squishy parcel - some thing which is pretty rare for me, buying decent yarn instead of making do with acrylic, or charity shop finds.

And while I was out in the garden yesterday I kept hearing Dudley`s meow, but I just couldn`t see him at first, but after a while of persistant mewing, I spotted him

Up here!

but I am pleased to say that he found his way back down again and spent the rest of the day

snoozing

Bond...the new swear word

Many years ago, I bought a Bond knitting machine (didn`t we all?) I used it a bit, but it has sat in the back of my wardrobe for the last 12 years. Recently, I had the great idea of getting it out to `quickly` make a baby blanket for the next Baby pack.


Time makes you forget the bad bits, and though it was a fiddle to get going again, and there was one latch that steadfastly refused to knit a stitch and had to be done by hand each row, it wasn`t until the carriage jammed, suddenly moved and all the knitting (including the weights) landed on my feet I remembered just why it had been put away.

Eventually, I succeeded, and a square of knitting was produced, but it was neither quick nor satisfying, but having crocheted an edging around it, it will pass and keep some wee one warm.

I probably won`t use the Bond until 2019, when I will have forgotten all about it`s awkward habits again, so watch out for the bad language again then!

My FO this week is lace, but not the knitted kind

Little cousin is getting married in a few weeks, and being a crafty young lady I`m hoping she will appreciate this. It was a lovely design to make, and though it doesn`t show up too well in the photo, it is ivory (to match her dress) with gold fans and the little diamonds are actually beads. The bows on the top are lilac to match the bridesmaid.
LC had thought of asking DD to be a bridesmaid, but quickly realised that as she is under 5 foot and a size 14+, and DD is 5'8" and a size 10, it might look a tad odd - she still wanted DD to be involved so has asked her to do a reading instead.

First Pack

Just a quick post to show you the contents of the parcel that I`ve just wrapped to send off to The Baby Pack Project, I know I could have just sent bits I knitted but I thought it would be fun to assemble a complete pack. So with the help of good old eBay and the local charity shops, I managed to find everything on my list. I have to confess to not actually having knitted everything - the cardi was in the 50p basket in the charity shop and was obviously new!

A pair of pairs of booties

But, first of all, I would like to say thank you to everyone who has commented on my last few posts about Rene. I hadn`t thought I would feel upset at her passing, having not seen her in the later years, but I have been surprised at the emotions it has stirred, and the memories that have resurfaced. It has been lovely being able to share with you.
I have now finished most of the knitting that needed attention and it is packed and ready to post to Feed the Children and I hope she would approve.
The only exception is the pile of knitted squares which Mum asked to take care of. She has sewn them together and is currently knitting an edging to attach - all 144" of it. I`ll post a picture when it is done.

As for my own charity knitting - here are items 6 and 7 (of my target for the year) which were actually finished a while ago, but Rene`s posts were more important.

These will be off to the Baby pack project when I have some more bits to go with them.

Apart from Granny squares, a bag and the odd edging, I haven`t really done any crochet that requires the following of a pattern, so the booties were an interesting challenge - the first one was frogged twice, (the initial effort would have needed a very deformed foot to fit!) but now I am keen to do some more and I have requested Crochet in no time from the library to see if it contains the sort of patterns I would like to make. (I hate not having a book shop with a decent craft section round here, and I am too mean to take a chance and order it unseen over the internet!) It sounds good from the reviews so we`ll have to wait and see.