Curve balls.

2 weeks since my last post and I was doing so well  .

But life threw a curve ball at me, quite unexpectedly  my lovely old Dad  sadly passed away, not related to Covid-19 I might add.  

I won't go into details and don't want to harp on about it, hence to say it knocked me for six and  the whole Covid-19 situation only exacerbated the situiation.

But a week later and I'm trying to get back into what is now a new normal, working form home.

I miss the team and the whole social dynamic that goes with my job, but I think this home working thing has helped me this week.No need to speak to anyone socially or address the big elephant in the room.I'm not one for public displays of emotion.

And that's all I am going to say on the matter, I am strangely now on leave for a week, despite my holiday being cancelled and not being able to go anywhere.  Don't fret I have many projects lined up, whether I do them or not is another matter completly.

I'll leave you with a pic of my lovely dad as a young handsome man.

WIP Wednesday.

Knitting has been my primary source of relaxation this week. I've managed to get quite a bit done.

First up is my Flax.

Only had 1 sleeve left to do and am almost there. Just the rib to go this evening then its done. The yarn is West Yorkshire Spinners The Croft, Shetland Country Aran, Which I bought from Alterknits Universe earlier this year. I love this sweater, its warm and snug and just the thing for walking the dog and chilly evenings camping or on the beach. I made an error on the sleeves, the pattern section should have been 1 row knit and 1 row purl but I ended up purling them all,couldn't be bothered to rip so left it as it was. I love the flax pattern so cast on another earlier this month

This is the flax light and is my sweater of many colours. Its almost like a temperature knit, just pulling random mini skeins as my mood takes me, no thinking, just knitting in the round. The kind of easy soothing knit that I need right now. This will be the item that I will always relate this time to. It will bring both back good and bad memories, will I wear it? who knows...



First sewing Project of 2020

I've been desperately wanting to get my sewing machine out get making, but just couldn't find the right combination of fabrics and pattern. It needed to be a quick easy sew with some fun fabric.

On Saturday I had a little nudge to a fabric shop in Brixham, Brixham Sewing Box, I have popped in here in the past when I have been in the area so was pleased to find their online shop. Sandy the owner is a lovely friendly lady.  The fabric I have bought is

How gorgeous are those turtles

and then this one

Beautiful little seahorse's

Can you tell I am missing the coast?

Pattern wise I bought this

 

Trapeeze Dress from Merchant & Mills

photo from their pattern page..

I am really pleased to see that they are now extending their size range for bigger women. I have loved this dress for ages.  The only downsize is that it is only available in a PDF so have had to print it and now have to stick all the pages together. The cottons will be for summer but I have some lovely heavier fabrics in my stash so could make a few for the winter to wear with t-shirts underneath. It comes with a pattern instruction booklet as well which is easy to follow.

I don't know about you, but I am finding it really difficult to focus on projects which  need a lot of thought. Were going into week 4 of lockdown, and despite still working full time ( at home ) I am struggling with being at home all the time. Don't get me wrong, I am well and my family are well, we are all here together, but boy do I miss my freedom..

So until we can start to spread our wings again I will be trying to find easy projects to keep me busy.

FO. Friday.

I have managed to finish a few things this year which has been great. Last year had lots of projects but very little finished items. I've set up a page to log my finished makes this year, alongside my goal to finish up all my knitting WIPS (12) , my goal is to have at least 3 sewing items finished and wearable this year. I have the fabric and the patterns and currently the time so there's really no excuse. Knitting wise, Id like to get at least 6 of my WIPS finished by the end of the year. I have 4 sweaters on the go so would be nice to get them done.


This FO Friday I'll show you the WIP that I have been most excited to finish....

My lovely Cornwallis sweater seemed to be never ending, but finally it's done. I absolutely love it. it's a great pattern, my only issue was that it was knit in pieces so had to sew it up. I hate sewing up...…

I also appear to hate blocking and it's yet to be done. But it's not exactly sweater weather here and I'm certainly not heading off to a Cornish beach anytime soon!


It was knit with Garns studio drops cotton merino which is reasonably priced for sweater knitting. I used Mustard, grey and white.


I'm really tempted to make another but I do have 12 WIPS to be getting on with......oops.....

WIP Wednesday.



WIP Wednesday, what can I say. I have so many projects on the go this would be a hug post if I showed them all. It seems that I have a serious case of 'Startonitis', made worse by the current lockdown. I have many projects but anything that needs a few brain cells is not happening. What I really want is some great easy knitting.

So I cast on a flax light sweater, using up all my mini skeins from stash, well not all of them the jumper wont be that big. I have cast on the biggest size as I want a lovely snuggly comfy sweater for wearing at home. This is a great free pattern with a large range of sizes. I have a heavier Flax also on the go using Aran weight yarn. Its much to warm to be knitting on that.

This was cast on last weekend and this is what I have so far

it is going to be very random, just picking out what ever colour I fancy when the skein runs out. Cuffs will all be in the dark grey.

Then for another simple project I joined Louise Tilbrook's safe at home KAL. I choose to cast on the fuss free festival shawl, another easy knit. . This is paid for pattern and costs £4.80 but is free until 02/05/20. Details of the knit along can be found on her blog

This was another stash buster, this was pulled out of the stash as it reminds me of sunny days by the coast, something I cant do at the moment...The fibre is Felt Fusion and is their super wash merino with silver stellina. I bought this from Purl a row .

It's got a bit of sparkle in and shimmers just like the beach on hot days. This is the progress from last night.

Both projects are really comforting and keeping me occupied both in the house and garden during lockdown, I also picked up the shawl during a  WebEx meeting today and managed a few rows. Something I would never have done had I been at the meeting in person.. one of the joys of working from home and turning the video off...

What i'm reading.

City of Girls.

The whole staying at home thing has really dented my reading time. I was a commute reader.  I have a huge pile of books to read but seemingly no time to read them. How is this possible given I can't blooming go anywhere?

So I joined a reading group, part of an online community I subscribe to, Middleyears Monday. and today I sat at my home desk half an hour early and had some commute reading time ! I had planned to commute read after work, but I got waylaid jigging my new home office around a bit. Don't get excited it's not a new home office, it's my little pink craft den which has now been repurposed. Tricky business as my craft stuff is still there and tempation is not far away. Trouble is with all this video conferencing everyone can see my huge craft stock piles...at least its not toilet rolls ........ 

Bloglovin issues and a new blog...

I'm still here in blogland, I have been trying to disentangle my blog from Bloglovin to no avail so have upped ships and closed the last one.

My issue with Bloglovin is that even if you have closed your blog and changed the RSS feed they can still show your blog and posts. If you don't know Bloglovin adds your full posts to their site and claims its theirs telling google their version is the original !  Deleting your account/blog  doesn't even remove it from Bloglovin, your posts will still be there! I can find no way at all to get my blog off of the Bloglovin site....'I've emailed and they just ignore me. I am not a  technical person so don't know what else ? anyone got any ideas?

I know blogging is a bit old school now but I really like being able to write and record stuff almost like a journal. I'm not in it for followers, just like the platform and enjoy following blogs.

So here I am , a fresh blog, the same as the last, but no previous content until I can work out how to get it disentangled from Bloglovin.