Tag: Felix

On a knitting holiday…not quite! Though the stars did align and a holiday has been had. We did a family trip to Wales where we explored little villages, chilled on beaches…

Were joined by the most awesome people in the world, my sis Rabbie and her husband! There we went on tiny trains and climbed up the Welsh mountainside to explore old ruins and castles…

There was playparks and dragon boats and an old copper mine that we explored, then suddenly we said our goodbyes and went back home…

I have lots of good memories, lots of fantastic photos and a fair bit of knitting to show for my holidays, but more importantly I feel like the world is just one step closer to being back to normal, and I’m ok with that.

Pattern being knit is a free pattern called Dad’s Cabled Vest by Ira Dearing which I am making for the FIL as well as matching ones for my Terrors just for cuteness sake. Unfortunately I was half asleep when I was doing my math after knitting a gauge Swatch and Engel thankfully realised several inches into the main body…at least I was able to begin the armhole shaping and now it’s the one earmarked for Felix. So I have cast on once again for the FILs…once all three are knitted I’lll do the finishing around the necks and armholes and show them on here. Until then its either going to be radio silence, in progress shots, or any distractions I decide to make instead of working in these!

Till next week, stay safe guys!

(No wool count again as I didn’t record how many balls of wool I got through, but I will be able to work it out when I figure out how many balls I started with Vs how many I have left…)

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The weather has been bitterly cold as of late, to the point the duck pond near us has completely frozen over. As such, I have been going through our stock of tea like crazy!

It’s been a quiet week all told. Work is quiet, so much so near all of us are on part time furlough – feels strange only doing three day weeks but I imagine I will quickly enjoy it! It will also give me a chance to do all those jobs round the house I have put off all winter, as it’s been too cold or wet…

Chinese New year, usually a big occasion, was also quiet. Felix, upon seeing her red envelope, was initially excited, before stating “Oh, it’s lockdown. There won’t be the dragon parade or dancing lions”. After speaking with Rabbie, it was decided that if there is no official dragon parade, then we will have our own! It’s amazing what Engel can produce with cardboard, fabric and a glue gun! The kids decorated his creation, and with some red fabric, we had our own parade!

It was chaos, and there was more falling over laughing than parading, but it was so nice to hear laughter! There was also Skype calls with both Engels family, and my own, and it was actually really nice.

Felix’s best friends birthday is today, and we arranged a small meeting at the park to exchange presents and let the kids fun around. The cold kept the visit short, and we all welcomed hot showers, fluffy pyjamas and tea when we got in!

Which leads me to this week’s knitting news – part of the gift given today!

A striped butterfly hat and a tiny cup and saucer with milk and a biscuit. The latter part of that gift was actually a request she had given me three times so I figured her birthday was the perfect time to cave and make her it!

The pattern for the cup and saucer is Teacup and Saucer by Sarah Keen from her book ‘100 Little Knitted Projects’ and the cookie is a free mochimochi land pattern!

That’s all for this week, until next, stay safe!

Wool Count

Starting total – 897

Wool used – 14 (1 this week)
Wool bought – 0
Wool given to me – 0
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 4

Total – 887

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Remember how I mentioned that I was going to have to knit a few more Pokémon hats? Well the terrors took the decision out of my hands and demanded a set of hats that matched their cuddly Pokémon toys.

So without further ado I present…

We have Inklings Espeon on the left and Felix’s Umbreon on the right, with the matching hat/toy. These are two of the evolution choices for Eevee, which I knitted a hat version of previously…

With a bit of luck, that will be the last hat for a while. Unless I knit myself one. Still debating just which one mind…

It’s a short list this week as I have been really under the weather – it’s not the plague! But I have definitely lost my enthusiasm and energy this week. On top of finishing those hats off, I did manage to spin and ply the ball of wool I needed to keep working on my other big project – hopefully I can reveal that soon!

So until next week, keep safe!

Wool Count

Starting total – 897

Wool used – 12 (3 this week)
Wool bought – 0
Wool given to me – 0
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 4 (1 this week)

Total – 889 (Back to last week’s total!)

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It’s been a quiet week for the most part, which is good, I don’t think we could all handle any more crazy! Though speaking of crazy…last night we did an early Burns Night celebration with the family on Skype. There was poetry readings, show and tell, gossip, laughter and general shenanigans.

My home sickness has been bad throughout lockdown. Typically I visit my family three to four times a year and a handful of the family visit me once or twice in return. This hasn’t happened. I’ve moped, and sulked, and played the ‘what if’ game but last night, I realised it had morphed, very slowly, to a sweet pang of nostalgia. A contented ‘this is good’ rather than a ‘I want more’. My friend from Australia told me at the start of the pandemic that this would happen and despite me disbelief at the time, yeah, it really does.

On a less sappy note, knitting! Penguins are plodding on their long march to December, my other big project is ticking away in the background but I know already it’ll soon be in hold so I can spin more wool for it, and a quick little knit was slipped in at the kids request:

Its the same free pattern (Snake Coil Cowl by Ariel Woods) that I knit previously my Felix – the terrors fell in love with this slow gradient wool and with the weather being so wet and soggy and things needing constantly washed and/or dried, it made sense for them to have a spare.

Hence my Sssleepy snake pun at the statrt. I am sleepy. I think the world is feeling the same so I won’t sit here and moan.

Not much else to report at the moment, so until next week, stay safe.

Wool Count

Starting total – 897

Wool used – 9 (2 this week)
Wool bought – 0
Wool given to me – 0
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 3

Total – 891 (Back to last week’s total!)

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Despite my best wishes and hopes, the start of 2021 was far more eventful than I wanted. That said, it wasn’t all bad!

The worst part was that, as I suspected, we’ve been put into lockdown again. So no school for the terrors, but unlike last time, I’m not on furlough. Cue many sleepless nights, much stressing and general feelings of despair. But, it all worked out. Both myself and Engel have been deemed as critical workers and we have secured places for both Terrors at school and nursery.

On a better, eventful note, I was surprised by a review video of my knitted Escher Ganger!

You can watch it here!

More eventful news, I won a toy pattern and two sweater patterns through the Wild Knitting challenge! I am really looking forward to doing some knitting for me, but I really need to reduce the stash before I can justify buying two sweater quantities of wool! I’m working on it, managed to burn through 6 balls this week!

In less eventful news, I have managed some spinning for one of my big projects, been plodding away at my year long project and finished a quick little one for Engel just last night which I will share now!

It’s Snorlax! Engel demanded that he get a Pokémon hat after Felix’s Eevee hat and Inklings Meowth hat, so I asked the kids what Pokémon I should knit for him and within three seconds, the answer was Snorlax!

Now the kids are demanding I should make one for me, but there are just so many choices… Gengar? Wooloo? Purrserker?

Till next week, stay safe!

Wool Count

Starting total – 897

Wool used – 6
Wool bought – 0
Wool given to me – 0
Wool gifted to others – 0
Wool handspun – 0

Total – 891

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Hello all, I hope you have had a fairly nice run up to the end of the year, regardless of what you cekebrate. Christmas here was surprisingly pleasant. I received some bad news at the very start of the morning, but other than that, it went smoothly.

Felix and Inkling are both at that age where they get swept up in Christmas and everything has that magic to it than only exists when you are small and young. And it was infectious. It was exactly what myself and Engel needed.

Because of all the changing rules and regulations, we kept it pretty simple, and have one set of friends over, and they too definitely needed the same dose of Christmas magic from the kids as we did!

It was one of their birthdays just a few days prior, so I knitted him up a little gift, which in my tired and exhausted brain from a last final push at work to complete a hell of a lot of work in a tiny time frame, may have drove my work colleagues mad…

Shark mittens!!! (Free pattern Puppet Mittens by Debbi Parker, there’s a bunch of animals so well worth a look) and because my brain was running on fumes, I did a tiny shark finger puppet.

Baby shark, doo doo de doo…baby shark doo doo de doo…and I have a mummy and daddy shark too so was giggling inanely to myself at my desk in work playing with them and breaking into song when people looked over at me…

I would like to point out that it wasn’t just me who was losing the plot completely, a lot of us where! They just didn’t see the brilliance of the shark mittens and song combined…

In other news, I had a chance to get my spinning wheel out and did a little bit of spinnjng. It had been too long since I managed to indulge myself with it! So one new ball of wool! But I also used a ball in my current project.

I’ll go into more detail in that at a later date, for now, I have festive chaos to return to!

Keep safe everyone!

Wool Count

Starting total – 704

Wool used – 156 (2 this week)
Wool bought – 28
Wool given to me – 318
Wool gifted to others – 8
Wool handspun – 17

Total – 898 

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O Christmas Wreath I never any to knit another…

Long story short: I don’t like Christmas cards, I feel they are a waste of perfectly good trees, and any parent who has had to try and get their child to write out thirty of the things for all their classmates knows, it’s hell.

So last year I knitted decorations for Felix’s class – there’s no bits of paper that’s just going to get tossed, there’s an actual keepsake, and no pain of writing the things out. Felix remembered and wanted to do it again this year.

And if Felix got it, Inkling wanted it to.

That’s 60 decorations. Ok. That’s doable. Kids settled on wreaths, not the quickest, lots of sewing, but doable.

Oh, wait, because of Covid all cards have to be handed in two weeks early. That’s 60 wreaths in under two weeks. And work has been hell. A couple of projects that due to things beyond my control, have to be done by Christmas. So that’s 60 wreaths, full time job, overtime, weekend work, running a house, looking after two terrors, trying to be full of Christmas spirit…

But on the flip side, I got to use up a lot of little nodes and ends of green which has made a nice dent on the stash, and they look cute, even if I was up until 11:30 the night before they got handed in sewing them all up…

Want to see all 60 ready for school?

Next year, I’m starting in November. Pattern btw is free, it’s Advent Garland 13, Wreath by Frankie Brown – if you haven’t checked out her patterns, I highly recommend it.

Now I’m off to enjoy my Sunday in peace. I have a house to put back together and terrors to entertain, but I’m happy with that!

Till next week, stay safe.

Wool Count

Starting total – 704

Wool used – 154 (3 this week)
Wool bought – 28
Wool given to me – 318
Wool gifted to others – 8
Wool handspun – 16

Total – 899

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A rare siting in my knitting repertoire – plain, basic, sensible knitting. With Inkling starting nursery, which attached to the school Felix goes to, he is required to wear the school uniform. Unfortunately he didn’t want to wear Felix’s old school cardigans, and didn’t want to wear the jumpers, so I knit him a pair of sweater vests in the correct bottle green…

(Made following the free pattern 6-Stitch Plait Unisex Vest For Kids by Ratchadawan Chambers)

I actually made three of these, the first one I somehow mucked up my gauge swatch (I suspect I used the wrong needle) and the whole thing was just too small…but attempts two and three are perfect – a good year or twos growing room in them!

And I can’t make for Inkling and not Felix. She thankfully didn’t want any new cardigans and instead pointed out a pattern she had previously spotted in my Revelry library:

Yep, an adorable snake cowl to match her snake hat! This pattern is Snake Coil Cowl by Ariel Woods and is currently free, so if you want it, grab it now before it becomes a paid for pattern!

I’ve got a few more knitting and spinning projects in the go right now, and hopefully I’ll focus on one and get something more fun done for next week. Seeing as we are in local lockdown, I imagine my distractions should be a bit less in the coming weeks…though I have been running Cthulhu Invictus on Skype and that’s been a lot of fun, but being GM takes a lot of time and prepwork! That reminds me, one of the gaming guys has given me a knitting challenge, so I’ll have to see how that goes…

And speaking of challenges, I joined in on the wild challenge on Instagram – first stop is Africa with a theme of flamingos! Now to decide just which flamingo themed thing to knit…

Till next week, stay safe!

Wool Count

Starting total – 704

Wool used – 122 (4 this week)
Wool bought – 28 (There was a ‘yarncident’ and I ‘accidentally’ bought an adorable hand dyed mini skeins set to make myself something cute! 10 mini skeins in total)
Wool given to me – 301
Wool gifted to others – 7
Wool handspun – 15 (4 have been used! 5 gifted)

Total – 913

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I survived! And no one was sacrificed to Great Cthulhu! The birthday party (slimmed down to just Felix’s best friend as they are in the same bubble) went well – better than expected to be fair!

The only down side to the whole weekend was I was too busy playing games and dancing and wrangling children to do much knitting, so much so I have nothing to show this week. And if I had finished, it would have been a somewhat boring pair of cabled sweater vests for Inkling to wear to school… However, I have a few cute cat themed KAL’s with a friend of mine, and i’ve joined a knitting challenge on Instagram so I’m sure there will be cute stuff aplenty soon!

But in the meantime, I have a special spinning project I can at least reveal! It’s taken five dying experiments to get the colours of the fleece just right, but finally, finally I can present:

Missy? Yes. Missy. The Missy of The Grand adventures of Little Miss daisy. My sister and I decided that such a beautiful loyal and loving member of the family deserved her own wool. So with her being tan and black and her signature pink collar, I got to work.

Natural black Hebridean, fresh coffee dyed Suffolk-Texel and acid dyed pink Suffolk-Texel. I present ‘Missy in the Meadow’.

I had tried used coffee grounds, beetroot and purple kale to get the colours but fresh coffee and the acid dye where the best matches.

But I needed something else, and so, a contrast colour was decided upon.

Depending on the light, her tan colouring can change quite spectacularly, and in the moonlight, it fades to a much fuller brown, and so the used coffee grounds Suffolk-Texel was spun with more natural black Hebridean to give ‘Moonlit Missy’.

There’s approximately 317m of Missy in the Meadows and 196.5m of Moonlit Missy making its way to Rabbie. I look forward to seeing what she makes with it, and will be sure to feature it here!

Last photo – promise – of the two colours together!

Stay safe everyone!

(No woolcount this week as no changes.)

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Cutting a long story short, two things have been on the cards for a while. A family friendly console that is fully supported (Curse you Wii!) and a birthday party for Felix. With the current situation regarding the plague, it as decided fairly early on that Felix would not be having her big class party. So what to do?

Rewind a few weeks when we were visiting family and Felix was introduced to her auntie and uncles Switch and promptly fell in love. Inkling, despite being 3, could even join in the games and play them (with all the baby settings on, but he didn’t need to know that). I had a go, Engel too, and yeah, it was pretty much decided that when we get a console, it would be the Switch.

Which brings me back to the present. The money saved on not having a big party paid for the majority of a Switch, and Felix quickly agreed to having one or two friends round for pizza and a Switch party. This is taking place next week, so if there’s no post, they’ve probably sacrificed me to an Eldritch Terror.

They grow up so fast…

But come on, it’s not a party organised by me without some cute knitted element! And so I took these Mario kart images:

And turned them into:

Mario Kart party bags! Each one unique with a variety of symbols! There is nowhere near that many invited, just so you all know, it’s to give the kids a choice so as to reduce the chance of a fight breaking out. And so the parents reminiscing of days long past can swipe one too…

If I haven’t been sacrificed to an Eldritch Terror, I’ll share my latest spinning triumph with you all next week. If not, Engel should have finished performing the necromancy ritual for the week after.

Until then, stay safe!

Wool Count

Starting total – 704

Wool used – 118 (3 this week)
Wool bought – 18
Wool given to me – 301
Wool gifted to others – 7
Wool handspun – 15 (4 have been used! 5 gifted)

Total – 907

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