So – another round-up of what I’ve been up to since my last communication….I actually started writing this nearly 2 weeks ago, around the time of my eldest daughter’s birthday and the kick off for Hat Attack but then someone came and asked me to switch the tv on/tell their sister to stop it/get them a drink please (choose any one of these or a combination), the post got kicked into draft and has remained there.

So first, Bratz. Now, anyone out there who does not have children (or more specifically girls) may not be aware of these evil voodoo dolls (think Barbie with a serious Paris Hilton fixation) but my eldest thinks they are the best thing since sliced bread so we have them everywhere….I find them and their “accessories” under the sofa, in the kitchen, on the bathroom floor…so when her birthday was approaching and we asked what sort of party she wanted the answer was inevitably “Bratz!”

After a few days of thinking she came back to amend this to “a Bratz makeover party” – oooookkaaaay……..after questioning a few other parents and toying (very briefly) with the idea of painting nails and applying lip gloss to a group of 8 year olds myself I found a wonderful beauty therapist who organises such parties for little girls. All I had to do was provide them with some food, put up some decorations …. oh yes, and bake a cake.

My eldest has coeliac disease so no chance of just walking into Tesco and buying a Bratz cake – oh no – mum has to make a gluten free sponge then ice and decorate it. So for a week this is what I was doing –

here is the cake fresh from the oven

and here is Yasmin (her favourite Bratz) in construction

This was all cut from regal ice in various colours (after a trial run with the kids play-doh!!!). I then covered the cake with white regal ice and decorated it with spray-on food colouring in blue, purple and gold lustre to get this –

– I was quite pleased with the overall effect and the party and the cake were a big hit!

Right in the middle of this week of Bratz Baking, blowing up balloons, wrapping presents etc etc Hat Attack kicked off. Having done no swaps/competitions/kal’s in about a year I was doing a very rare spot of browsing around on the net a month or so ago and came across Hat Attack….a bit like Sock Wars except your weapon of choice in this particular battle is a hat…so in a moment of madness I signed up….to then discover the pattern was coming out a couple of days before the Big Party…oh well, I thought, at least I’ll get a nice hat.

I actually managed to get a fair bit of knitting in that week and found the pattern fairly easy so got the hat completed in about 3 days and it was posted off by the weekend.

One kill in at least I thought. I then waited for either a WIP from my target or a bullet through the head from my assassin….both of which arrived on the same day. Which is probably why I realised there was something a bit off about the weapon fired at me.

This is the two hats together, bear in mind that all the way through the game, and for several weeks before, the organisers have been banging on and on about gauge and how important it is and how we are only allowed to be off by, at most, an inch either way in size….

The smaller one was the WIP (yes, I know it’s a finished hat – it was agreed to be a misfire on account of one row of pattern being missing) the larger is the hat destined for me….a little large? Well, this is me wearing it and I didn’t pull it down hard or anything

and this is my hubby wearing it….

now, he’s 6′4″ and has a notoriously large head. We never find hats that fit him. His head is so large that when he was born the doctors thought he had encephalitis and told his mum that he might not live, they performed tests for a week – including a spinal tap – before his granny came to see him and just mentioned to one of the nurses “Of course I had the same problem when his dad was born, his head was really big, we couldn’t get baby hats to fit him” at which point they decided there was nothing wrong with him….apart from the freakishly large head of course. Actually, this fact is the one thing that I console myself with when thinking about not being able to give birth to my own children…at least by adopting I avoided having those large headed babies……ouuuchhh!

So, to get back to Hat Attack – the powers that be agreed it was a misfire so it ricochets right back to my assassin and I live some more. I unpicked and reworked the other hat and sent that off last weekend. Kill no 2 done.

I am now awaiting the arrival of hat no 3 which should be here tomorrow however I know that my new assassin is working on my hat as we speak….I don’t know what stage it is at but I do know the hat I’m getting is already at the decreases near the top so has only a few rows left to do. I then discovered that my new assassin (Ravelry name purps) goes to the same knitting group in Birmingham as RooKnits so if you see her there could you just accidentally unravel the hat or stab her in the hand with your needles or something? Ta!!!

I have an apprentice and pleased as Yoda am I…..

One of the things I have always imagined when I looked to the future of myself with children was sitting teaching them to knit and this afternoon that dream was realised. My eldest , who is about 2 weeks away from being 8, was watching me sew name labels into her younger sisters school uniform and asked if she could help “I’d really like to do some sewing…..or knitting…yeah, that’s what I realy, REALLY want to do…..”

So, I found some suitably sized needles, large size so they are easy to hold and knit up quickly but fairly short so they are not unmanageable – I finally dug out some old wooden needles that were my grandmas (she used to call them her “string vest” needles) they are 10mm needles but only about 11″ long and being wooden they are nice to the touch. Then I dug out some wool – I decided on Twilleys Freedom. It’s 100% wool and very soft to the touch, it’s fairly chunky so the knitting grows pretty quick and the couple of balls I dug out were in a variegated blue so the fabric would knit up a little more interesting than a plain yarn.

I cast on 15 stitches for her and showed her how to make a knit stitch and she was off…

with very little input from me aside from the odd screamed “Help, mum…it’s all gone wrong” as the stitches slipped off the needles or she wrapped the yarn the wrong way! She sat working away happily shouting out excitedly every time she finished another row and, after about an hour of knitting she had produced this –

It may only be 6 rows of garter stitch but to her it’s a real achievement and (so okay, I may just be a proud mum) I think that’s pretty good for a not-quite-8-year-old who has never knit a stitch before! She has informed me it is going to be the longest scarf in the world, EVER! and that she is going to knit every day.

My husband walked in as she was knitting and said, “oh no – a convert. What have you started?” I prefer to think of her as an apprentice and I’m rather proud of myself as well as I’ve never taught anyone to knit before.

Well, as things begin to settle down and life is beginning to feel “normal” (whatever that is) so hopefully this is the return of blogging. I’ve not stopped knitting, although these days quite a bit of my creative & artistic energy gets used up in helping small children make junk models or beaded jewellery or finger paintings or fairy cakes……

First, with the hope that this is not going to turn into a “mommy blog” I have to share a story. When I told my best friend her reaction, after she stopped laughing, was “Well, now you are definitely a mum – you’ve got one of ‘those’ stories!”

So, yesterday morning my youngest is following me around upstairs whilst I’m putting away laundry, tidying bedrooms etc. I leave her stamping around in her bedroom to go into the bathroom. Whilst I’m in the bathroom I notice, as you do, that the sink needs a clean and that, of course, leads to the bath etc and so I’m in there quite a while and haven’t noticed it’s gone ominously quiet outside.

As I open the bathroom door and look out onto the landing I see my youngest freeze in one of those “freeze, I’ve been caught” poses. She is standing in the middle of the landing clutching a large container of baby powder (now empty), she is white from head to foot, there is a trail of white leading in and out of both her bedroom and mine. There is white powder up the walls, on the doors…..everywhere….and she just looks at me and says “oh!”.

Later on the same daughter somehow (we are not certain whether this was accidental or on purpose) emptied a large quantity of bubble solution over our cat….we didn’t find this out until after the kids were all in bed and the cat came in looking very bedraggled and sorry for himself….picture me trying to clean soap solution from a long-haired cat who really doesn’t like being washed, what a fun evening.

On the knitting front though I’m currently working on Gigi from www.knitty.com for me. The yarn was bought on eBay and comes from china so I have little idea what it is. It seems to be a sock weight or similar and is in a deep, scarlet red (which doesn’t photograph well) and black.

When I bought this I had no idea what I was going to make with it I just thought it was interesting and it was a bargain. I also bought a pack of the same yarn in a green/yellow/orange/white combination because I can’t resist a bargain.

So, when I checked out the latest edition of knitty.com and saw this -

I immediately thought of my chinese yarn…and knitting with yarn from china whilst watching the Olympics in Beijing (wooooo! Go Team GB! Congratulations to my heroes Chris Hoy & Bradley Wiggins) seemed very appropriate.

So far I’ve completed the back and am halfway up the left front, the patterning on the back looked great but with the shorter rows on the front I don’t know whether I like the pooling…..

I’m also not sure if it’s going to be too small. I’m knitting the smallest size, XS, as the sizing given seemed right for my new shape (6 months into having 3 kids, giving up an office job for a job where I NEVER sit down I’ve lost over a stone…..and I was only a touch over 9 stone to start with!!!) it’s knitting up rather small. Let you know how it turns out.

I’ve also got out my sewing machine and dusted it off to make this gorgeous little sundress for my middle daughter -

I can’t even remember where I got this rather pretty gingham with embroidered butterflies but I came across it whilst clearing out some cupboards a few months ago and it was just crying out to be a sundress. Whilst walking past the sewing shop in town this weekend they had this on a roll outside the shop door

It was incredibly cheap so I’ve bought enough to make a second dress for the youngest daughter so she can have one as well…her favourite saying at present being “how..how…how ’bout me?” whenever anyone else is given anything.

To round off this creative outpouring my eldest daughter and I made apple pies this weekend. The deep dish apple and blackberry pie looked so delicious that we ate it straight out of the oven so I’m afraid I only have photos of the remains….it did look fantastic though! This was our first try with gluten free pastry for pies and it came out quite well. As gluten free is always more crumbly the shortcrust had a lovely crumbly, crunchy texture…quite pleased…..oh yes, and the apples and blackberries were picked from our garden. Apple pies always make me think of my grandma who loved to make them and taught me a lot about making pastry – the secret is cold hands and don’t mess it around!

I tried to resist but inevitably, with the arrival of 3 little girls, a tide of pink has engulfed my house – toys, clothes, bedding, walls. I have to admit I was never averse to a little pink myself and have a sizeable quantity of pink items in my own wardrobe but now my washing line resembles an explosion in a candy floss factory!

And by the end of an afternoon this is what our lounge looks like (and this was on a fairly quiet day!!!)

The pink has now reached my knitting and, unable to resist, I have made them something pink. Admittedly it’s a very pale shade of pink and in fact it is not knitted but crocheted. Summer has arrived with a bang here in England and my girls are in need of summer clothes so I searched through my stash and found 4 balls of Rowan All Seasons Cotton which was my free gift with my Rowan subscription this year. The pale pink colour and the cotton content seemed perfect for a little lacy cotton number and from 4 balls I could probably manage something for both the younger two.

A quick search on Ravelry for a pattern (I love being able to do that!) came up with the Spring Fling Halter by Jaybird Designs. Since teaching myself to crochet last year I have (excuse the pun) become hooked but have yet to crochet an actual garment, just granny squares, lace edgings and amigurumi.

This little halter top is fantastic, it took less than 3 balls to make the size 2T and 3T so I still have a ball and a bit left and it took me only an evening to make each one. So after 3 hours in the company of my 3 favourite men (that’s Gil Grissom, Horatio Cain and Dr Gregory House) I had a finished top.

(check out the model pose from my 3 year old!!)

And here’s a close up of the shell pattern at the bottom.

It’s very satisfying making things this small – you get a very fast return on your efforts and (thankfully) at the moment the girls love wearing things I’ve made for them so I’m making the most of it.

As promised, some knitting! This is a hooded sweater I’ve just finished for my youngest – the cheeky monkey in question.

I knew exactly what I wanted to knit but after exhaustive searching online and through all my pattern books I couldn’t find it. Now, I’ve knit hundreds of sweaters over the years and I’ve often tweaked or adapted patterns so – why couldn’t I design something myself?

I found some bright DK yarn (Sirdar Salsa in orange and yellow) in my stash, worked up a few tension squares to decide on needle size and work out how many stitches I needed then I cast on….. basically I just started knitting and made up the parts I wanted as I went.

I’m pretty happy with the results – as is my cheeky monkey. The neck shaping probably needs a little tweaking, and I think I picked up a few too many stitches around the hood but as my first design I’m quite proud.

If you want it the pattern can be found under my free pattern pages and it’s called Cheeky Monkey (link over there in the side bar). If you do decide to knit it I would appreciate feedback as I’ve never written a pattern for someone else to follow so I don’t know if it makes sense.

Just to reassure any readers who may not be aware why I’ve been absent for so long. Everything in the Beckett household is fine, we’ve just been a little busy. Our little family has expanded from 2 to 5 as we are in the process of adopting 3 little children aged between 3 and 7.
As you can imagine this means I have less time for knitting, blogging or anything other than being a full time mum! I have done some knitting – all little things!! – and hope to be back to blogging on a fairly regular basis very soon. I’m beginning to get used to the idea of being a full time, stay at home mum and the job is getting a little easier every day so I find more time to spend on myself.
I’ve just completed a hooded jumper for my youngest which I designed myself (I knew exactly what I wanted but couldn’t find it) and I’ll get the pattern up here as soon as I can.

OK, so this is becoming an annual thing. As I was going to bed on Thursday night I noticed my right wrist was itching – looking to see if maybe I’d been bitten I realised I had a rash all up my right arm….by the time I woke up on Friday morning I had red wealds on both wrists, around my waist and behind my ears.

I took an antihistamine tablet and smeared on some hydrocortisone cream and then spent all day at work trying desparately not to scratch. It spread all over my torso and onto my feet. I left work early to get to the pharmacy to buy some more antihistamine and by the time I got home and took off my top I was one huge weald from my neck, down both shoulders, both underarms down my sides, joining up across my stomach and right down to the tops of my legs – lovely!

I took a bath just because I was on the point of screaming from the itching…..it didn’t help much. It spread all over my back. I sat in my loosest pyjamas all evening took another antihistamine and it seemed to calm so at least I got to sleep.

This morning my arms are covered in red bloches as are my knees, ankles and the very base of my spine – it’s even spread onto my hands – one of my palms is actually very sore.

The weirdest thing about my hives (or urticaria) is that they seem to flare up this badly just once a year in November…last year I had an outbreak on 1st November and the year before it was the 29th October. So this years outbreak is a little late. We’ve never managed to pinpoint a trigger for the outbreaks – at least nothing environmental or food that I might be allergic to. The fact that it seems to be occuring at the same time of year is now making me wonder if there is something environmental – what is there around at this time of year which seems to be triggering these outbreaks? The only thing I can find in common with the outbreak I had last year is that I had just had a horrible cold then and I am just recovering from a cough/cold now so perhaps it’s the cold virus that is triggering this?

Whatever it is – it is very, very annoying. Apart from the fact that it looks horrible (great big pale lumps surrounded by red skin) the itching is driving me to distraction….

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Tags: hives, urticaria, allergy

I got such a wonderful package this week and it came at the perfect time. I’ve been suffering with a horrible cold bug for over a week which has progressed into a hacking cough which keeps me awake all night.  The day the package arrived I was curled up on the sofa under a blanket in my pyjamas watching daytime tv and feeling generally miserable. The arrival of this bumper haul was just the pick-me-up I needed so HUGE thanks to my wonderful Swap partner, Lisa.

 The Mystery Theme Swap was a wonderful idea – no set requirements just let your swap partner have three themes and they send a package based around one of those themes. I think I gave my themes as purple, gardening and chickens….Lisa took the chicken theme and (in her own words) ran with it as you can see –

Here we have – a gorgeous oven mitt decorated with chickens, 3 “Chick-o-Stick” peanut candy bars and the yarn and pattern to knit rooster! Also (you can’t really see him in the pic) a “Posable Magnetic Rooster” – I’ll take some action pics of him on the fridge door later!

As you can see my own chickens came over to take a look at the pressies.

As well as all the chicken goodies she sent -

Alaskan goodies – blueberry jam, honey soap and Rasberry Earl Grey tea – yummy and just the soothing thing my throat needs at the moment. The card is hilarious – a chicken (think it might be a white leghorn like my Morwenna) with a strap-on peacock tale, the caption inside reads “I got it on eBay”

But it didn’t stop there, Lisa also sent some purple themed goodies –

The yarn is baby llama and is the most wonderfully soft yarn I’ve felt…Brittany Birch needles (I love, love, love these – I just love the feel of wood anyway, it’s so tactile), some beautiful red glass stitch markers, the pattern for Odessa, lavender flavour chocolate with a little purple glass stitch marker attached and lavender bath fizzers. Oh…and also (not in the pics) a bar of Lindt 85% cocoa chocolate (yummy!)

Here’s the whole parcel – Jonathan took a look when he got in and declared it a deluge not a swap parcel!

….oh, and I’ve already started on the rooster (I couldn’t resist!)

Being at home nursing my cold means I’ve completed a whole load of knitting – firstly Jonathan’s Gryffindor scarf which I finished just in time for the start of the cold weather. This is his “first day back at school”  photo !

The scarf was knit in King Cole Merino Blend DK which is very soft and squishy and the finished scarf is very thick. The pattern is by Lauren Kent and is from Charmed Knits. Took forever and was VERY boring but it’s provided my hubby with a lovely warm scarf for his early morning wait for the train so was worth it.

Next up, I decided to do something with the packet of Noro Silk Garden I bought whilst we were on holiday in Whitby earlier in the year. It’s been stored on the top shelf of my stash cupboard and has been calling to me every time I open the door. The colours are just so autumn that I had to do something with it whilst the leaves were still showing their wonderful colours in my garden. As I have quite a few little girls to give presents to this Christmas (and a few more I’m going to be responsible for clothing next year!) I decided on the Child’s Cable Jumper by Anne Hanson. This is a downloadable pattern – I should point out that in England “Jumper” means something completely different and I was a little confused by this pattern – “that’s not a jumper” I thought “it’s a pinafore dress”….before I realised that’s what you call them in the US. Here in England a “jumper” is a sweater/pullover.

Anyway, whatever you call it – it’s very sweet and knits up perfectly in the Noro Silk Garden

I love the pleats which are formed by bands of knit and purl like a very wide ribbing and the pleats then flow up into cables on the bodice. I knit the largest size for age 3/4 years and will decide if this is a Christmas gift later on.

This only used 4 full balls and about a quarter of another so I had nearly 6 balls left. I looked around on Ravelry for another suitable pattern and came across Wendy Bernards Girlfriend Swing Coat Sweater pattern. This is actually a pattern I’d seen before as I read her blog on and off (she’s another Wendy who knits I have to show faith). Wasn’t sure if the Noro would work but decided to give it a try – and it worked like a dream

This is the front

…and back, showing the lovely big collar and the swingy shape. This is so nice I want to knit one in my size…I wonder if I could scale it up…hmmmm

I just need to weave in the ends and fix some sort of closure…..actually I went to a Couture exhibition at the V&A museum in London on Thursday with my mum and I bought a whole load of buttons in the shop afterwards including some gold flowers which would look really good on this.

I’ve also knit a couple of Wooly Wormhead baby hats but don’t have photos yet so will share those next time.
 

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Tags: knitting, noro, chicken, swapI’v

Just found this post lurking in the drafts where it had become lost in limbo – whoops! Enjoy!!!

30th October 2007

Well, I am sitting in an empty house thinking it is very, very quiet. Our friend Tracey has been visiting with her two daughters (aged 5 and 9) since last Thursday and it’s been a busy few days.

On Friday we took the girls to Legoland Windsor which is about 15 miles away from us, I think they had fun….

and we saw lots of lego….

…I even found some knitting….

…and because it’s close to Halloween they had a huge firework display at the end of the evening. This was probably the best firework display I’ve ever seen and it seemed to go on for ever…the photos don’t really do it justice.

On Saturday we walked down to feed the ducks and swans on the river in Marlow and stopped at the craft shop to buy paper and glitter and crayons to make witches hats and draw fireworks pictures. My brother came over late afternoon and we all went out to our local pub, The Marlow Donkey, to have dinner. When we got back home we played Singstar on the PS2 – Tracey and I singing along to our favourite 80’s songs!!  

Sunday was a quiet day at home playing on the computer games, with lego and then a killer game of Monopoly with Katy, Lucy and myself.

Monday we had a trip to London to visit the Natural History Museum – lots of dinosaurs

and then a whistle-stop tour of some of London’s more famous sites including the Tower of London, Tower Bridge and the Houses of Parliament

We had so much fun this weekend and really loved having Tracey, Katy and Lucy stay with us…but my house now seems so quiet. I think I’ve finally reached the point where a house full of children seems normal and an empty house with Jonathan and I seems wrong. Throughout the adoption process which Jon and I have been enduring for the past 2 years we’ve gone through various stages – panic (can we really do this?), worry (will they let us do this?), dread (do we really want to do this?) but finally it feels right, I feel I have room in my life for children and things I want to share…..spending a weekend with 2 energetic girls I think settled any lingering worries about that.

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All’s fair in love and Sock Wars…

What a week, it started with my assassination of a dear friend, Roo. I killed her with a pair of socks in blue alpaca so at least her feet will be warm and cosy in the afterlife. The weapons struck her on Tuesday and by Thursday she had sent me her partly assembled weapon in lavender Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino and the assassination dossier for her target, Donna. I completed the mission and by 10pm Thursday another package was in the post box at the end of our road.

My second target fell early Saturday morning and Donna emailed me news from beyond the grave of the my next mission. Unfortunately the partly assembled weapon for this target had not been particularly well constructed and the materials were not really suited to their purpose so, after discussion with Donna and her original target from whom the weapon would be coming we decided the best thing to do was for me to begin assembly of a totally new weapon from materials in my storage facility.  I will wait until I receive the original weapon before I post the new one and then wait however long it took me to knit from wherever they had got to so as to make it fair.

but I’m not dead yet…. and I have the t-shirt to prove it….

We’ve also been rearranging more furniture in preparation for (1) by friend Tracey and her children who are visiting next weekend and (2) the future arrival of adoptees….it’s progressing…slowly

We now have one room which is quite tidy and has two single beds and another room which at the moment has a single bed and a sofa bed in it…rather cramped but hopefully by the end of tomorrow we will have disposed of the sofa and armchair in the playroom and the sofa bed can move down there….

I also managed to knit this –

…his name’s Herbert and he’s a Snowme (I’m taking part in a Christmas themed swap and need to send something for the tree…)

There are no more finished objects but I have made progress on Mad Weave socks, but no photo I’m afraid.

In other news, I won a competition on Krafty1′s blog – can’t wait to receive my prize…some yummy yarn and chocs and a bag.

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Tags: sockwars snowme competition