A quiz for you

No, I'm not going to tell you but I want you to guess. 

Here's a picture of me wearing some shoes which don't belong to me!!!!

Who's shoes are they?

The person who they belong to doesn't know about this, by the way, and it's only thanks to Bev from 'down under' that  you have a picture to take the guess!!!  That in itself should give you a clue!!!!

Answer will be tomorrow!!!

Sock it to me!!!

Now when I was staying with Terry in Canada I got severely and sorely tempted to knit some socks. I've always had a fascination for knitting socks and it's been a few years since I did a pair. 

I've always thought it was a lot of time to spend on making something that may wear out after a few 'outings'. Anyway, Terry assured me that if I got the right yarn it would be fine and promptly gave me some - so generous and thanks, Terry. 

So, Ruth, Terry and I went out one day for high tea (mega, mega yummy it was too) and just before that we visited a yarn shop they knew about. Well, yarn AND fabric - heaven without tatting threads!!!!

I decided to buy two more balls of yarn AND some new double pointed needles. Why? Well I figured that mine at home were older than me (probably) and I would spend hours trying to match sizes up. I was recommended to buy some carbon needles and that's the most sensible thing I've done in ages. They're fantastic. They don't slip out of the stitches but again, don't catch or 'stick', if you know what I mean.  Thoroughly recommend them.

A week or so ago I decided to start my first sock with Terry's yarn first. I found a pattern and then decided that I needed to learn to knit a new way (to me) - the continental way. MAN, was THAT a steep learning curve (thank you, Youtube) and it slowed an otherwise slow knitter down to slow, dead slow and 'nearly' stop. But a week later I'm now flying and the sock is progressing wonderfully. Here's a picture taken a few days ago. MUCH progress has been made since but you'll have to wait!!!

New hobby?

Well I doubt it'll take off completely for me but I must say this is more challenging than it looked when I first saw it!!!

It's needle felting.  No, NOT needle tatting before you misread this and think I've lost the plot!!!

I'd already started thinking about needle felting some time ago and my friend Louise and I wandered into a shop in Alcester a couple of months ago and were browsing the craft section. I saw some needles for this craft so bought the equipment. Cheap as chips (as 'they' say).

A few weeks later Lou and I went to a wonderful open afternoon that the local Dyers, Spinners and Weavers (link to their blog) were putting on at a local venue so we wandered down there. Really only to support our friend from Crafternoon called 'Spinning Jane'. That nickname has been adopted to differentiate her from 'Tatting Jane'!!!!  I've found this link to the blog where you can see Lou and I learning needle felting.  Lou's got her back to the camera, unfortunately.  In fact further down on the page you can see 'Spinning Jane' teaching spinning with a drop spindle too.  It was a truly splendid afternoon in good company and with lots of interesting things going on.

During the afternoon Lou and I took two workshops one of which was for making Dorset buttons and the other was needle felting. The top is what I achieved 'on the day' and the bottom heart is my second attempt at home. I'll be interested to know where this is taking me - I know that BC3 already has ideas!!!!

Back to boring!!!

First of all thanks to SueH who I'm going to promote to being my internet secretary!!!!  She tells me that the candles were put up in 2003 which is quite a long time ago!!!  It's a good job that she's there to keep an eye on me!!

Well here you are - back to boring. Two more Rachel doilies done while away from home. 

The first one is done in size 40 thread and the brown one in HWT. I do LOVE my HWT!!!!

Candles

The other day I had a lovely message from Kay who had found my little candle pattern on my site. Oh, before I forget - here's the link. Oh, here's another link for you too - for the larger candle!!! 

Now these must have been some of my first patterns onto the internet (I think the owl family was the first) as the candles don't have a date on them. It must've been in the 'early' days of this wonderful invention called the WWW when dates just didn't matter and I was a lot younger and more innocent!!!

Anyway, I digress. I am showing you her candle today as I'm most impressed at her creativity in finding a solution to not having the right sized ring available. I used brass curtain rings when I was doing them but Kay didn't have enough of the right size of .......... Let her tell you!!! This is part of her message to me. 

"Each year for Christmas, I try a pattern or two (of yours) and tuck a few tatted ornaments in Christmas packages as gifts. Some of my friends/ relatives LOVE those more than anything else. This year I really wanted to try your little Christmas candle, but didn't have enough of the little rings in the proper size.....so my "pack rat" tendencies came in handy. I've been saving the plastic pop off tops from 1/2 gallon size milk containers, hoping I'd find a use for them at some point. Guess what? When I cut the ring off, it's just the perfect size for your little candle ornament. I'm delighted. :-) Thought you might get a kick out of this."