Confessions of ... cont'd

Well, the long socks saga (try saying that quickly when you've had a couple of glasses of wine!) is nearly over. All that remains to be done is to pass them on to their new owner. Grandpa Flea very obligingly modelled the socks for the photo - can't you see why I married him? Such a shapely pair of legs! Sorry about the photo quality - not helped by the dark colour of the socks. They are a Patons pattern in a 3x3 rib, knitted in Patonyle. I astonished myself by grafting the toe on the first sock with no trouble once I found a book with clear how-to illustrations. Unfortunately I couldn't manage it when I tried to follow Montse Stanley's directions. But I have a couple of old multi-craft encyclopedia type books and the illustrations and directions in one were very clear. However (my knitting always has a sorry end!), when I came to graft the second toe, I had uneven numbers of stitches on the two needles. Being absolutely sick of the socks, I grafted the first two stitches on one needle to the first stitch on the second, and it made a little bump in the side of the toe. It would be annoying if the socks were worn with shoes, but the recipient lives in slippers, so I think it will be okay.
True to my word, I am confessing to another UFO which I have just come across in my clean-up. I have knitted this pattern a number of times and it always works well. I started this at the beginning of last summer for the Littlest Flea but it somehow got to the bottom of a pile of knitting and I forgot about it. Fortunately I was making a size 5-6 as Little Flea is rather sturdy, but she has had a recent growth spurt and shot up so she is slimmer and I think this will still fit her come summer as she only turns 5 next Saturday. When the knitting is finished, Little Flea and I will make Fimo buttons to match. I did this with Ms 11 when I knitted her the same pattern at about the same age and we had a wonderful time. The buttons looked a bit wonky after little fingers had prised them up off the benchtop and put them on the baking tray, but that only added to the charm.
So this will be a UFO that is finished.

Somehow, confessing them publicly seems to make them get finished. I wonder why?

I had lunch with Janette today - lots of good knitting talk and general gossip. Janette is a beautiful knitter, plus designer plus teacher. I did a workshop with her at Virginia Farm a couple of years ago and her instructions were so clear that I amazed myself - I still haven't mastered Dorset buttons though. She published a knitting book about three years ago (it only seems like yesterday) but has since been waylaid by the arrival of three beautiful grandchildren - two of them twins. Have a look at her website http://www.styk.com.au

Thank You and Questions Answered

I've been very remiss in responding to comments and questions left on my blog and want to play catch-up.

First of all, Roxie asked what PROBUS is - it's an organisation for PROfessional and BUSiness people who have retired - an off shoot of Rotary, except that there is no fund-raising or "good works" involved - people meet for fellowship and recreation. There are male, female and mixed groups. Grandpa Flea belongs to a male only group. He has a committee meeting once a month (he always gets involved in organising things), has a PROBUS meeting once a month with a guest speaker (partners are invited to these a couple of times a year), an outing once a month to all sorts of interesting places (partners go on these), and a day walk once a month (partners go too). Twice a year there is a bus trip away for 5 or 6 days (partners go too). So while Grandpa Flea is busy with PROBUS he is not at home organising me, so I enjoy it too!

Next, thank you to everyone who has commented on my possum pals and expressed concern for their welfare when we move. I will certainly take up the suggestions to leave the new owners a note asking them to start a blog with photos - and I'll let you know if they do (that is, if they let me know). I have started a folder for them with guarantees, instruction books etc and I'll add a possum page. So, Roxie, Carson, Kate, Willow, and Celia I hope that is reassuring.

Thank you, also, to everybody for the advice and words of reassurance about the move and the process of packing up. I appreciate it. Also to Roxie, Kate and Willow for the stash and UFO comments! There are certainly more UFOs yet to be confessed ....

The rare and unusual sighting of a FO brought a lot of very lovely comments and suggestions about a suitable closure. I think I'll have to finish a few more things! So thank you Janette, Roxie, Carson, Kate, Willow, Lynne and Sandra. The pattern was from Patons Book 1253, for size 2 - 10 years, "Zhivago for Kids". I knitted a size 10 as Ms 11 is quite skinny and my tension is a bit loose (the word "swatch" is in a language I don't understand!). The book looks like this (excuse the poor quality, blurry image!): Also a correction - I said in my last post (since corrected) that the yarn was a wool/tencel mix. It is in fact, 50% acrylic and 50% tencel.

Last, but not least, thank you to Roxie and Dodi Raz for your comments on my David Hicks rant. I feel very strongly about this issue.

Blogger won't let me preview this post, so I'm sending off as is - please overlook the typos etc.

Chapter 2: Confessions of a Serial UFOer

At last, a UFO which is nearing completion - as I knit the edging I keep breaking into that Johnny Cash song - And the Road Goes on Forever!. I still have about a quarter of the edging to do, but it's not the edging shown in the pattern photo - it's off another jacket in the same book.

This jacket is for Ms Just 11 - I know she'll love it (provided it fits) because when I asked her what colour she'd like, she said "Grandma Flea, it doesn't really matter because I love everything you choose for me ..." and my heart nearly broke with love for her. She is a special little Flea, our first grandchild, born the day after Grandpa Flea came out of an extended hospital stay for his bowel cancer operation. She was the "light at the end of the tunnel". I hope to have this one finished in the next few days so that I can post it to her.

Confessions of a serial UFOer

Yes - that's me. I didn't mean to do it ... and I'm really sorry .... but somehow it all got away from me .... but what's a girl to do? You know - you're happily knitting away and suddenly you're bored - that snazzy new ball of yarn winks at you - or maybe the subtle mixing of colours in the stash catches your eye - and before you know it, you're flirting with a new relationship - you vowed it would never happen - that you'd be faithful until the last seam was sewn - but now you're dancing with a new partner and your old love is lying discarded in the corner .... how did it happen?

I didn't mean to confess - but the enormity of my sins became apparent when I started to rationalise my knitting supplies in preparation for the move. Well, that's not quite true - it really started when I was rationalising the toys in the little Fleas' room - deciding how few dolls ' beds we could survive with - how many bedtime stories were past their use by date - how many toys, how many boxes of old calendars and Christmas cards, old wrapping paper, assorted pieces of ribbon, foil, pieces of cardboard, half used vials of glitter, toilet roll inserts, empty cardboard boxes (all for drawing and snipping, stamping and glueing) etc, I could palm off on my eldest daughter and the littlest Flea. And there, in the wardrobe, were two boxes of yarn I had totally forgotten about - odd balls of cotton that I had left in the house for TV knitting of washers and kitchen cloths. The rest of the stash had been secreted in boxes wrapped in garbage bags and hidden in a large cupboard under the house when we were pretending to live a life of elegance and ease while our house was being sold .....

So, leaving the little Fleas' room in total disarray, I decided to investigate the other places where I knew knitting things to be, with a view to finishing a few UFOs and tidying things up in readiness for packing into boxes for the move. Note that this is not stash we're talking about - that's another story - this is the accumulated baskets of projects etc that seem to multiply in corners at night. What a mistake. Mea culpa, mea culpa. How could one person have so many baskets? and how could so much stuff fit into so few baskets? And how could one person have started so many projects without finishing any? Of course, it isn't really my fault - no, I blame Grandpa Flea. If he hadn't had the temerity to RETIRE, I would still be happily knitting all day until about 5 o'clock, at which point I would run around and start the dinner and make like I'd been very busy all day - well, I had been, hadn't I? just not with housework ....

So, here it is - the results of my investigation - mind you, it may well take the next ten posts to document it all ... but it may spur me into action - well, they do say, while there's life there's hope .....

Some of these photos are not too good - but they tell the story ... first, the relatively empty looking basket in the study:
How did all these things come out of that basket?

My Montse Stanley book (I've been looking for that), numerous printouts of downloads from the internet of things I'll(never) make one day , a ball of mohair (I wonder what I'd been doing with that?), an odd coathanger waiting for a cover (part of my plan - the first part, actually - to cover all the wooden coathangers in the house ), an old Guild newsletter and ..... a bag of yarns I keep forgetting to give to a friend of mine so she can knit herself a shawl ... OKAY! I'll put it near the front door so I remember to give it to her - better still, I'll ring her and ask her over for lunch and so I can't forget, I'll ask her to remind me!

Now, while I was in the study I remembered that the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet had a few things in it .... including: a half-finished bag knitted in the back of the car in Western Australia about five years ago after I saw a sample in a shop in Albany - I lost interest when it didn't look like I thought it should ... OKAY - I"LL FINISH THIS .... the beginnings of a mitred hat. I think the pattern was in a Knitters' magazine - we know what's going to happen to this, don't we? a small jumper I was knitting for THE SHACK's street stall. A friend gave me a lot of yarn to use for charity knitting when she was moving - OKAY - I"LL FINISH THIS .... and some crocheted squares started to use up some left over yarn from a granny rug I made for the littlest Flea when she was tiny. This new rug was going to be a capsule cover but I forgot what size crochet hook I was using and the squares are two different sizes - and now I have NO idea what size hook to use - BUT I'll finish this by turning into a rug for one of the doll's beds I'm giving away ... and another half-finished capsule cover started out of sock yarn in the stash after I decided that I would never master the art of sock knitting... hmm - this will either be finished or become another doll's blankie ... and some little squares that I'd started to do for a back-pack ... looks like a Barbie sleeping bag coming up ... or a doll's cushion .. and a scarf being made to use up some donated yarn (for The Shack again) - not that I can imagine anyone buying it - that's the problem with a lot of donated yarn - it's useless/horrible/too little/etc. Maybe I'll finish this one, or donate it to the rubbish.

And that's only scratched the surface of that drawer - it's like the Magic Pudding - cut and come again. I know you can hardly contain your excitement, but you'll have to wait until another day for the rest of the filing cabinet drawer to reveal itself. Just in case you're in lorikeet withdrawal here's a more cheerful sight to finish with: and a Mother's Day gift from my eldest daughter - a vintage needle gauge -