Twinkle, twinkle little star...

December already and tomorrow it will be only three weeks until Christmas! Am I in the festive mood? No, even though there has been a little Christmas activity going on here. Knitted Christmas decorations, no less.

At the top are three little twinkling stars knitted from this pattern. They are rather cute, only aobut 5 cm from point to point, and take so little time to knit. There are only five rows, knitted flat with a tiny seam to sew up. In my stash inherited from my late mother-in-law there was some white acrylic with a lurex thread plied with it - Sirdar's Super Prelude which has been long discontinued I would imagine. No way would I want to wear this, it being rather scratchy and just not me, but it was just what I needed for these stars. Knitting up as a 4 ply I have made these three dainty little stars so far. More may follow. I may adjust the pattern slightly and make one or two larger stars as well. Perhaps.

Why am I knitting stars? Not for our Christmas tree, although they may make an appearance on there as well, but for a tree our Spinners and Weavers group are entering in a local competition. Not because we think ours will be the best but to lift our profile a little. Every bit of publicity counts. A lot of decorations were made for our Open Day in May but I have since found out that some of these have been given away (!!!) even though members should have known about this competition. So, in case we are short of decorations, I have been busy.

The other two photos are of a simple kumihimo braid also destined for this tree. All members at the last meeting were given 7 lengths of yarn to make these braids to add a bit of cohesiveness (and traditional Christmas colour) to the tree. Kumihimo, I have decided, is not my favourite occupation but this braid was simple enough and made up fairly quickly. At least it is now done and not waiting for me to make it at the last possible minute as I usually do!

Last weekend was the local A & P (Agricultural and Pastoral) Show. Again to keep up our profile, the Spinners and Weavers had a very small display in one of the tents (a rather out-of-the-way tent, unfortunately). Three of our members, including myself, sat with the table throughout the day. Not a totally wasted day as this is what I accomplished while I was there. The best part, though, was meeting Stella and her two children! This is the second time I have had the pleasure of physically meeting someone I have got to know online - both lovely ladies.

Through the week I also finished knitting the pieces for the Cabled Baby Jacket. Back, sleeves and fronts are finished with the front bands now needing to be picked up and knitted on before sewing up.

You may notice that I have chosen to use a tubular cast on for the bottom bands. I am hoping this will look neater, and be a softer edging, than my usual longtail cast on. I used a provisional cast on for the fronts as the front band is picked up along the curve at the bottom. Of course, I didn't realise this at the beginning (does anyone else not read the entire pattern before launching into the knitting?) so maybe I now need to research into the best cast off to match the tubular cast on.

There were other events which occupied me over the last week - a family dinner to celebrate several birthdays, the Rose Festival and D's birthday as well as the end-of-year lunch with our Spinners and Weavers group. Tonight is another dinner out - with friends, this time. Another birthday celebration. There seem to be an extraordinary number of family-and-friend birthdays during November/December as it is our Grandgirl, L's, birthday on Thursday as well. She will be a whole two this time! We'll celebrate this one with a bbq in Ashb on Saturday. It looks as if the busy times will still be here for a while!

Procrastinating!

Mmmhmm, me all over! Putting off what I should be doing, writing minutes, re-hashing a newsletter and finishing off a pamphlet - not to mention the ever-present housework and grocery shopping! But it is chilly today with numerous, short, sharp southerly showers coming through. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!

I thought and thought and thought some more about the Cabled Baby Jacket, or, more correctly, the colours I originally chose, and finally invited the Frog in for a little party over the weekend. I will use the bright pink and the blue-violet for something else (or, more accurately, some things else) in the future.

Instead, I bought some pastel pink Cleckheaton Cocoon and have knitted up one sleeve and have started on the next. It is rather unusual for me to be using the yarn the pattern calls for, but that is what was available in the LYS I was in when I made the decision. It is quite a nice colour, maybe a little paler than the photo shows with a decidedly blue lean to it. The yarn is lovely and soft but not my first choice as it is 30% acrylic. Call me a yarn snob but I really do prefer natural fibres. Most of the time. But, whatever. It is what was there so what I bought.

I have finished a couple of small things since I last posted. First up was the pair of Pocketbook Slippers mentioned last time. (A totally horrid photo but what can one do when no-one else is around to help one take a photo?) I guess these are ok for what they are but I don't think I would make the adult size again unless I really wasn't sure of the size of the foot. These really only just fit me so will be just the same on K. Maybe they'll shrink a little with further washing?

The other items I knit, started and finished, since the last post was a pair of Fetching fingerless mittens from Knitty. These were also for K's parcel but, and I hang my head in shame here, I totally forgot to take a photo of them! But they were black so probably would not have photographed well anyway. I made these from some black, probably wool, yarn from my stash. No label so I have no idea what it was. They knitted up well and, apart from a little gaping at the cast off around the top, turned out quite nicely. A pattern I would probably knit again one day.

Speaking of my stash, I wonder how many others have one like it? Much of my yarn stash is made up, not of useful amounts of any one yarn, but mainly of odd balls left over from long-finished projects. Most is not originally mine. Some comes from my late mother when she gave up knitting after her eyesight began to fail. Most of the stash, however, belonged to my late mother-in-law who used to make a lot of crocheted rugs for charity. She must have used a lot of mohair or brushed acrylic-type yarn as well as there seems to be a preponderence of this type of yarn. Not my favourite and mostly not colours I would choose. But most of it could be useful at some stage and my Scottish heritage won't allow me to throw much of it away. (I've tried giving some away but that hasn't been entirely successful, either!) Quite a problem as I have two 60 litre tubs of it! So, I was quite pleased to use up one small ball on these mittens.

Another reason for my procrastination today is that I am a little annoyed with how things have been turning out for me lately. I had recently made careful plans to rid myself of three responsibilties which weighed a little heavily on me at times - mostly because they often seemed to all come at once. But the old saying about the best-laid plans of mice and men came true once again. One of these responsibilities I have finally managed to offload - but only after three months of frustration. The second, I have had to shoulder for one more year. This isn't too bad in itself and there is light at the end of the tunnel for this one. The third, due to be offloaded last night, was also frustrated! The person I understood to take over from me had elected to take on someone else's position. Fortunately, another came in to help but, at the moment, is only taking on part of the responsibilities leaving me with, perhaps, the more fiddly part. Patience. I must practise patience. This, too, will pass as they say.

But we did have a celebration in our family last week - our youngest son turned 21! Happy birthday, M, for last Thursday! He doesn't normally look quite so much like a skinhead but had recently shaved his hair for "Movember" (a charity fund-raiser), or some such thing. He has done this a couple of times in the past for CanTeen week, too. Fortunately his hair doesn't take long to grow back!

So that is me caught up with for now. Time for me to get something productive done before the day gets any older!