The good and the bad

It is raining heavily in my part of West Yorkshire at the moment but I have a bit of summer in my living room. We have a beautiful peony plant in the garden, unfortunately the flowers are so heavy that they droop to the ground and get don't last very long. I know when they're drooping it upsets Mr.NM so this year I decided to enjoy some of them in our living room instead.

I left some outside of course and the bees seem to be enjoying them.

I finished my cowl. The way the weather is I feel like I could be wearing it now! I'm really happy with the way it came out and I just love this yarn, it's such a gorgeous colour and so soft and snuggly. I'm looking forward to knitting the matching fingerless mitts.

I think I should actually knit the patterns from magazines I buy more often!

I am going to show you something now and I suggest you get a cup of tea and sit down, it's quite shocking and rather upsetting. Are you ready? Well there was a little accident in the Monkey household...

Do you see what's wrong with that picture? Let's get a bit closer shall we?

One of my 5mm knitpro nova tips...bent...bah! I am not happy. I believe it was stepped on and whilst I know it shouldn't have been on the floor (and am not entirely certain how it came to be left on the floor) but I'm still upset. Fortunately I don't need a 5mm tip at the moment but I must remember to replace it before I come to do a project using a 5mm needle only to find I don't have one any more.

Still bent needles aside I've had a good weekend and am feeling quite accomplished to have another WIP turn into an FO...I'm ignoring the fact it was a new WIP and not one that has been sitting there for ages unknit. Ho hum.

I hope everyone has had a lovely weekend and has an excellent week.

Socks and the Lake District

I finished my stripey socks last week and I am thoroughly chuffed with them. I know some people obsess about stripes matching, I am not one of those people. When I finished the first sock the beginning of the next stripe repeat (which are very long in this Opal yarn) started at the toe. I refused to wind right through my ball of yarn to get to where it started again so just cast on the second sock and knit. They are a few rows out in matching but not enough that you can really tell and I love them anyway.

I do love this yarn. It's just so soft and doesn't feel at all overprocessed in spite of being mass produced self-striping. I very much envied the socks I had knit for Mr.NM in this yarn so am please to finally have got round to a pair for myself. I have another ball in my stash to do another pair for me (I can't see Mr.NM wanting a pair in the yarn as it's pink, lilac and green but you never know!) I also had quite a bit left over so may be able to get a little pair of trainer socks if I use a different yarn fo the toes.

My Ravelry project page for the socks with details of yarn is here if you're interested.

My new socks went on a little trip away at the weekend when we visited the Lake District. It was not really woolly sock weather as you will see from the pictures though they kept my feet comfortable for our long walk.

I got Mr.NM to take a photo from the car as we drove over the Hardknott Pass but I'm not sure it really reveals how difficult the driving was (the link explains if you're not familiar with the road). It was rather frightening in my little car which only has a 1.2l engine! Fortunately though we made it in one piece and I did have a great sense of achievement afterwards. I think you should get a badge really "I've survived the Hardknott Pass" or something.

The glorious (and very un-Lake District like) weather meant our planned walk for the Saturday went ahead. We took a lot of pictures so I'll share a few of the scenery.

The little white dots in this one are lots of sheep, oh my goodness did we see a lot of sheep! Not just in the fields but up in the fells where we ran into plenty of Herdwick sheep, I'm sure they were amused at how we struggled up the hills...if sheep are capable of being amused. I'd like to think they are.

A rare sight of a sheepless field!

We saw this rather handsome fellow in one of the fields, look at those horns! Fortunately we did not need to cross this field as I doubt he'd show the indifference that the ewes do.

Mr.NM fell behind as I stormed ahead with one of our friends...

Part of our walk took us through a forest of pine trees which smelled fabulous but were not so fun to have to push past when they were close together, they were rather prickly.

My new socks doing their duty! They got a touch muddy as whilst it was very sunny when we were there it had been raining heavily the week before and the ground was boggy in places. Fortunately the combination of good boots and wool socks meant my feet were dry and comfortable.

This was the view from the highest point of our walk (well there abouts) it was a bit hazy but breathtaking. I do love this part of the country.

The end of our walk involved walking back down the Hardknott Pass where I had driven the previous day. This was much harder on the feet (and the knees) than walking over the grass on the hills but after 10 miles of walking it was a relief to know that we were nearing the end of our walk.

We had a lovely time but on the way home I did not wish to drive through the passes again so took the longer (and much easier) route along the coast. We stopped briefly in Ravenglass for some toasties and a pot of tea feeling sore from the previous day's walk and rather glad to be going home as the rain was threatening. I made a mental note to visit in the future as it was quite pretty. We saw some Morris Dancers but I didn't take any pictures of them, they were wearing impressive costumes though.

I feel very fortunate to have managed a weekend in the Lakes without getting soaked (I've NEVER achieved a trip there without getting soaked to the skin at least once!) I'm just a little sad now that we don't have another camping trip planned until the end of July. Oh well, it's good to have things to look forward to.

I hope everyone has a lovely week and I'll be back soon with an update on the progress with my cowl.

Another new project you say?

I started another new project...yes I know I have oodles of WIPs but I DON'T CARE. Nope...not one bit. Knitting is not the boss of me and I shall knit whatever I like whenever I like so there.

It's OK to knit new things anyway, I'm "stash-busting" and that's a good thing. The current bit of stash I've decided to bust is the bit that expanded last October when I went to Loop in London. One of my purchases there was a divinely soft skein of Old Maiden Aunt Alpaca/Silk Sport in "Last Night's Red Dress" now I'm not sure what was done in this red dress as the yarn is quite definitely purple to me! Still it's beautiful and soft and I bought it entirely on a whim then had no idea what to do with it.

Well I found a pattern in my latest copy of Simply Knitting and decided that this yarn would be just lovely for it. The pattern, Aqua Ripples, is for a simple lace cowl and matching fingerless mitts. It's written to be knit in Natural Dye Studio Queenied Love which is double knitting weight and a bit heavier than the Old Maiden Aunt but I decided to give it a go anyway and see how it went. It seems to be going well so far but when I come to the mitts I'm going to use a smaller needle as I think 4mm is really a little big for the yarn I'm using and my hands and wrists are stupidly skinny compared to the rest of me anyway so a tighter fit on the mitts would be better.

Anyway I'm happy. I'm using up yarn and the magazine purchase was actually worth it as for once I'm knitting one of the printed patterns! Amazing.

Monkey gets her mojo back

I admitted recently having rather lost my knitting mojo. I was fed up with all my WIPs no matter how beautiful and the urge to knit just wasn't there, I couldn't explain it. Well it's back, that beginning of a sock seen in my post about camping has rather developed.

Last night I watched the Champions League Final. Mr.NM is a big football fan (as in Soccer for any US readers) he's not a fan of either team who played in the final but he likes to watch the bigger matches regardless of who is playing. He was rather pleased with the result, him coming from Liverpool and me from Leeds neither one of us is a fan of Manchester United! There were some cheers from us that Barcelona won.

I don't object to watching football but I knit through the match, I knit like the wind! I forgot just how quickly plain, stockinette socks grow, how much fun self striping yarn is and just how enjoyable it is to have a bit of completely mindless, no pattern to check, knitting on the go.

At kick off I had this:

At half-time I had this: (20 minutes of first half knitting time were lost to me making and eaching cheese on time!)

At full time I had this:

They seemed to just fly off the needles, brilliant! Just what I needed to get me going again. I didn't stop after the match. This morning I had this:

One finished sock! (also one very pasty leg...oh dear!) I immediately cast on the second and over the course of today am racing along and am on the gusset decreases. I may even have a new pair of woolly socks in time for our next camping trip, we're going to the Lake District at the weekend and I'm thoroughly excited.

The yarn is Opal Schafpate in the creatively named colourway 2712. It's lovely yarn, the colours are slightly heathered instead of being the harsh, bolder colours you get in some self-striping. It also feels very much like it has been a sheep instead of feeling over-processed and unnatural. It's just lovely and I'm very glad I have another ball of this yarn in a different colourway as I bought three when in Berlin a year ago. I've used it before on socks for Mr.NM and can confirm it's sturdy stuff and washes really well in the machine, he wears his a lot and they still look newly knit.

I'm excited to have my knitting mojo back and have lots of ideas whirling in my head for what projects I want to cast on...and I will finish my WIPs, honest!

A happy camper

I said I'd have something exciting to post about soon, well here it is. It's exciting to me at least, last weekend we went camping. I was terribly excited to be going on our first camping trip of the year, hardly sleeping excited. We were going somewhere I'd never really been before (I'd passed through but never actually spent time there) which made it doubly exciting. We went to Derbyshire.

Much to my mother's amusement (as I was a child who had to be forced out to play and spent even the hottest months in my thickest jumpers) I love getting outdoors. There's something about being out in the fresh air that's just wonderful. Unfortunately the UK weather has been very UK-ish of late and I'll admit it was rather soggy...and windy, oh my goodness it was windy!
This is the tidiest our little tent ever looks, all set up ready for me to move our "stuff" in:

Once we were set up we were ready to explore. On the walk out of the campsite we saw this little guy up a tree, no idea what he was doing up there but he did make me laugh and reminded me of my childhood when all my friends had these little monster toys:

I don't remember what they were called but I recall you could swap them between a cuddly, cute appearance and a monster, I wanted one very much but never had one...what a cruel woman my mother was ;-)

For some reason I didn't take photos of our nosey around Ashbourne on our first evening there but I did take pictures of our day out on the Saturday when we went to Buxton. Buxton is just lovely, if you get the chance to go then do so. The Pavillion Gardens were especially beautiful.

There were many ducks and other water dwelling birds which made Mr.NM very happy as he is very fond of ducks.

I did find Buxton's yarn shop, of course! I was very restrained though, I didn't buy anything. They had a nice selection of Sirdar, Sublime and Rowan as well as some Noro and some sock yarn.

Whilst I was very restrained in the yarn there was a shop I couldn't resist a purchase in. Possible the most exciting bookshop I've ever been in. It was spread over 5 floors and sold books on every subject imaginable including some of the oldest books I've seen (and touched) outside of museums and libraries. There was little order to the books which made it all the more exciting, hunting for hidden treasures in the shelves.

There was even an organ to have a play of the sheet music before purchasing

Possibly the best bit was the little kitchen to make your own cup of tea or coffee to drink as you browsed

I did buy a book, a little book of narrative poems from the 1930s, for some reason (I'm a dimwit) I didn't take a photograph but it's very special and I'm happy with my little purchase.

After a lovely day in Buxton (and some delicious fish and chips) we had to head back to the campsite and settle down for a relaxing evening. We set up our chairs, got out some beer, lit the BBQ and relaxed for the evening.

I'm not going to lie, it was cold but it was OK. I had two very important things to keep me warm. The glowing remnants of the BBQ

And the most important keeper-warmer...WOOL!

Still here

I was going to go with "I'm doing science and I'm still alive" but:

a. I've used that post title before
b. It might make people think I'm playing Portal 2 which I'm not because Mr.NM hasn't bought it for himself yet and he's the gamer, I'm just a keen observer

I am still here though, still alive, still reading everyone elses' blogs. Unfortunately fairies appear to have visited in the night and replaced my brain with cotton wool. Knittnig beyond the purple thing I showed last time has ground to a halt and I've not even been doing other interesting things or taking photographs to share with you. I apologise for being a rubbish blogger.

I promise to get back on track very soon. I cast on a new project last night (no I haven't finished any of my other WIPs, shush!) and I have some exciting things coming up that I will be able to share with you and that I hope will feel blog-worthy as nothing else I've been doing of late hast been.

I will be back, I promise.

Also yes it was my birthday last time I posted and I didn't get a single knitting thing, not one, not even a book about knitting or anything! I didn't even buy any knitting stuff with the money I got and have been successfully sticking to the yarn diet since March. Wow.

Welcoming the merry month of May

As a UK person working in a standard office job I must say I'm rather getting on board with this 3/4 day weeks business and will be most disappointed next week when I'm in all 5 days! Unfortunately it's also throwing me completely off balance and I'm rather losing track of what day it actually is. I knew what day it was today though as I woke up to a little pile of cards waiting to be opened.

I had a lovely weekend. We did not watch the Royal Wedding, I'm not particularly interested in the Royals or in weddings I'm not invited to/where I don't know the people getting married so I was never going to get into the wedding fever that seemed to hit so many people. I'm not complaining about the wedding though, I would never complain about an extra bank holiday!

Instead I caught up with a lot of housework and did some serious spring cleaning then went to a 60th birthday party on Sunday. It was a good weekend really and the good weather meant I could dry all my washing outdoors, I do love that line dried smell.

Yesterday was a day of baking, I spent almost all day in the kitchen making buns to bring to work today.

Chocolatey buns

The chocolatey buns were topped with chocolate ganache made from dark chocolate (85% cocoa solids...yummy) and double cream, not good for the waistline but very tasty!

Vanilla buns with buttercream (which is supposed to be lilac but looks a bit grey in the photos) and hundreds and thousands.

And "Passion cake" buns which are banana, carrot, sultana and coconut, they're supposed to have nuts in but one of my colleagues is allergic so I left the nuts out.

These buns are topped with cream cheese frosting...mmmmm

Naughty but totally worth it! Also banana, carrot and sultanas...got to be one of your five a day right?!

Worry bot though, I managed to fit in some knitting time and am making good progress on my new project, a lovely cotton and silk blend for spring/summer knitting.

Summer is definitely on the way, I was awoken this morning by the sun blazing through our window, I panicked that the alarm hadn't gone off or I'd slept through it only to look and find it was actually 5am. I think we need darker curtains!