Progress despite the obstacles

Posted on October 26, 2012 by honey

This week will be a week of posts, as tomorrow I am off to my favourite LYS, Purlescence, to do a workshop on Continental Knitting and Norwegian purl! So I’ll write about that soon.

However, right now I want to update on a couple of other things. First, in this post I want to let you know what I’ve been upto. Plugging away slowly I have managed to finish a crochet shawl, and a knit shawl and start on another small project.

First up I finished my recuerdos de la niebla shawl. This seemed to take forever, as I am used to crocheting much faster than my hands currently let me. That and the never ending ball of yarn. Seriously, the pattern said use about 50% before starting the border. I used 75%. Then I did three rows of border. You are supposed to get 7 rows of border total, so I weighed how much I used in row 4 – 4grams – and I had 23 grams left. 20/4 is 5 rows plus a little bit left over. I got 11 rows. And another 2 rows of SC across the top edge before giving up with another 4grms of yarn left. Not entirely sure how that works, but that is why my beads aren’t on the last row of the edging, but 2 rows in. I think it worked out pretty well!

After that marathon, and my hands being a pain, I wanted a project that was quick, that was knit and that used up some of the yarn that I had been gifted in the last 12 months. After lots of fussing and indecision I went with the beautiful ‘the age of brass and steam kerchief’ (a free pattern on Ravelry), done in the gorgeous DK weight Debbie Bliss Andes. I had been gifted 2 skiens last year for my birthday in a lovely deep, dark red. The beaded sections were a bit of pain (literally) but easy enough – particularly if you decide to knit together and *then* bead the resulting stitch. My first beaded row I tried a pass2, pass 1 over, bead the stitch and then knit it. It worked, but not as well.

Once blocked the yarn bloomed slightly, softened even more and is just the right size to sit in the V of a coat and give lovely warmth. The yarn has lovely stitch definition as well, and it was such a joy to work with I picked up some more in chocolate at the Ally Pally show.

Delighted with having a ‘fast’ project (a little under two weeks all told) I wanted another one. I have some gorgeous yarn staring at me, and a hankering for some cabled fingerless mitts, but I’m not quite there yet, so instead I broke out another gift.

I was given some beautiful handspun last July, and have been dreaming of the perfect project. I wanted something that I could use both yarns together, and something that would show off the yarn. The grey is a thicker, bulky type weight and the cream a much finer closer to 4ply weight. A pair of 6mm needles, and a bit of ‘constructive swatching’ (known to others as ‘that’s not right, I’ll start again’) I’ve started a cowl.

I’m doubling the cream yarn to give a little weight so it’s similar to the grey, and I’ll go as long as I can before using a kitchner stitch bind off to have a seamless loop (hence the odd green bit at the bottom. It’s lovely and soft, and has a sort of ‘rustic’ look which goes lovely with my new full length wax jacket! If this goes well I think I might look at working some cabled mitts over a longer period of time!

Knit & Stitch Show – part II

Posted on October 15, 2012 by honey

With plan in hand, day 2 went smoother (though we didn’t get as far as room3 this time).

It was as busy as Friday at points, but we arrived early, when it was quiet, and stayed till it got quiet again. There were some interesting overheard conversations, my favourite of which concerned a beautiful natural pure British wool yarn, which was being fondled by a woman and her pal…

Woman1: this is a pretty colour, but it’s very rough
Woman2: (glances at label) yeah, it’s *British* wool, that’s why.

It really made me think about how spoilt we are now with such beautiful soft fibres like silk, mohair, alpaca etc… Though I hadn’t thought of British pure wools being any more or less ‘itchy’ than other pure wools.

So I bought some beautiful fyberspates lace to make the gorgeous Tirrold sweater, I also got 2 lovely tunisian hooks, some pure British wool (of the above conversation from Woolyknit.com), two hanks of Debbie Bliss Andes, the beads needed to finally start on the Queen on the Night, two gorgeous green&black superwash merino/buffalo blend and a drops pattern book (for £1!)

I also picked up several bits that have nothing to do with crafting – a gorgeous waterproof backpack from Bergs Designs (which will be perfect for walking to work over the winter months), a lovely teapot coaster that contains oat and spices that fill the room with amazing scents when the hot teapot is put on it, a fashion book, a couple of Christmas presents (shhh 😉 and lots and lots and lots of flyers and business cards. Oh, and a free mini tote from the Irish tourist board.

I could have easily spent twice as much as I did but I’m happy with what I got, and my only regret is that I’m not rich enough to sit at home all day and knit pure alpaca dresses or scrumptious aran weight tunic jumpers (I have to make that at some point though).

I now have lots (more) projects to add to my ever expanding list, but I can at least start on a couple of long standing ones – and I got lots of ideas for existing stash, which I am quite excited about.

More about that next week…

Breaking Radio Silence

Posted on October 13, 2012 by honey

I know, I’m sorry. I have left you all alone for far too long. How are you? Come in, pull up a chair and I’ll put the kettle on.

The status quo has been maintained on my hands, thank you for asking. Currently we are at the following: it isn’t Arthritis, it isn’t Carpel Tunnel, it isn’t any of the blood things they have tested for. It *might* be tenosynovosis in my wrists, but they are not sure, and that doesn’t tell me what is wrong with my fingers, and the next appointment is 15th November. In the meantime I am wearing splints every night – which is helping somewhat with the wrist pain. The lovely Dr who did my EMR tests for Carpel Tunnel suggested I see an osteopath as it might be something in my neck – which is interesting and I’m following that up separately.

I have a whole notebook page of blog posts to go on here, but my hands have been bad enough the last few weeks that either I haven’t been able to type, or I have been able to type or craft and I’ve picked the crafting for 15 minutes instead. We seem to be coming out of the worst of it now, so maybe I’ll get some of those other blog posts written up and on here!

So what has prompted this currently characteristic whittering? Yesterday I went to my first Knitting & Stitching show at the beautiful Alexandra Palace. I’ll be honest, I had no real desire to go – a mild curiosity maybe, but several friends had said in previous years it was heavy on the ‘Stitching’ in the title with lots of cross stitch and embroidery and precious little yarn. However, my mother-in-lieu (she’s not quite the Mother-in-Law yet) wanted to go, so I offered company.

It worked out to be almost as cheap to buy 4 tickets as 2, so I’m going again tomorrow with another friend, and frankly, I’m glad I’ve got a second day to go at – this show is HUGE. The smallest hall contains 42 exhibitors, a ‘try your hand’ area and a fashion catwalk. The ‘mid’ hall is about twice the size again, with exhibitors and stalls of display work – some of which I didn’t ‘get’, some of which is stunning and all of which shows more creativity and skill than I possess. The ‘main’ hall is about twice the size of the medium hall and given over almost exclusively to exhibitors – and there are several workshop rooms as well, and 3 separate galleries of displayed finished work.

We arrived at 10.45 (doors opened at 10) and stayed till 5pm (doors close at 5.30pm) with 20 minutes for lunch and didn’t see everything. It was a knackering day, but I’ll do my best to convey highlights and things I remember most. There may well be another post tomorrow (with photos – lots of things said ‘no photos’ but I think I’ve sussed the bits Ican photograph).

The Galleries. There were 3 separate presentations. The first, as you walked through the door, was a carnival tent with unfinished projects decorating the sides (donated by members of the public). Inside the tent were the stories of FO’s. Emotive and moving it was a little sad to see some things that were a few stitches short of completion that had obviously taken hours to get that far. But it was also gratifying to know I’m not alone, and to see just how many people must have started those hexagon fabric quilts in the the 80’s!

The second was a display of embroidery on the theme of ‘Gold in the Seam’ (I think) – again there were some amazing pieces with astonishing attention to detail, and some from very young crafts people (the youngest was 5!).

The third was a knitted village, again knitted and donated by people attending the show. There was several churches, a fire engine, house and crew, lots of houses, pubs and even a scout troupe. It was very witty and fun, and prizes had been awarded by Rowan Yarns for the top 3. (Though, amusingly, I did overhear one lady complain that Rowan had won everything, and they shouldn’t have been allowed to enter)

The Exhibitors. There was an amazing mix of exhibitors – and yarn crafts were well represented with everything from £1.25 a ball acrylic to £(deep breath) Quivat. The quivat lived up to it’s reputation for being insanely soft. I can’t even begin to describe how soft that stuff was, in an 8 year old ‘demonstration’ scarf that was foisted around my neck. I think it feels how I imagined clouds to feel when I was 4. However, at £110 (yes I typed that right) for just short of 400m (50g) it’s not happening in this life time. Lots of stalls had pure breed yarns and butter soft natural fibres (thicker yarns – DK, Aran and Bulky) seem to be coming back – and cowl necks are everywhere for this season. Black Sheep Yarns caused a melee by dumping 10 skien bags of all sorts on the floor of their unit – 10 hanks of Noro for about £65, and 10 hanks of Debbie Bliss Andes for £30 anyone? Fyberspates had beautiful yarns (as always) and though I can’t afford to buy the yarn for one of the jumpers (I worked it out as £130 for the yarn) I am buying the yarn for a different one tomorrow. The Mother-in-Lieu (MIL) may have cracked at this point and bought two skiens of laceweight to make the adorable Hethe cardigan from the first Scrumptious Collection. The Little Knitting Company had some fun snowmen kits that could be made into juggling balls – and almost every stall we passed had some form of advent calendar kit.

Quilting is not going away anytime soon, judging by the pure number of quilting stalls there were – beading, cross stitch and embroidery were also well represented. There were a couple of odd ball stands – rain coat anyone? and a couple I could have lived without (why do those market-like stalls selling cheap cotton scarves show up everywhere?) but the day was heavily biased towards craft and I’ve got plenty I want to go and check out tomorrow. This is turning into a really long post, so I’m going to stop and update after my second visit (including everything I buy)

update on the hands/wrists

Posted on August 10, 2012 by honey

After a very difficult weekend pain wise I packed myself off to the hospital on Tuesday for a set of ultrasound scans on my hands and wrists. Unfortunately I wasn’t as half as bad as I had been just 24 hours before, but these things happen. The scans were done with a little mobile type unit, and it was fascinating to ‘see’ inside my own body.

The Dr doing the scans was very helpful, and explained a lot of what was going on (particularly once we had established I’m relatively intelligent). While I don’t have copies of the files to show photos here, we managed to prove that

a) I don’t have any babies in my hands 😉 and
b) I *categorically* don’t have any type of arthritis.

Now, while *I* knew that, it’s nice to have medical conclusive proof of that.

It was once we moved onto my wrists that things got interesting – or “odd” in the words of the doctor. What she discovered was signs of blood underneath/behind the Extensor carpi ulnaris tendon. Don’t panic – blood at this point could just be a sign of inflammation in the syvonium (that is to say the ligaments that hold the tendons of my wrist in place). The extensor carpi ulnaris is responsible for moving the wrist to the side (towards the little finger) – the Dr says this could be a sign of Tenosynovitis. This would be the cause of the pain in both wrists and my thumbs – but doesn’t explain the different pain I’m getting in my fingers and palms.

However, due to the equipment being used she couldn’t be sure, so she has gone to my official consultant and is recommending I’m referred to the Radiology department for a ‘better’ scan (I don’t know if that is an Ultrasound or an MRI) – however she did say that with the better equipment if they see anything they can give me a corticosteroid injection on the spot to see if that targets the inflammation and helps with the pain management.

On which note I’ve stopped taking the drugs – I didn’t see much point loading my body with strong drugs with an impressive range of side effects if they weren’t doing anything. Today I’m having the best day I’ve had in a LONG time 😉

Thanks to everyone for all your messages of support on this, it means a lot even if I can’t always type to reply!

Olympic Efforts

Posted on August 1, 2012 by honey

While I got a few days of what currently constitutes ‘normal’ for my hands last week, this week they have been particularly difficult. I’ve got a date for my scans though – next Tuesday evening, so I’m hoping something comes from those.

The Olympics got off to a very British start, being very eccentric, but Danny Boyle gets points for:
a) getting the Queen involved (she’s a good sport isn’t she?) and
b) the pure *genius* that was the Olympic Flame Flower.

Ravelry is having it’s own simultaneous competition, in which individuals challenge themselves in a variety of fun events. For myself I leapt into the lead during the opening ceremony by entering the Frogging Trampoline and finally frogging my beaded cape which had been lying since March 2011 look at me accusingly. I loved the pattern, but I’ve finally had to conceed that the yarn I was using didn’t want to be that project. I’ve already got my medal for that!

I’m also trying to finish my ‘Jan Sweater’ (as part of the WiP Wrestling, or I could put it in for the Sweater Triathalon though the yarn itself is about a week too young to qualify for the Syncronised stash busting as I bought it at KnitNation last year).

A jumper for all seasons?

I’m thinking of renaming the project from ‘August Sweater’ to ‘Calendar sweater’ as I have now being working on it longer than a year! This is the sweater I’m doing in the Portuguese method of knitting (which is great for my hands) and I’m really enjoy it. I particuarly love the fact that every time I pick it up I am reminded of the meeting I gatecrashed to meet a fabulous group of people – including strikstrik who taught me the method, V (who has been mentioned previously) and *the* Stephen West!

I’m also trying to design, make, write up and publish a ‘shawl’ in the three weeks of the olympics. It’s going to be more of a ‘receipe’ than a ‘stitch by stitich’ pattern. The inspiration for this is the lack of relatively easy ‘confident beginner’ patterns that aren’t rafts of SC or DC. I wanted something that had a bit of interest (visually and mentally), that was unisex and could be easily modified without being too hung up on the ‘precision’. I’ll be entering this in the Shawl Sailing, Single Skien Sprint and possibly Balance Beads. I’m using a ball of Schoppel-Wolle Zauberball in fuchsienbeet that Needlemania (who I met for KnitNation 2011) sent me at Christmas. I’ve made a reasonable start…

sneak peak..

Gosh, I’ve just realised how involved KnitNation 2011 is in my choices – the yarn, the techniques, the people!

cracking on and getting things done

Posted on July 20, 2012 by honey

It takes a while but I do get there eventually! After a couple of weeks of not doing anything (particularly craft related) I got time to sit down and convert part 2 of the crochet chart reading tutorial into a webpage along with it’s PDF.

so you can find that at the top of the page…

I’ll do part 3 and 4 soon, I promise.

I also got chance to block my most recent shawl – it’s the Lisa’s Shawl pattern in a Three Irish Girls 4ply colourway called ‘Finlay’. The beading took forever, but I’m pleased with the results..

Lichen Dew

An Artists Hands..

Posted on July 14, 2012 by honey

Wednesday was my hospital appointment with a consultant about the mystery pain in my hands and wrists. After an entertaining morning in which I gained 4.5lbs on the hospital scales, and had to have my blood pressure (107/72 if you are interested) taken 4 times before the machine worked I was finally ushered into the consultant.

Once we had established that the pain had lasted longer than a month (what her note said) and that my doctor hadn’t sent through the blood test results or my x-rays she prodded me a bit, I said ‘ouch’ a bit, and gave her my ‘pain diary’ for the last 3 months.

Eventually she referred me for a scan at somepoint in the next 3-4 weeks, with a follow up appointment 7-8 weeks from now. With lots of bloods to be taken now.

She said she thought the wrist pain and the hand pain were unrelated and that it was possible the wrist pain is tendonosis (not tendinitis). She also told me that when she had tendonosis she had to wear wrist splints every day, all day, for two years. Oh yes, that’s exactly what I wanted to hear. I’m not inclined to agree with the two seperate things diagnosis, purely because it would be just too coincidental to have things go wrong in both wrists and both hands within days of each other.

It’s about this point that I dug my heels in about the drugs that I am currently on not working, and that that 8 weeks at least before getting drugs that do work was unacceptable. The consultant suggested I try diclophenic – which I pointed out I had already tried and couldn’t take because of the side effects. She then suggested I try paracetamol. Yes, you read that right. Paracetamol. I can’t get dressed in the mornings, can’t ride my bike, can’t brush my own hair and the NHS’s best suggestion is paracetamol. I may have pulled a good face at this point, because she then suggested that I take the paracetamol in conjunction with the current tablets (naproxen) as sometimes the two work together to be more effective, and then she wrote me a prescription for tremadol (morphine) to use if my hands are particularly bad. It’s only 14 days worth of morphine, and I have at least eight weeks to wait, but it’s a start.

Yesterday the trick of taking paracetamol and naproxen worked to take my hands to ‘almost normal’l – which was nice. Then I realised I’d be running out of naproxen in the next 7 days, so I tried to get a prescription from my GP. I have to have an appointment (it can’t just be a repeat) and the next appointment is, wait for it (cos I am), the 24th July.

So, long story short. We still don’t know. We have no idea and it will be at least 8 weeks before we get any further. Unless my blood tests show up something insane.

In Memorium

Posted on July 6, 2012 by honey

At this crossroads, we must part, for now you must travel a road that I cannot. I enjoyed your company and valued your wisdom for the part of the journey we did share. I learnt from your examples many life lessons and treasure your friendship. Even though I knew the fork in the road was coming, it is hard to say goodbye. It is said that all roads lead to the same destination, and I hope one day to catch up with you at journey’s end.

There is so much I could write here, and none of it would truly convey what it is I want to say. Instead I shall let a one of my favourite funeral readings stand in for me;

When we are weary and in need of strength,
When we are lost and sick at heart,
We remember him.
When we have a joy we crave to share,
When we have decisions that are difficult to make,
When we have achievements that are based on his
We remember him.
At the blowing of the wind and in the chill of winter,
At the opening of the buds and in the rebirth of spring,
We remember him.
At the blueness of the skies and in the warmth of summer,
At the rustling of the leaves and in the beauty of autumn,
We remember him.
At the rising of the sun and at its setting,
We remember him.
As long as we live, he too will live, For he is now a part of us,
As we remember him.

We Remember Him (from the Yizkor Service, adapted)

Meeting myself coming back

Posted on June 22, 2012 by honey

I’m so far behind with myself it’s not funny anymore, so heres a bit of a catch up post.

first up, after another visit to my GP to get stronger drugs, my consultant appointment was suddenly and unexpectedly moved up by a month – so I now only have to wait 3 weeks before the mystery pain in my hands and wrists starts a proper treatment (and maybe a name!) In the meantime however it was gradually getting worse and worse, resulting in about 15 minutes of crafting a week! The new drugs however are very impressive so maybe I’ll be getting some more crafting in the next few weeks.

Back in April I had some friends come stay with me, the lovely V and his partner G. I have long admired V’s beautiful knitting, his colourwork leaves me awestruck and his cabled sweaters bring me out in a sweat just thinking about the hours involved. Under the unwritten knitter’s code, V naturally turned up carrying yarn, and what yarn. Some of my readers will have heard about La droguerie in France – the luxury yarn store that sells off the cone and has it’s own ranges of alpaca. This yarn has definitely bumped up my next visit to France! So thanks to V and G’s generosity I now have yarn in my stash that I am overwhelmed with options – want a peek?

left to right: plumette, alpaga and holst garn.

Plumette, the softest lightest beautiful mohair. This colourway (gris tourterelle) is the softest grey around a core of palest lilac. I have plans for these nearly 500yards, once I get over my fear of them – possibly involving my estonian lace pattern book.

The Alpaga is a colourway called Avec lamen du Nord and is a 4ply alpaga in the most beautiful mix of soft browns and teals – I’m told an approximation of the translation of the colourway is ‘with the north sea’, and it captures perfectly the colours of the sea on an overcast stormy day. I love this so much that it’s going to take me a while to come up with the perfect pattern. This one might be crocheted.

finally is this gorgeous Holst garn, a 2 strand yarn, one strand bright navy blue and the other black resulting in a sort of tweed effect. This one is 100% wool and is very soft. I’m closest to working this one up – I’m designing as I type!

Aren’t I a lucky, lucky girl?

oh, and if you want to catch up with V’s yarn adventures you can here.

D.I.Y. Yarn Club

Posted on June 7, 2012 by honey

Back in November of 2011 I was starting to ponder Christmas presents for myself (my birthday is the 23rd and I invariably get lots of people asking me what I want) and I was looking at all the beautiful different yarn clubs available. Ones for sock yarns, ones for lace, ones for sock patterns, ones for shawls, ones with a theme, ones for a particular type of fibre, ones for indie dyers… it was all so overwhelming.

I also felt a bit like I was cheating on my existing stash – and I had a couple of unanswerable questions about the yarn clubs (what if I didn’t like the colour, or the pattern, or needed more, or if I fell behind?).

What I ended up deciding to do was my own ‘free’ yarn club. I would bundle up my existing yarn with the pattern I wanted to make from that yarn, with maybe a surprise and then a ‘sketchy’ note on the outside such as ‘quick’ or ‘laceweight’ or ‘rustic’. Then each time I finished a project I could ‘adjective’ dive and pick out a surprise lucky dip type package. Of course life isn’t quite that smooth, so I didn’t get chance to wrap up everything before December, but I did get to give a number of yarn/pattern pairings to a dear friend. I say a number because I genuinely can’t remember how many. His instructions were to add a *small* surprise if he wished (he is forever buying me little treats) and to hand them back at some point in 2012 to be decided by him.

We meet up for dinner every month(ish), and this month I got an extra bag! My beautiful forest green Wollmeise was returned to me, along with my signed copy of Franklin Habit’s Giovannina Stole (both of which I had completely forgotten I had handed over in the first place)

do-it-yourself stole kit

along with 2 bars of Lindt chocolate (nom) and a wonderful collection of 1940-1980s patterns (knit and crochet) which he had found in his mothers loft (who used to own a haberdashery).

anybody else feel old?

(sorry about the blurry quality – I will take some better ones I promise!). I’ve had a ball reading the Woman’s Weekly from Sept 1980, and some of the yarn pictures are genuinely terrifying – the Paton’s green boarded one you can see on the right has the entire family dressed in the exact same green cabled/lace jumper (though ‘his’ buttons the other way) – no wonder the dog needs two people to hold onto him!

The yarn is sitting staring at me, and I have managed to photocopy my own ‘abuse’ copy of the pattern. Now I just have to get up the courage to start!

Tuesday Fortnite

unraveling the yarn

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