Back again with Blankies

You would think the amount of time I spend on my laptop, I could actually post a little more frequently on my own blog.  It is exactly the same with Ravelry(a knitting and crochet social networking website) that I am a member of.  If only I employed as much zeal and time to my knitting and crochet wips as I do browsing the projects, forums, groups etc that are on this wonderful site than I would be inundated with finished articles and projects.  This said I have managed to finish one long ago started project - Autumn Log Cabin Throw  I started this well over a year ago and did a few squares, then it was put away until just after Christmas when I dug it out and really worked on it to finally finish it.  I was pleased how it turned out, particularly as the colours I chose bring the log cabin effect alive. 

“Some folklore meanings to the log cabin quilt relate to the center piece and how the quilt block is pieced together. The center piece was traditionally a red square and was believed to stand for the hearth of the house, as told by the quilters to others in the late 1800s. The strips of material surrounding the center square alternate light and dark sides representing the sunny side of a house and the side in the shade. Another meaning to the light and dark stripes is that the light side relates to happiness and the dark side to sorrow, of which life is filled.” 

I didn’t use red for the centre fire square but a coppery colour which I hope had the same effect.

Another blankie project I have finished was the 70’s Scooby Doo inspired Groovyghan by Tracy St John.  This project just flew along, whether it was the delightfully retro bright colours or the crazy patterning, I just couldn’t put it down.  It was a zany, riot of colour that really lifted my spirits in the dark depths of a dreary winter.  The photos don’t show the colours to their best advantage as the current winter days are too dull.  Once the weather improves I will take some more.

Before Chrimbo

Again, weeks have passed since my last post.  The couple of weeks leading up to Christmas were hectic, not through organising Christmas and buying lots of presents and unnecessary food, as we don’t really go in for all that commercialism, only buying gifts for Sam our son,  but with tying up loose ends at work (we close for 2 weeks over the festive period), so this meant working out wages for the next 3 weeks.  We had one visitor to the boatyard staying in our holiday bungalow, Brenda a regular visitor.  This was the first year we didn’t let any hire boats – just as well as with the severe weather we experienced before Christmas came with it freezing temperatures which froze up all the back waters and most of the navigable stretches too.  It is just not practical cruising in the winter, as no matter how well the boat is heated, you can’t get away from the fact that you are sitting in a plastic tray in VERY cold water!  For the last week at work all the water pipes froze solid, so all the water had to be turned off and the heating left on to further reduce anymore freezing.  Throughout our whole closed period we had to keep checking that everything was safe round the yard and that all the boats stayed afloat.  There is quite a lot of water stored on boats which have to be drained off and the boat especially the engine winterised, as once this water that lays around (in pipes, toilet bowls, in the engine itself) freezes, once it then starts thawing, it expands and can wreak havoc, splitting metal & plastic quite easily, which in some cases can cause the boat to sink.  Once we were back at work we heard of several examples just in our very local area about boats that had sunk and engines completely cracked open wide, solely due to the owner not having the foresight to winterise them – A very costly mistake.

Once I had tied up all the loose ends at the yard, I had booked off the week leading up to Christmas  as we had organised 7 days up to and including Christmas Eve as collections outside various retail premises.  The 18th & 19th December we were outside with Tillie & Raven but also in my care was Vikki, another greyhound we are looking for a home for.  She has been in foster care but the fosterer went away over the holidays and I have been looking after her.  By golly it was cold as we sat outside.  The dogs have a purpose built shelter which keeps the rain and wind of them and of course they had on jumpers and coats.  I was fairly cold but managed to wrap up well also apart from I couldn’t keep my feet warm at all.  In the end a Swedish friend offered me some leather fur lined boots which with a wool pair of socks made all the difference.  Next day was outside Tesco at Stalham another village about 6 miles away.  By far this was the coldest day for me and once I was home, after a meal I sat in our living room with the central heating on, the wood burner alight and huddled under a blanket and it took me until I went to bed that night for me to warm up properly.  Tuesday to Friday we collected outside Pets at Home only missing Thursday.  We did really well, not only collecting a substantial amount of money and selling plenty of snoods and knitted greyhound pups but also our main objective raising awareness of the plight of greyhounds - I was glad it finally came to an end on Christmas Eve and so were the dogs.

This was the Christmas card Nigel drew me.

Greyhound Snoods

Whenever we go away anywhere I always make sure I take plenty of knitting & crocheting to do.  In fact I probably take more of this stuff than clothes & food.  Recently whilst we were away in Derbyshire marooned in our snowbound cottage, I knitted my way through a good load of greyhound snoods.  As mentioned in a  previous blog entry awhile ago I use the wonderful pattern from Erssie called Dizzy Lily - A Snood for a Hound.  Erssie sells this pattern to support Essex Greyhound Rescue.  The link to the pattern can be found scrolling down on the right hand side of her homepage.  The pattern suggests knitting with dpns but as I absolutely loathe and can’t get on with these devilish instruments of torment I usually knit flat on two needles and once finished quickly sew the seam up. You find my current selection for sale HERE

As modelled by Raven (top) and Bluey the nearly real greyhhound

Greyhound Calendar

The 2011 Action for Greyhounds UK is now on sale for £7.95 plus postage and available from AFG’s website here – where you can pay by cheque or paypal.  My very own Raven is the star of May.  I think you will agree he looks every inch the star due to the talent of Greyhound Watch whose stunning photography is featured throughout the calendar.

A week in the Derbyshire Snow

Saturday 27th November saw us head north to stay at Aero Cottage near Baslow in Derbyshire.  This delightful, tastefully converted stone holiday cottage sleeps 4 and is equipped with everything to make your holiday perfect.  John & Claire the owners are always on hand for any queries or advice about the local area -they live behind the property.  We had stayed previously in Aero in September and thoroughly enjoyed our stay especially as they are one of the few holiday cottages that allow two pets.  The ground floor of the cottage has flag stones with under floor heating, so with dogs and boots traipsing in and out, there are no carpets to worry about. 

We left Norfolk with a slight dusting of snow on the ground and as we proceeded northwards up through Lincolnshire and into Nottinghamshire there was a little more snow about.  However we arrived safely at our destination stopping for a well earned late lunch at the nearby market town of Bakewell (famous for its puddings!).  We soon settled ourselves in for the evening.

Sunday and Monday were ok to get about in, we could drive out to the local villages and get a meal out in the evenings as long as we drove really carefully.  Both evenings we drove into Sheffield to pick up Sam to take him out for a meal.  Also Monday was Nigel’s birthday (46th!).

However from Tuesday onwards we experienced a lot of snow (about 2 foot in places) and freezing temperatures and after visiting Bakewell in the morning to pick a few supplies up we headed back to the cottage where we stayed put until we left on the Saturday morning.  Luckily on Thursday, Charlie the son of the owners of the cottage gave Nigel a lift into Chesterfield in his landrover which with difficulty managed to creep back up the hill to the cottage and his house.

We had a lovely relaxing time where I got loads of knitting and crocheting done but we would have like to have gone walking in the hills as we usually do.  Nigel had to dig us out of the cottage drive and on to the road.

Our journey home was initially slow as the first 15 miles took over an hour to drive but once past Mansfield we drove home as normal as there was considerably less snow the farthest east we went.  On arrival home there was hardly any snow around but evidence of some very hard frosts and to Nigel’s dismay our little river dyke that leads onto the main river was frozen and remains frozen to date, so he is unable to get his boat out from its shed.

Raven ready for a cold spell

I finished Raven’s new jumper yesterday, so he is already for his duties with us fundraising in the lead up to Christmas.  Probably not a good idea to let him loose on a walk in it though, as he has a tendency to sidle up to any hedge, bush or tree to ‘cock’ his leg, if you know what I mean and knowing Raven he would be likely to snag it and then run off with his new apparel unravelling behind him!

With the collar rolled down

Wearing his jumper ‘snood style’

Crazy for Crochet

I love knitting but in the last couple of years I have found attempting to knit for long periods of time hurts my thumbs not sure if it is RSI or arthritis, so I have been leaning towards doing more crochet plus the projects seem to proceed quicker.   I was taught to knit by my Mother but taught to crochet by my Grandmother. 

A recent finished crochet project was this crazy scrapghan blanket I made from all the odds and ends of chunky (bulky) yarn I had kicking about.  I made 4 different colour themed panels, crocheted them together and then did a quick border around the whole blanket.  I was pleased how it turned out and it was a relatively quick project completed on and off in 2- 3 weeks, unlike some other blankies I am in the middle of making – a hexagon, granny type blanket and a log cabin blanket I started over a year ago.

I am now in the process of crocheting Raven a snood combined jumper using two strands of double knit in orange and brown.  The orange was donated to me but I thought a bright orange jumper on its own would be too vivid so I toned it down with a dark brown.  I purchased the pattern from the Etsy store of the pattern  Crochet Pattern for Greyhound Sweater and Snood.  I have had to modify the pattern a little by cast off more around the chest area and continuing the collar to make it into an attached snood rather than a seperate snood.  I had it nearly finished before I realised it wasn’t a great fit around Raven’s chest and had to rip it back.  Once it is finished he should be real toasty in it especially as in December we have quite a few outside fund raising collections taking place.

Week 7

Well I have continued with the running programme Couch to 5K – where it is possible to be able to run 5k after 9 weeks of training.  The idea is to run three times a week, mainly doing intervals – walk for so long, run for so long, walk for so long.  Week 6 was really hard as Day 3 was brisk walk for 5 minutes and then continuously run for a WHOLE 25 minutes!!  The thought of that was very daunting, but not to be deterred I started it and guess what, I managed to do it all.  According to my treadmill my distance was about 2 miles.  Tuesday night I start Week 7 which is the same as Week 6 Day 3 but hopefully increasing the distance over the same amount of time, so I shall have to up the speed a tiny but.  At the moment I am running at 5mph.  I usually hate to exercise unless it is walking but this programme I am really enjoying and once I graduate I am going to actually run outside!  Maybe by that time I will be fitter and not look so red in the face as I do at the moment.  You can download all kinds of podcasts for the programme with mixes of music and cues to walk or run at the appropriate times. At the moment I am using Carli’s podcast from her website Running into shape – the music is a mix of r ‘n’ b and hip hop, but there are loads of different ones out there.  The running must be helping with my weight loss as in 6 weeks I have lost 10lbs – only another 32lbs to reach my goal of a 3 stone loss!!

This is Floyd one of the dogs our rescue group is trying to find a home for – I probably run with my tongue out too!