Progress

I thought i need to write down what i have left to knit.
So in the next 10 days:
1. Finish Linda's scarf (15% left)
2. Finish Stuart's scarf (half left)
3. Finish Delia's top (30% left)
4. Weave in the ends and saw Colin's Christmas Cobblestone
5. Start Tom's scarf.

Before New Year:
1. Grandma Unity's red scarf
2. Jane's throw.
3. something for Mother (no idea what yet but has to be quick)
4. Beret for Daniella

In the nearest future:
1."little sister dress" for Unity
2.wool vest for Leo
3. Cabled hoodie for Colin's birthday
4. Josh's socks
5. Mo's doggy jumper

Only after i have done all those things i can think about knitting something for myself.
Do you know of any knitting deity i should pray to? Let me know if you do.


Only

Leona Lewis

Cheese, i know. But how do you explain goosebumps on my skin and knot in my throat? Beautiful voice. Beautiful instrument. That girl is blessed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovGFPKZ3lgM

Yarn disaster

So i was happily knitting along on Linda's scarf when it suddenly dawned on me that i dont have enough of yarn to finish it. You see i wasnt happy with the original pattern, because i thought it was too narrow. So i have doubled up the stitches. Disregarding the fact that if i do that, I'd need double the amount of yarn. It didnt help ether that this particular yarn is discontinued and i had to order it online and hope that it will arrive before next week. Fool you say? Too right I say. But now i have started on the blue scarf and hoping it is gonna take me very little time to knit it.

Nakered

I am absolutely, completely, totally shattered. I got barely any sleep this weekend because Unity had a cold and teething, but last night was the worst ever. She winged and cried and moaned and screamed out. I did absolutely everything i could to comfort her, but she gets very frustrated and almost lashes out when you try to pick her up or cuddle her. She also hates to sleep in our bed so me and poor Colin had to take turns to get up and comfort her. And just when she finally fell quite, Leo woke up about 4am and decided that he wanted to sleep in our bed, so we were all squashed and hot together.
On the positive side we had a great laugh on Saturday because we made our festive gingerbread and decorated the tree.

The brown-haired boy is Alex our neighbour and Leo's best friend. They constantly bicker but miss each other profoundly if dont see each other on the weekend. Here we are cutting the cookies.



Unity getting a bit overwhelmed and dramatic. " Oh, creative decisions." May be she will grow up to be an art director.
And here is decorating. I got different food colorings and mixed up very bright liquid icing.
There also were silver balls, hundreds and thousands, raisins, yoghurted fruit bits and lots more of things to put on top. So it all end up looking like Jackson Pollock


I didnt take the picture of the Christmas tree yet, but i will. by the way, if you want a recepie of great gingerbread, here is one:

12oz Plain Flour
1 teaspoon Bicarbonate of Soda
2.5 teaspoons of ground Ginger
1 teaspoon of mixed spice
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
4oz unsalted butter
6oz Light brown soft sugar
1 egg - beaten
4 tablespoons Golden Syrup
pre-heat the oven to 190 degrees C

sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and ground ginger and spices together in a mixing bowl

chop the butter into small pieces, and rub into dry mixture until the consistency of fine breadcrumbs, then add the sugar and mix together

mix the beaten egg and golden syrup together, and add to the mixture, mixing together to form a dough

Now the fun begins!
Roll out on a floured surface to about 3mm thick, then cut out what ever shapes you want. Put onto a lightly greased or lined baking sheet, decorate and cook for approximately 10 to 15 minutes depending on size of biscuit. I tend to check the colour and spread of the biscuit.

When they are cooked, leave on the baking sheet for a few minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack, and leave to cool completely.

The trick is to try and roll the dough quite thin because it actually rises quite a lot.
Have fun! (thats in case someone does actually reads my blog because the numbers seem to go up, however i dont get many comments)

Boob Job

I have just created a boob out of girl's knee. To explain: Im doing an advertising campain for a well known underwear brand. Now, if you are a logical person, you'd think: I have to advertise these large bras, so i should get a model that has enough boob to actually fill the cups. Well in art director's world it doesnt work like that. They got this very pretty and rather skinny girl to model the enormous bras and the poor girl hasn't got any boobs to speak of. So now for the third day in a row i'm creating boobs to fill the cup. On this one i just made a top of the breast out of the girls bent knee. Trust me, you'd never ever be able to tell. Only I and the client will ever know. Well and the girl of course.

So close

And yet so far! Im knitting and kitting and still only just past the second decrease on the yoke of the Christmas Cobblestone. im starting to get seriously twitchy about the whole thing, i still got million things to knit before Christmas and very little time to do it. May be i should just give up and put the needles aside and just admit that im no good..... (sobbing with self pity).
Now, i have to remember that Im tough and strong granddaughter of a hardcore woman , who came from the communal farm and end up a head engineer in one of the top factories of USSR and never never gave up (or remarried after becoming a widow at 32). There is will and determination worth mentioning, not my wining over slow knitting. I am ashamed. What would grandma say.
I dont know if i should put the Cobblestone aside though and start on those scarves. May be I'll give it till Thursday.

Proof

Just in case if you started thinking that im a big fat liar and not a knitter at all, here is some proof that i was in fact working very hard (and rather slow) on Christmas Cobblestone.
It is so tantalizingly close to finishing it! I recon (perhaps foolishly) that i will finish it this week. It is quite tough on the wrists to knit with bamboo tape, it has zero bounce so you have to keep constant tension.
Another thing i made is some Very Sticky And Spicy Gingerbread with fruits and nuts.


This picture really doesn't do it justice. It was delicious.

It is Thanksgiving today in USA and I wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends and also mention few things Im thankful for:

my children
my husband
my house
my patience
my sanity
our health
that there is still compassion left in the world
that i still got a job
for yummy yarn
that despite of being very slow i still manage to finish things

I think thats about it. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Struggle

The heating briefly went on in the morning and then stopped once again. Its freezing. My everything cold despite me wearing thermal underwear (yes, it does go below my knees) and about 15 layers. You might say im not a real Russian, i hate being cold.
I started knitting some mittens for baby Unity yesterday. I was so ambitious and arrogant thinking i could do it in an evening. I couldnt. Not only that, but i couldnt even work the pattern out. Now i decided that it was all pattern's fault and who has heard of knitting mittens on two needles anyway? So today im going to try gain, with a different pattern, this one.
To add insult to the injury Colin went out and bought some mittens today. He said he understands everything but it is far too cold for Unity to wait whilst I work out patterns. He is right. But i will try again and see if it works. Never give up, thats what my grandma says.

Freeeezzzzing

The boiler broke in the office. Its 42 F outside and Arctic wind. It is about 60F in the office and we are sitting down all day so its cold cold cold. I had to wear my mittens all the day because my fingers got so cold they were unable to hold my tablet pen. Speaking of mittens, i have to knit some for Unity tonight and finish them because poor baby is mittenless.

Update

I will not bore anyone with my lame knitting progress (half way up second sleeve if you really wanna know) But here is a couple of pictures from my birthday.

Tate:
Got to love the giant cat skeleton.


And then my camera had totally freaked out and did this:


It is quite beautiful i think and the funny thing is that it would be quite hard to fake that.
And then there is the picture of the food from the party. I dont know if it looks nice, but it tasted great! And even after i gave all my guests doggy bags to take home, there was still enough for lunch next day.Mmmm massaman prawn curry. And there you can just see the side of the pot with spicy rice.

Dance moves

Check out these dance moves! The first guy is not too good but the last one rules!
It hard to believe a human can do that..
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=EcUF3vGgwNc

Birthday grump.

It was my birthday on Sat. Im 31 now, going on 78. My mother took the children (which admittedly was nice of her) for a weekend so me and Colin got to spend some time together. Well Sat anyway. We were planing to go to Kew Gardens but it was raining and without driving it would have taken us 2 hours to get there. So we went to Tate Modern instead. I didnt bring my camera with me today, so i'll post some pictures later. It was nice and i got a great book for Leo from their shop. After that we indulged in a long peaceful walk along the southbank of the Thames, past the National Festival Hall and the Wheel down to Waterloo. There i remembered that i saw on Ravelry a knitting shop iKnit just around the corner from there, so we went to check it out. It was a lot smaller than i thought, they evidently used wide angle lens to take photos of it for their website. I asked the owner about their weekly meetings and he told me that yes, they have weekly meetings and 20-50 people turn up. Well first, i cannot possibly imagine 50 people fitting into that shop without it being some kind of train in a rush hour experience, second there is a bar there! You see i dont drink, i have intolerance to alcohol so the idea of being stuck standing up with a lot of drunk women in a very small space does not rock my boat. Not one bit. And the owner told me (proudly) that yes, on meeting days there tend to be more drinking and chatting than knitting. Hmmm.

Anyway, they had a sale on so i got myself some Noro Cash Iroha 2 balls in purple and Regia Sock yarn in beautiful varigated whites with pastel rainbow colors. Love love love varigated yarn.

So after that we had lunch in a small Japanese place in Soho and then got some DVDs and went home, to curl up in front of Sin City. I liked it. Violent yes, but beautiful too.
On Sunday it was party time. I started cooking at 10am, people were coming at 3pm. Now i would much rather not to have a party, but you know Russians, they like to celebrate every possible occasion so i sort of had to for my family.

I made a massaman prawn curry, fragrant rice, yellow mung dal, lime and ginger chicken hot pot with sweet potatoes and grated beetroot with garlic and herbs. For dessert i made a poppy seed and tahini roll and carrot cake. I really did cook a lot of food.

My mother arrived in a terrible mood. Absolutely rotten. And from then on it all just went down the hill, with her criticizing everything about me, my house, my way of life, the way i look and the way i bring my children up. With a full blast of " your children will grow dumb because you dont spend time with them and you will burn in hell because you have a Buddha statue in your bedroom". And so on and so forth for 4 hours non stop. Now i know my mother and i know how difficult she is at times, but it was my birthday party and i did make a huge effort cooking. So i could do with a well done or thank you or any of those things. And so eventually my patience run out and i told her (very calmly, honest) that if she hated everything about me and my life so much, then she should leave. To which of course she grabbed her coat and my 15 year old sister and stormed out. Well she tried to storm out but it didnt quite work because she forgot first her bag then her umbrellar and had o send my little sister to fetch it.
So there, im still a bit uneasy about the whole thing and i know she is my mum and all, but iam not apologizing, and im not even feeling guilty. There has to be a limit to how much abuse i can take at one time. And that was it.

Hell

I think if hell exist then my personal hell would be that job i have just finished. i had to change all the colors to the one two tones colder. like red to yellow, orange to
green, yellow to blue on the pictures of dancing people, that includes their skin. Now
go figure that one. My eyes hurt!

Super Leo

In Leo's nursery teachers have asked parents to create a front page for child's achievement book. It had to represent something that the child likes. So today, when there was a break between jobs coming in, me and my darling husband came up with this masterpiece:


I admit it is slightly over the top, but hey, it made everyone laugh and Leo will surely love it. So it must be good!

Obsessive behavior

This is where my true craziness comes out: obsessing over things. I have been looking for a book that i dont remember the name or the writer of, but remember the plot. It was given to me by a good friend of my ex husband about 9 years ago, and after reading it i have lent it to my sister's ex boyfriend never to see it again. I have completely forgot about it until something in my head (probably some chemical instability) made me
remember it and so i have been feeling in desperate need to read it again for past .. five weeks! It is terrible. Im trying to go on about my daily life as usual, but there is that constant nagging thought in my mind about the book, and what i can possibly do to find it. I have spoken to my sister in hope she could remember the name of the guy (of course she laughed) then i spoke with my mother wondering if she remembered the name of the guy (she told me to stop waisting her time). Then i have registered with 4 sci fi forums, describing the plot to see if anyone recognizes it (the book is sci fi) still no result. I am even considering contacting my ex to try to get the contact of his fried that gave me the book in the firs place. And i know that is a bad idea. But im so desperate it hurts. Now does that sound just a bit crazy? So, if anyone does read my blog, please, please i beg you, do you have any ideas how would i find a book by just its plot?

He won

He came, he saw, he won. Im happy. And hopeful that the change will come. And that he won't be shot by some crazed skinhead. And i hope for the end of this war. He has a lot to show for himself, and i hope he does.

Catch up

I know, i haven't been very good lately in blogging, we were extremely busy last week, not so much this week, but the time just seem to fly past me...
So we were doing H&M advertising for spring/summer09 last week, well still bits and bobs this week, and some Children in Need Pr stuff, so we are pretty busy with all that. So much so im writing this instead of working. And i have been knitting, im half way up one of the sleeves on the Christmas Cobblestone. And of course it is election day today, and even though we cant vote, we can pray that Obama wins. I guess we will find out soon enough.
And on Sunday we went to the Natural History Museum to see dinosaurs. It took us 3.5 hours to get there across London, because London transport doesnt actually work on Sunday. But oh well, children loved it so i guess it was worth it in the end. Some pictures:

On being a foreigner.

Yesterday night was the first time my English-speaking baby has realized that i have an accent when i speak English. We were talking about Scooby Doo and i was saying something about his friend Wendy when Leo said:
-Mommy, its Wendy, not Vendy.
-Thats what i said, Leo, Wendy.
(Looking at me with amusement) No Mommy, its Wendy!
-Yes, Wendy.
(Starting to laugh) It Wendy Mommy!
-Thats what im saying! Wendy!
(Leo, bursting out laughing) Wendy Wendy Wendy!!!
(me,irritatedly) Wendy Wendy Wendy!
Leo laughs so had he falls off the sofa and i stomp into the kitchen. Its tough being a foreigner! Even your own 4 year old laughs at your accent.

What Color Is Your Aura? Your Result: Violet   You are the most sensitive and wisest of the colors, artistic, magical, and spiritual. You believe in the goodness of the world. Violets have great imagination and often become the artists, designers, architects, and writers of the world.
Green
Yellow
Blue
Orange
Red
Brown
Pink
What Color Is Your Aura? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Hey, i worked out how to use html thingamagig. I must be smart! ;0)

Tired Monday

After a very weary Saturday and exhausted Sunday we have come to a tired Monday. It seems to me that i havn't slept properly for years now, even though it only has been last couple of weeks that Unity's teeth have decided to come out all at the same time. So she is in pain (poor baby) and we have no sleep. And im not going to pretend that i dont want to throw her out of the window at 4.30 in the morning when i get up for the 50th time, but instead i give her a hug and some chamomile water and lay down for another 25mins....
So things are slow at work again and there are bits and bobs that are supposed to be coming in, so we are waiting, zombified.
And i have been getting on with my Christmas Cobblestone thing, it looks great so far and i have progressed to a point that im starting to worry about the sleeves. I shall post some pictures soon.
Oh, i saw this animation on Youtube, ts quite funny, check it out "Learning to knit"

A week later

It was incredibly busy at work this week. I always feel like im back from war after a week of 13-14 hour days and cycling back in the dark. And we worked Sat as well. We were supposed to work on Sunday but it was canceled. Children were at my mothers and we didnt tell her about Sunday being off so we got a nice long lie in in the morning and i had most of my chores done before she brought them back. So anyway, it was a great job, i enjoyed working on it and i didnt get angry with the photographer, not even once. I had a certain freedom from him as well, he trusted me to do what i think needs to be done as long as it achieved what he wanted it to look like. Its much better way of working, rather than having someone constantly poking in your screen and telling you how to do your job. You tell me what you want, and i'll decide HOW to do it.
Surprisingly enough i managed to do a bit of auto-pilot (whilst zoning out in front of TV) knitting on Christmas Cobblestone, its about 30% done. I think it has a lot to do with me looving to knit with Bamboo tape, its so soft and yummy.
I also did some yarn hand-painting on Sunday with some food dyes. I have fixed it afterwards by steaming it for 20 mins and letting it cool in the steamer before washing it. My inspiration was autumn
Its incredible how bright it turned out, im very happy with that. Its a shame this wool is so scratchy, i need to get some nice merino to experiment with.

Another Friday

Im tired today, tired and sort of .. melancholic. Unity was up pretty much throughout the night and was very grumpy in the morning... It was sad i didnt get to say goodbye to her properly because my mother is picking them both tonight and keeping them for a weekend, because we have to work Sat and probably Sunday. It is gonna be Unity's first weekend way and im worried sick how she will react to the whole thing.. I have packed enough clothes to last them at least a week without changing and tried to foresee every eventuality, getting all sorts of food and drinks and snacks and Calpol and dummies and blankies , you get the idea. Its weird, because im usually quite calm about my children, like i dont drop everything and run everytime there is some scuffle or fall, unless it sound really serious. And here i am, literally making myself ill because my baby is going to her grandma's for 2 nights. Like my mother said, its gonna be how its gonna be. And breathe...
So we were supposed to get these "extremely important deadline Tuesday morning" images and guess what, we are still sitting twiddling our thumbs ( well im writing this blog of course) and nothing is happening because photographers are probably most unreliable people on the planet (oh, and art directors, they may be worse, its a close one) so we are not getting any images until tomorrow morning. And that means we will have to work Sunday, and so no ironing done, or cooking or any proper knitting time for that matter... Why do i do this job anyway, someone remind me...
I managed to get Nicola, my colleague, interested in yarn dyeing and she loves the idea. Being wonderful as she is she go me and herself a book on natural dye plants, called A Dyers Garden by Rita Buchanan. Nicola is a keen gardener and i like the idea of gardening, never having time to do any. But next year i will (i will i will i will ) have a vegetable garden and at least a couple of dye plants. Now its just how to convince Colin to allocate some space for me in our 150' garden... Last time i spoke with him about it he frowned and said i could have the 5' patch between garage and shed. To which i meaningfully and articulately told him that i'm planning to plant p-o-t-a-t-o-e-s and need s-p-a-c-e. He frowned some more and said he'll think about it. So i guess i just have to remind him every week or so before the planting time comes. And im so looking forward to my yarn spinning class, its gonna be my birthday present for myself. Month later than the birthday, but hey, better late than never.

Wool dyeing

Well i was ill all weekend with tonsillitis, my tonsils got so swollen that i had to go to the doctors on Sat and get some antibiotics so i dont die in my sleep like Colin said i would. Anyway, i didnt die in my sleep and, feeling much perkier on Sunday i have dyed one skein of smelly yarn. (It is still smelly and noone seems to know what to do about it ) The result looks like that
(I have actually knitted that little bit on two pens at work just to see how it looks knitted.) I think the dyeing was a success, now its just what to do with the smell...
And here is a picture of Unity's socks
And i have made those sock blockers all by myself!! I have cut them out from the kind of plastic they use in envelopes to make them stiff and put cellotape all around the edges so it would not catch. And voila, i have 3 sets of sock blockers without spending £60. I know, im great.

Friday

Well its Friday and i wanted to write about my current state of knitting. I have started on a dreaded Cobblestone monster pullover. It is not actually as hard as i thought it was gonna be (it's all in your head, its all in your head) but the progress is still very slow. I'll be lucky if i finish it in a month. Also yesterday i have unwinded that huge hunk of yarn my grandma sent me, and made 5 small skeins out of it, approx 120g each. I soaked them in a bath with wool soap and water overnight, and even though it does look a bit fresher, it still really smells of animal. I dont quite know what to do about that, i hope after i have soaked it in vinegar and dyed it the smell will go... Or may be it will smell of animal and vinegar.. Colin said to just stick it in washing machine, not sure about that one ether.

I have finished Unity's socks and very happy with the result. I'm also 60% done on Mother in Law Christmas Drops vest, and finally received the yarn i have bought on ebay for Josh's socks. Its Rowan Botany wool, sort of caramel color, 350g of it, so it will be plenty. I did actually take a lot of pictures in the morning, but in a blur of leaving the house (i didnt cycle because i feel mweh today) i forgot my camera at home.

Oh, there is one massive thing: I got mentioned on Rose Kim Knits blog, which i feel truly honored about. She is great.
Apart from that, the weekend is upon us and im just happy that we have no visitors planned this weekend, so may be i can take things slowly. Or slower than usual.

I have survived.

Here i am, in case you are wondering, i have survived the Batbirthday. On Saturday we went to the shopping center, and whilst Mommy was shopping, Leo had his face painted.



He supposed to be a Batman of course. Later when we tried to wash the paint off in the bath, he looked like this:
And then after 20 mins of active scrubbing he looked like this:
Even after i have used half a bottle of my make up remover wash, he still looked like he had eyeliner on. After getting out of bath he looked in the mirror and declared, visibly upset: "Now i dont look like Batman, now i look like a girl!" sending poor Colin into absolute hysterics laughing.
So apart from that i have made 2 cakes, a Batman cake and a carrot cake. The name of the first one does not imply that it was made out of Batman, it was all in design.



It looks really wonky on the picture but i was quite proud of myself, it took me a while to do the symbol.
I think the birthday itself went well. We were blessed with great weather, everybody turned up, there was (more) than enough food (i always seem to panic about that and make too much), kids had pass the parcel, music, pizza, cake and fruit kebabs, adults had chicken, sausages, salads, pickles (all sorts of different pickles) and lots of other stuff. I always tell people in advance that since we dont drink, we dont buy alcohol, so they come with their own if they wish to do so, otherwise we had lots of lovely juice and tea. Anyway, here are some more pictures:







So yeah, i think it was a success. It was my first kids party and i think i did pretty good.. Im just so happy that now all members of my family had their birthdays, now its just mine (which we never celebrate) and the Christmas.
Speaking of Christmas, i really need to start on Colin's bamboo pullover, but i am dreading it... Im finding any old excuse not to do it, knitting sock for Unity, then doing a bit on Mother in Law Drops Vest, planning to make socks for everyone for Christmas, just not touching the pullover. It would be my biggest project yet, and im scared......

Goodbyes

Just a quick one, to say my goodbyes just in case i dont survive Leo's birthday on Sunday. At the moment, there are 5 children including mine and 14 adults. Yup, you hear that right, 14 adults. That includes my entire family, and some parents of the kids. Poor them, they probably have never met so many Russians in their lives. So although i initially thought about just making some pizzas, now it looks like a full-blown barbq, so lets pray that weather stays. Lets not forget we are in England and weather here is unpredictable at best of times....
Oh well, all that said, i refuse to get stressed about it, so im cool as a cucumber and we are making a trip to cash and carry. I dont actually know what i will make, so im hoping inspiration will strike me there. Im just set on Batman cake and cookies, but now it looks like i will have to make some pecan roll as well.
May be i am a little stressed.

AAAAAAAAAAAAARrrrrrrgghghghghggh

thats better.

Another weekend

Im happy to report that i have survived this weekend, even though i did have my doubts if i would. And i even did most of my chores, including washing (a lot) ironing (a lot) and cooking. On Sunday we had guests in, new people from the meeting, with their three children, all boys. It was another attempt on our part to accuire friends with children and something in common with us. And I'd personally say it was a success. But i guess we'll see that if they invite us back or attempt to meet up again. I made a lime garlic ginger chicken hotpot and a pecan roll. Here is a picture of the roll:
It split on the side but it still was yummy. They had wine, we had tea. Children watched Star Wars. We talked about cabaret, Barry Long, Buddhism and local schools.

We have finally done the Batparty invitations, so im quite looking forward to making Batcookies and Batcake for Leo (Batman,) birthday on Sunday. I know one boy will come for sure (our next door neighbour), I hope the rest will come too.. It would be good for us to meet other parents as well, we have been living in South London for a year and a half now, but made only very few friends. Working full time does not help with social life...

Aanyway, i took Leo to the hospital today for his ear check up, and unfortunately he is not better so they will have to put grommets in, its a small operation that i was told was quite routine. Didnt stop me from feeling terribly sorry for him and tearfully pressing him to my chest with a big hug. Aaaah poor baby. He was so good in a waiting room as well... Sniff sniff sob... :0(
Oh by the way, grommets are little tubes that are put through the ear drum to help hearing and stabilize the pressure. Hospital put us on a waiting list, they will let us know when they have a date for the operation. On a positive i'd have to stay at home with him for a week after that, and
it is considered a sick leave and not a holiday so i dont loose my holiday days. My mother just gave me "Baking with children" book so we can make a lot of cakes and cookies with Leo. It will be great.
Just to finish this post on the positive, here is a video of Unity walking. She falls in the end, but she didnt cry and was very brave, got up and walked on. All together now: Aaaaaaaaah!

Cocksberg?

Here is an example of Metro news.

Giant ice penis - is climate change to blame?

Thursday, September 11, 2008

If there was any doubt about the terrible threat that global warming poses to humanity, then it can now be dismissed - as this shocking photograph proves that climate change is turning icebergs into giant penises.

I laughed long and hard. I guess in the view of global recession, war, murders, hurricanes, floods and general devastation, it is a good thing to think about ice penises. Thank you Metro!

Power and things

Today i have heard word "power" more than in the whole of last year. I had a big client in, and i mean, Big, Huge kind of client. He is an art director of a very influential fashion and lifestyle magazine, photographer, illustrator, basically one of the most influential people in the industry. And, he is great! I actually really enjoyed working with him. And that makes a change from me going " oh just give up" to the photographer. (And yeah, i do get into trouble for saying that.)
So anyway, he was saying how he'd have all the text written for the article before the images are shot. And then, after the whole article put together he'd just go: "I dont like the way that first letter looks against that background. Why dont we change it to say "M" or a "W". " And you know what? They would have to rewrite the whole thing so it can start with M or a W. Now, that is power for you. Speaking in narrow fashion sense of course.


Aanyway, i wanted to post couple of pictures that i think are pure inspiration in the sense of color, for wool dyeing ( if i ever get around to it).



The last two are my beloved orchids. Loooove orchids.
And last but not least, here is a picture of my sweet dumb cat Maneki.

Discovery

Today is the day i have discovered Flobots. I hope you have too.

Im here

Ok, so the weekend was HECTIC and i mean it really was. I was cooking all day Saturday, made a quiche and lasagna and walnut roll(attempt number 3). Only i swapped this time walnuts with pecans and i liked it better. The dough was great this time, just the filling turned out a little dry. So hopefully next time perfect.
Then Unity had a stomach bug so she was sick in the middle of the night (why is it always the middle of the night?) all over the duvets and basically everywhere. So yesterday it was a big washing and ironing and cooking and cleaning and putting things away day. And then i tried to put the duvet in to washing machine but it was having none of it, so i had to drag it upstairs and stuff it in to the bath filled with warm water with soap and then dance around on it for about 20 minutes and then repeat that procedure like 3 times with no soap this time to rinse it, and then log it into the garden and hang it on the scaffolding. And how grateful i was that my dear husband is lazy enough not to take the scaffolding apart, despite me regularly hustling him about it. And, just when you though that was enough, we had to change the tires on my bike. All that along with taking children to the park and having neighbour's boy around and feeding them and entertaining them and resolving their scuffles.
So it is not surprising that i didnt have much knitting done, and what i thought was gonna be a couple of days kind of project now is going for a second week!
On the positive i have finally organized my yarn into plastic boxes so that my wardrobe is not completely filled with bits of yarn in plastic bags.
Ahhh, i thought i'd never say that, but im happy to be at work. So peaceful....

The last knit

Loooooooove this!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6ZjMWLqJvM
Please watch this!!!

Cycling pic

And thats me on my little Dahon. I love my little bike, it is very fast, despite having 20" wheels.
At the moment it is in the garage looking all dismembered, because my dear husband got me some new tires (which was sweet) because my back tire has a massive hole in it, left by a shred of glass. Only the thing is that he got a wrong size tires! And he only realized that after he took my old tires off.... So hence i had to change into civil clothes and take a bus and a train like all the normal people do. I guess the good thing was i could knit on the way to work, but i still hate commuting, it just takes forever and i feel like my freedom to move is morbidly restricted by train times and such.
Aaanyway, i am so close to completing Birthday Drops vest for my mother i just might finish it before Sunday, which would be nice. Oh, and my Rowan Bamboo Tape pattern booklet has arrived, giving me a lot of inspiration. Surprisingly enough Colin got very excited about the idea of making yarn out of bamboo, thats his latest craze - bamboo and more bamboo. He just got some black bamboo to go to our front garden. When i weakly protested that it grows up to
50' tall so will eventually stop any sunshine getting to the front of the house, he enthused that it will be just like living in a jungle. In a semi detached house in southeast London. Oh well, Russians say let children play so that they dont cry...
I was spending a lot of time on Ravelry again, as you do, chatting to more people. I love all that discussion board stuff you know. I even started a new thread and it had fantastic response.
Sweet baby Unity has started her nursery this week. She is doing great, they said she loved it. They give us like these little sheets of paper where it says what she did and what she ate, it was so sweet. I can just see her sitting there on a little chair like a big girl and eating cheesy mush and baked beans with a spoon. She is off today though because she is having her MMR immunization. I hope she takes it well, poor baby.

A lot to do, little time.

Ohhh the time goes sooo fast i have no time to think! Last week i was down with the cold that sort of progressed into flu then into chest infection and i'm still a bit not too great. Have been cycling like crazy though, i mean just fast, but always stopping at the red lights and generally being careful. Ever since we came back from our holidays we have been going all the way, and that 15 miles every day, half of it up the hill. I can just feel my hamstrings turning into stone. Or wood. Anyway, point being- I have been going up Greenwich hill every day and didnt get off once. You know Greenwich hill? Then you'll know what i mean.
Apart from congratulating myself and patting myself on the back i have been cooking (a lot) and knitting (not quite as much). Oh and getting excited about alpacas. I decided im fed up with retouching and wanna have an alpaca farm. Not tomorrow of course, but like in 5 years time. Or 10 years... Just have to see. When there is a will there is a way. And i am serious.
Im so serious i booked myself some spinning classes. I want to start spinning yarn and dying it so that when i have some alpacas i can do those things. I also have been reading a lot on alpaca farming and it all makes perfect sense.
And im progressing nicely on Drops Top 2 in black for my mother in law's Christmas present. Im just being realistic about my ability to knit and also about the amount of time i have. I know i said that my next project was gonna be Superman pullover for Leo, but he suddenly slipped to the darker realms of Batman so now im left with some wonderful cotton in Superman colours (and it did take me FOREVER to find just the right shade of red) and my son doesnt want to hear anything about Superman and totally Batman obsessed. Im personally more of a Spiderman kind of girl, he is not as dark as Batman and not as unobtainable as Superman, just your local hero.
Aaaanyway, it is a bit slow at work today (as in noone has shouted angrily at me yet) so i have time to write my thoughts down. Oh, another thing is that for my mother's birthday she asked me to knit her a vest. It seems everyone is vest obsessed, but i dont mind. So i just received the lovely green wool i have bought on ebay for it. Even though the picture looked totally emerald green and the wool itself is more of a leaf green, which reminds me:
Stop fuffing with the colours in Photoshop people, especially if you dont know what you are doing!
So many ebay sellers think: "oh i'll just up the saturation and lighten it a bit to make it look prettier" It doesn't work like that, all of those things make your colours look wrong. Adding saturation makes things more yellow and lightening things make them more red/blue/green depending on your base color.
Sorry got destructed from important stuff there for a second. So yeah, another Drops vest, here i come. Not the same Drops vest though. So a lot to do, little time.

Good and bad

Ok, lets start with good - i have finished my comfort shawl! wheeeeeee hey! I, of course, have to still weave in all the ends and crochet around it and block it, but the main grueling backward and forward knitting is finished. Im so proud of myself. And i dont really mind how it looks, plus i think grandma will love it. So there it is, im a knitter, past the scarves and socks.
Have spent a lot of time (far too much time really) on Ravelry, chatting away mainly on various discussion boards. I have never participated in activities like that, and think it is great. And i get to meet all the wonderful women (and some men) and for me, who find it hard to make new friends, it feels just great.
Also i have worked out (well more or less) how to make the superman jumper for Leo, thats my new project. At the same time there are so many things i wanna do, i feel that my very presumptuous resolution of "One Project At A Time" is going to be dumped very soon. There is this cardigan i really want to make and there is of course Colin's Christmas sweater that i will have to start soon, considering how little time i have to actually knit. And Colin, bless, he had ordered some patterns for sweaters, because i offered him few designs and he said mmmhew, so i told him if he finds a pattern, ill make it for him. Which he did.
Thats for the good. And on the bad front - i have a cold. A nasty crappy snuffly cold. Which is not the worst thing that can happen and if you think about it, very small compare with massiveness of I Finished The Shawl!!
:0))))))))))))

Back from Tallinn

Here i am, back from Tallinn, still glowing with a healthy suntan... What? Sun in Tallinn? However, we were extremely lucky with the weather, it was sunny and hot every day. And yes, i did get horrendously burned, but then tanned. We went to the beach with children every day! And in the evening, after putting children to bed, we went out and just walked and chatted and kissed like teenagers. In other words, it was a great holiday. It was good to see people as well, like Milka, who is probably going to be my best friend for rest of my life, and other old classmates of mine. And it was just long enough for us to be glad to get back home.It wasnt the cleanest seaside, but the amount of pleasure my children got from just frolicking

in the sea! And Colin of course.. He was the talk of the beach because he was building sandcastles with children which is "not a manly thing to do". Hehehe!
And here is my beloved grandma we stayed with .
They are big on spinning and knitting in Estonia, which i presume is natural since its so bloody cold in the winter. I left my knitting at home because i just wanted to give all of my attention to my family.

All scrubbed up to go out for a dinner with some of my friends.
Leo was in ice cream heaven, he had one every day.
So there you go.
Im still very happy. Lets see if that lasts!

So it has been like a week since the last post, and what a busy week it was. Working like crazy, because we are going away to my home town of Tallinn on 22nd, so its like EVERYTHING needs to be done before that. My knitting is pretty neglected as well, i mean i do labor on, but very VERY slowly. i thought i'd finish my comfort shawl this week, but no way now... Unless i stay up all night for three nights in a row.
I finished reading my book last week and to be perfectly honest, it did disturb me and not a little bit. I think when you have small children and a lot of responsibilities never ask yourself question about reality. No wonder all those existentialists were a miserable bunch. When you start doubting the reality of everything around you, suddenly everything becomes a question without many answers, and more you are trying to understand, more it feels like swimming in a cave lake in total dark. So i was a bit depressed for a couple of days and the whole family was tiptoeing around me. I guess for them my grumpy mood was pretty real!

Friday moods

Im so happy! We were supposed to be working this Saturday, but it all got canceled. Wheee, the whole weekend just for ourselves. So i booked tickets to see Hancock as a surprise for Colin tomorrow night. So exited! It was like 3 month ago the last time we went to see a film, we were so busy all the time.
I forgot to have a moan about the book i have bought, it turned out it is an old book by that writer, they just changed the name for American market. It is still a good book, but i was obviously hoping to get a new book, not just a new name... Aaanyway, i still like it, i read it in Russian last time, so now its English time.
And my Comfort Shawl is coming along nicely, i'm on a row 40, which is quite good, considering. Weekend here i come!

Update

Things are quite slow at the moment, we finished the Bitch From Hell job yesterday, luckily i didn't have to deal with her at all, my husband has taken that upon himself, which is nice. So now i can serf freely on the internet, not feeling guilty!!
I have started on the Comfort Shawl.
It wasn't as straight forward as i thought it was gonna be, i end up ripping it first time and starting it again because i lost the count and end up three stitches short, and then i couldn't work out where i lost the count. But its better now, and prettier because to be perfectly honest, chinese wool didn't impress me at all. So im using my leftovers from The Natural Dye Studio.
So looking forward to our holidays.

Maneki

As promised - Maneki Neko, our sweet kitten.

Wind

Oh, there is something else - it was Very Windy in Brighton. And here is a proof:

Brighton Pics

Hurraaaa!! I have finished my Drops Tank!! Im so proud of myself. That has been the hardest thing i have done so far and i've done it. Spent most of last night weaving in the ends and correcting things. Now just to block it and its ready. Oh, i could just kiss myself!
Anyway, here are some pictures as promised:


So here we are. Today im starting on "Feather and Fan Comfort Shawl"
And here are some pictures from Brighton

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Its Super Leo!!!




So there, a mini holiday!