Blue...

The finished blue yarn is all spun, and suddenly, somehow, it seems to be clicking. Drafting suddenly got much quicker, and easier, and the yarn was behaving itself. Practice? Maybe? Deadlines? Possibly that as well. I need a naked spindle in preparation for the start of the tour de fleece tomorrow, which meant that the spinning had to be finished.
In retrospect, I'm regretting not leaving the singles sitting on their coke bottles a while longer. This could be stunning with some fluffy white bits in, or possibly a bit of glitter. Ideally, even both. The colourway just needs something to pep it up, you know what I mean? Oh, it's exactly 50 yards from just under 2oz of fibre, which means that if I'd had a full 4oz of it, I'd have finally achieved the mythical 100 yard skein.
Suddenly everything is getting more productive. Her Highness the Princess of Cling has discovered that crawling is a good thing, because it enables her to eat a wider range of choking hazards (childproofing with children in the house is turning out to be increasingly difficult)and so life is much, much quieter around here. Alex is on a mission to create balls from wool, as opposed to balls of wool, so there will be a little light felting going on around here later today. Oh yes, and amineko now has hands.

Chocolate

How the heck can you get salmonella in chocolate anyhow? That's just so wrong in so many ways.
Our favourite bars of chocolate aka the BIG bar of Cadburys caramel, the pregnancy craving, the stuff with the pornographic bunny wabbit advert- has been recalled. Smeg. And somehow, I have to stop my hypochondriac husband discovering this any time within the next year- mercifully he doesn't watch the news, read broadsheet newspapers, or read my blog.

Which leads to my other issue. It has come to my attention that certain people (you know who you are) have been reading the old blog, and even the new blog, and not leaving comments on it. So, if you're reading this, please make me feel loved and drop me a line to let me know you got this far. There could potentially be a bar of chocolate in it for you.

A small vent

I understand that colonialism is a pain in the bum, and heck, even I don't want to be British- so I have no quibbles whatsoever with the Americans choosing to be independent. I don't have a major problem with any of the other things that they've done since, though it really bugs me that they don't see u in color
But now, finally, they've gone too far.
It suddenly dawned on me, whilst rereading The Happy Hooker, that the reason I had such difficulty getting this crochet project up and running again is because amigurumi aren't made in single crochet: they're made in american single crochet, which is the same as our double crochet.
Doh.
Such a simple thing, yet caused so much havoc and destruction. Spinning is way easier. Heck, even socks are easier.
I have lost all will to master more complicated stitches- I think I'm just going to move somewhere quiet where they don't speak English, American, or even Canadian. Scotland would do nicely.

Work in progress

I'm feeling very down that I'm stitching away and achieving nothing, so here's the WIP to cheer myself up.
Skye is on a mission to conquer the world one mouthful at a time, and has discovered that she can even eat herself. The sock of doom (aka protosock) has been on the needles for months and months an months- this is the same sock that was originally started as part of the Knitting Olympics. Well, it's the same yarn and the same needles- but a totally different pattern. Does that make it better or worse?
Plus, in a moment's madness I decided to buy myself a crochet hook because I had a burning desire to make amineko The one problem being that I haven't crocheted since I was about twelve, and it's very, very slow going. I'm feeling incredibly proud of myself for having figured out the magic loop thingummy- which was admittedly way easier than a knitting style magic loop- and it all seems to be going along swimmingly.
Must knit more- spin more- crochet more- sleep less.

The Loss of Innocence

Ten days ago, Bill was playing football when his ball went over the wall. He tried to climb over the wall to get it back, and the wall fell on him and hurt him so badly that he couldn't stay alive with us. He was six years old. So the goddess is cuddling him and looking after him now just like his mummy did, and Isaac's mummy does, until the time is right for Bill's mummy to go and be with him again.

This is what we've told Isaac. He is five years old, and watching someone so small struggle with something so big is breaking my heart. In the last ten days, he's both got very old and very young- asking for lots and lots of babying and cuddles and attention, yet also wanting his independence. He wants to play outside by himself- not only in the garden, but to go to the park quarter of a mile away by himself as well. Yet every night the bed is wet and he cries in terror, associating the sensations of his asthma attacks with the way his friend died. I haven't got the words to help him, but I so, so, wish I had.
The games he and his friends play so often have changed so much. I haven't seen Superman's red cape zooming round the house much recently, or heard of the doings of the Power Rangers. (Not the TV version- Power Rangers Isaac-stylee are way cooler. They have all kinds of superpowers, for one thing.) Instead, they've been obsessed with an ants nest and watching the way that the ants interact and work together, and trying to protect the ants from the other children.
Probably the hardest thing to see, though, is the way that he hasn't been taking risks. His ongoing onslaught on the climbing wall at the playground has been put on hold for a while, as has the battle with the monkey bars- because for the first time in his life, Isaac has realised that failure is an option. For him, it's no longer as simple as "I can't do it yet" because he knows that there's the possibility that a goal may prove too big and too dangerous for him. He now believes in "I can't do it." His innocence, his brave open-hearted sheer reckless stupidity is gone at 5 years old, and I don't think I can bring it back.
We love you, Bill.

Katja

though that should probably be with a very small K. Because it's a fairly short top, on account of me forgetting a row or seven- but then it's for a fairly short girl, so that probably makes everything OK.
And it was a fun, relatively quick knit. I'm not sure about some of the measurements, because it is absolutely swamping Skye- and similarly, I think the i-cords are longer than they needed to be- but it looks really sweet on and I love the colour.
The next project on the needles is actually only on one needle. In a moment's madness, I decided to pick up a crochet hook again, inspired by the gorgeous amigurumi animals I see from time to time across the net. It's harder than I thought-and if I ever get to meet Debbie Stoller, I want to slap her for asserting that crochet is easier than knitting. It's really, really not.

New Day, New Blog

Okay, a new day, a new blog.

The title of the blog? Two reasons:
1) My eldest children are obsessed with Dr Who, and indeed, sci-fi in general.
2) It feels like 90% of my valued possessions disappear into the back of the sofa at a regular interval. In particular, knitting needles, pens and money.

So, today I am hiding down the back of the sofa trying not to watch the football. I HATE football. I'm also trying to finish katja so hopefully pictures will be coming soon.