Presents

It was my b-day yesterday and I just want to show my fantastic gifts: 3 great books by CUP and a new BBC movie-documentary about earth. I loved the old version of the film but this one is astonishingly good, it is brilliant, one of the best movies I have ever seen!!!!


Of course I have not watched it fully yet, as it is on 5 disks! And each disk is about 3 hours long! But I have seen the first one today and I am so impressed I had to blog about it.


I know I am a huge fan of National Geographic and all the programs about Earth, but it is so beautifully done and has the footage of some species never shown before: like the natural intimate story about the Snow leopard. It took bloody 3 years to shoot and it is only a little part of the movie; or the part about the forest change over the year following the seasons, shown from space, pictures collected over the year. I mean can it possibly be any better!!!!!

Wishing for the White Christmas

The Christmas stocking is finally done and I cannot express how happy I am, no I am ecstatic, I am over the moon!!!
This has been the most challenging knit for me, since the pattern has so many discrepancies and mistakes. Basically I have knitted it form the picture.
It is not a small sock, it is absolutely massive, just to prove it, I’ve taken a picture with the CD; thank God it is a swap present, there is no mantle piece in my humble flat.

Name: Christmas stocking
Pattern: VK Holidays 2006
Material: exactly 3 balls of RCY Cashsoft DK
Tools: Inox bamboo 5 DPN 3.5mm
Alterations: uncountable

Close up

Front

Back

Micro-Knitting-array

I've had loads of laboratory work this week, and as usual it put a lot of strain on my hands. Do you know that if you have a coffee in the morning and then will have a precision work with pipette your hands will shake?

So, this week I was on a coffee-free diet. This was particularly tough due a non-stop rain. To compensate for all the inconvenience I was suffering I needed a relaxing knit to relieve the pressure from my fingers at the end of the day. And what could be better then working with small needless?

Since all my projects so far worked with needles 3.5-7mm, I had to start a new one. I know I am awful but here we go.

This is a sneak preview of what I’ve done this week: first Hedera sock. I LOVE IT.

And it is much more accurate then the Christmas Stocking. I guess it is because this time I am using aluminium needles (bamboo and me just don’t exactly go together).
I haven’t washed it yet, so some of the stitches are still not in the right place but I just had to show it to you

Another week has passed

I am burning at Uni right now and so there is no time left for knitting and blogging. Not only I don’t write anything new, I also don’t read much these days and if I do, I don’t comment. Sorry guys.
Christmas stocking is still untouched since last update, I’ve done a little bit on entrelac Sweater, but this is it. Don’t know when I will catch up.

Poster!

My whole week went fast under the pursuit of my very own scientific poster, which I will present on Tuesday. I took me enormously long to do coz I’ve never actually done one in PowerPoint before. Next time I will go for Publisher as pictures turned out washy and had to be altered into higher pixel content at the print shop, and it did cost me big time. Just thinking about how much yarn I could have bought with all that money makes me want to cry.

As I wrote in the previous post I decided to re-knit the Stocking in RYC. And I have to say it: it is bloody addictive. I could not stop knitting it and had to lock it, so I could concentrate on the poster.
So far I’ve knitted it up to foot and I already encountered 6 mistakes in the pattern!!! This is not common for VK; anyway I knitted from picture using common sense and ignoring 2 sentences of the actual pattern, and then pattern went on stitch-to-stitch with what I was knitting! Hurray!

The colour bright white, as at the first picture, taken on Thursday.

Guilty Pleasures

I think there is something completely wrong with me as I cannot stand synthetic yarn. It is ridiculous; I can even detect the 15% mix. So, my hands were absolutely killing me and I had to frog Christmas Stocking. I decided to go to Robert Sayles (John Lewis) today in search of something alternative, at least that was the plan. Ha, yeah right, alternative came in the form of something expensive: RCY. So far I only got 2 balls and then will buy more as I come along.



I also became tempted by the Rowan Studio first issue, so here it comes and the model which I want but not sure will fit me.



The mail order came in today with my long waited and anticipated alpaca (my future VK beret). And I absolutely love it, so gorgeous and soft. Plus it smells fantastic! Now I have to wait for 9mm DPN, and it will take another 2 weeks as retailed run out of stock.




(The colour is teal. So I guess the second picture is closer to real yarn, however not exactly. My camera hates me)

And another thing, I had such a stressful week last week that I just wanted a relaxing knit, without row counting, stitches counting, something I could do from the top of my head. I read Eunny blog and the idea struck me: I have long wanted this Gedifra Highlights 42 sweater and I had the yarn for it at the bottom of the stash: so here it comes, first rows revealed.

Bon Fire Night!!!!

Last night was absolutely fantastic!!!! It was a double celebration: the Fireworks itself and the fact that it was the 20th anniversary of the venue in Cambridge. As far as I understand, before they only burned the dummy.
Fireworks lasted for 10 minutes and were breathtaking, I just so love them; the ground was rocking and crowds (20,000 or so) cheering. The spirit of festiveness was overwhelming.
From now on, Christmas shopping and decorations can be on, in fact the London Christmas make over will be revealed next week on the 7th.
And the other thing is I managed to finish my Spencer gloves just in time!!!

And this is me rocking my new Spencer gloves and the Odessa hat