Almost the end of January already....

Here we are, just about to enter the last week of January already - where has the time gone?

My last blog post wasn't the most cheery and, to be honest, I've not been very much cheerier for the rest of the month.  In fact some days have been downright diabolical, and I've spent a great deal of the month just being a hermit and not really wanting to interact with anyone much.

It's been a combination of things but mostly dealing with Sylvester's death which still upsets me and will for a while - I may not be able to write much about it but I'll just say he was very ill, pretty old for a cat and there was nothing more anyone could have done for him.

I also seem to be going through a bout of menopausal emotional instability where I genuinely feel like I'm holding onto my emotions by my fingertips and I could degenerate into a sobbing heap at any second.  Tie that in with the loss of Sylvester and it seems to have triggered a lot of deeply buried sadness and grief from events in my past that then comes spewing out uncontrollably.  It's pretty fecking awful and if it continues I may well have to visit my GP to see if there's anything I can do.

And the weather's been wet and windy, with not very much sunshine - I don't tend to respond well to the overcast, grey skies of January at the best of times.

There have been one or two brighter spots, though.  A very lovely online friend from Atlanta, Georgia sent me a beautiful skein of hand-dyed yarn, a merino wool/cashmere mix, from the hilariously named 'Bugga!' range (it's American and I'm not sure the word means the same there, but it makes me chortle all the same).  I decided to knit my first shawl with it so whenever I wrap myself in it, I'll be reminded that someone was kind enough to think of me, even though we've never met in real life.

And yesterday I got a call from another friend who has been taking pottery classes and has discovered a natural aptitude for it.  Several months ago I suggested to her that I'd be interested in a yarn bowl when she felt capable of making one.  If you don't know what a yarn bowl is, it is, unsurprisingly (the clue is in the name) a bowl you put your yarn in while you're knitting/crocheting with it.  They come in many designs but they all have slots in the side that you feed your working strand through.  Hard to describe but look, here's a picture:

What this means is the ball of wool stays in one place, in the bowl, rather than falling off your lap and unravelling across the floor as you work.  Anyway, this friend rang to say that she's made me a yarn bowl that she's going to gift me, and what colour would I like?  How exciting!  And lovely!  I've told her my favourite colours are from the blue/green end of the spectrum, and she's going to bring it along to the next craft fair we're both at, which is on 1 February!

What else?  Oh, yes - The Lovely Husband's current contract comes to an end next Friday and he's made the very sensible decision to not look for more work immediately but to treat himself to some much-needed time off.  I'm very much looking forward to having someone else in the house that I can talk to, as I do tend to get a bit lonely, and as I dearly love my husband it's going to be really nice to be able to spend a decent amount of time with him - it's fortunate we still like each other's company, even after 20 years as a couple. 

We realised the other day that we've not had a holiday together anywhere at all since 2007, what with one thing and another, and now that we are sadly pet-free we no longer need to tie ourselves to home in order to look after an ailing moggy.  We've decided we're going to take February very easy, maybe do some day trips if we see something we fancy doing and the weather's co-operating, since TLH has (very excitingly) signed up to run in the inaugural Surrey Half Marathon on 9 March and he's actually doing proper training to try and improve his already respectable time for 13.1 miles.  So once the Half's out of the way, we can seriously start to consider where we want to go and, believe me, we're spoilt for choice.

So, slowly, I'll improve as the weather gets better, plus I didn't do very much painting over the last month or so, but classes have started again and I'm re-finding my arty mojo.  (Dammit, the weather's seriously deteriorated here in the last 30 mins, gale force winds have appeared from nowhere, the sky looks apocalyptic and the lights are flickering ominously.  I'll end this post here in case everything goes tits-up powerwise, but next post I show you my latest paintings, promise!)

That's handy! (Part I)

I'm still poorly.  I've coughed my lungs up so many times I'm surprised I've still got any left.  And I'm astonished at the body's ability to create so much snot.  Which is now, apparently, in my Eustachian Tubes and has made me go deaf on my left side.  And I also woke up at 6.30 this morning with a sinus headache, one of those bastard ones that doesn't really respond to paracetamol.  Thank the Gods I included Sudafed Sinus in my online grocery delivery which should be arriving within an hour or so (I'd already decided there was no fecking way I was going to be facing Sainsbury's on Monday - they can bring it to my house instead).

Woe.

Still, on the bright side, I've managed to do quite a lot of work on my current cross-stitch project.  I rather like doing cross-stitch.  It's easy and is a bit like painting with coloured thread.  I did a post back in November 2011 about rediscovering cross-stitch when I did my series of Mexican sugar skulls, and then more recently I did my Alan Measles cross-stitch which you may recall.

Anyway, I fancied doing another and recently found a couple of patterns that appealed to my inner Goth and current obsession with all things skeletal; one was of an x-ray of a hand, and the other an MRI head scan:

I got both patterns from nerdylittlestitcher on etsy for less than a couple of quid each, I think.  That's just for the pdf pattern, of course, you then have to buy the black aida fabric and all the embroidery floss but I think it came to less than £20 for the lot.

I started by printing out the hand chart on 4 sheets of A4 and joining them together.  Located the central block of 4 squares and marked them on the paper.  I then cut my aida fabric to size and found the middle by folding it in half, then half again, then ironing the central point.  I then did something I don't usually do and that's basted in each block of 10 squares with thread so that it matched the squares on the chart.  Protip - be VERY careful when counting out the 10 squares because it's incredibly easy to miscount.  And that can be very disconcerting when you come to doing the cross-stitch later because it suddenly doesn't line up.  Ask me how I know.

Also, for a pattern that seemingly at first sight is just a couple of shades of grey, there are an AWFUL lot of different colours in it.  Often just one stitch, here and there.  But it's best to be scrupulous about putting them in because that's where the magical shading happens.

And black aida fabric is a bit challenging to work with until you get used to it.  I've found it's best to have a lamp shining on your lap (and preferably put something light coloured on your lap) so that you can see the holes in the fabric and where to put your needle, and I also need light behind me so I can see the front of the fabric as well!  This generally means I'm only working on it up until mid-afternoon because I sit with a window behind me, and the natural light starts to go by then.

This is turning out to be quite large and so is going to take a long time to finish.  But that's okay - there's something weirdly addictive about cross-stitch.  I started it back in early September and have tried to do a bit each day although I've done more this week due to this stupid bloody cold.

Anyway, have some photos:

The chart - four sheets of A4 with the central squares marked.

Close up of a section of the chart.  Each symbol relates to a colour.

Close up of the same section of chart, as it was being worked.

As far as I've got, as of this morning.  The oval cameo thing with the stylised letter 'K' on it is a magnetic needle holder, so I don't lose my needle!

Fiddling around with a naked lady and a teddy bear....

Another picture has been finished.  And a small tapestry of a cross-dressing potter's favourite teddy bear.

In fact, let's deal with the tapestry first, shall we?

As I mentioned in my last post, earlier last year I bought a couple of tapestry kits from the British Museum's Grayson Perry exhibition.  It was of Alan Measles, who is Grayson's 50-year old teddy bear and overlord.  One kit was completed and gifted to my good friend, Katy, for her birthday last April.  The other has sat around, forlornly, waiting for me to find the inclination to pick it up and start it.

The inclination arrived last week.  I had a 'need' to do something with wool (or 'yarn', as our American cousins would have it!).  I'd had enough of crocheting hearts and the Celestarium shawl I mentioned at the end of last year is a bit of a non-starter until I learn how to use double-pointed needles properly (perhaps later this year when I've forgotten how frustrating it is) so I was flailing around a bit until I remembered poor, forgotten Alan.

I located the kit from the back of the cupboard where I'd ignominiously flung him last year and got everything out.  With the kit comes the Aida fabric (the specialist tapestry/cross-stitch fabric with the little holes) with the design printed on it with all the colours, a black and white photocopy of the design with the little symbols for the colours, all the tapestry wool, a needle and a thread sorter (this is basically where you label a short length of wool with its relative letter of the alphabet):



This is a close up of the actual printed design after I'd done all the bright red on the first day:



And here he is finally done, five days later:



I think you'll agree he's a handsome fellow and needs to be framed.  Normally I choose very plain frames for my creations, either black or white.  But Alan is such a colourful, flamboyant character that it would only be fitting for him to have the most elaborate frame I could find:



I think he'd be pleased.

So, onto the naked lady.  About 10 days ago The Guardian had a short article about an exhibition of photographs of nudes by Nadav Kander, with examples of 10 of his photographs.  The models had been coated with an emulsion made from marble dust and therefore look a little like marble statues, a little like dead bodies.  If you bother to read the comments on The Guardian page (at the risk of your blood pressure), you'll see that they're slightly controversial inasmuch as the old 'is photography art?' argument goes.  I didn't - don't - care about that as I firmly believe there is no definition of 'art'; all you can rely on is whether you like something or not.  If you like it, you're more likely to classify it as 'art'; if you don't, then you won't.  Simple.

I like these images.  REALLY like them.  I like their simplicity, their stark black and white ness.  The subtle shading of muscles and fat.  The soft, dough-like body of one of the women versus the sharp angular insect-like man.

One of the pictures really stood out to me, the standing, full frontal nude with gorgeous, flowing red hair.  It's called 'Islay standing':

As soon as I saw it, I thought it would make a stunning picture in white pastels on black paper.  So I decided to have a go at it.

I've never done life drawing before but I'm getting more confident with my ability to observe and draw what I see, more or less accurately so I hoped she wouldn't be too difficult!

I printed off an A4 print of the photo and got quite a large piece of black paper, and started to draw the outline in white pencil, trying to get the proportions right and hoping that she'd all fit on the paper:



I figured that wasn't too bad, so went over the outline in white chalk pastel and started filling her in, from the legs upwards, blending with my fingertips and doing some shading by removing the pastel with a cotton bud:



About 4 days later, this is how far I'd got.  I knew the top of the picture - hands, face, hair - were going to be the most difficult so sat and thought about it for a few days:



Finally decided to be brave and just go for it:



And here she is, final version:



I'm really REALLY pleased with how she's come out.  To be honest she wasn't that tricky to do although I was anxious about the top bit, and I was constantly expecting to accidentally smudge a bit or drop the pastel right down the picture but, for once, that didn't happen.  And the beauty of using chalk pastels (as opposed to oil pastels) is that you can rub it out with a putty eraser.

I'm now giving serious consideration to doing another of the photographs in the series, plus going to life drawing classes next term.

I have to say I seriously think that doing these art classes has been one of the better decisions in my life - I only wish I hadn't given it up for the previous 30 years or so.....

Hello, 2013!

Yesterday, New Year's Eve, TLH and I decided to visit his mum to give her her christmas pressie and take her out to lunch.  However seeing as how she still lives in his native homeland, visiting her involves a total of at least six hours driving (3 hours both ways).  It's a long old haul and even in a car as comfy as ours, you still end up with aching anatomy.  Still, despite the driving rain and spray on the motorway there wasn't actually too much traffic so the journey was relatively quick.

TLH's mum, by her own choice, decided to move into a nursing home a couple of years ago now - she was (then) recently widowed and not so nimble on her feet, and the house was too big for her to maintain - and I have to say it really seems to have agreed with her.  Yes, there was obvious trepidation on everyone's part, not least due to the media horror stories of terrible nursing homes, and sadness and anxiety on her part on leaving the house where she had lived for the last 50 years but the home that she chose, after visiting several, is absolutely lovely.  It has a terrific atmosphere, all the staff are friendly and kind, it's very clean, modern and cosy.  There are endless activities put on for the residents several times a week.  They have a vegetable garden, and there's chickens and ducks scratching around, and his mum's social life has expanded exponentially.  You see, the town where she lives is quite small and she's lived there (or nearby) all her life.  She was also one of the town's school-teachers and, consequently, knows absolutely everyone, and all their family, and their neighbours and all their families too.  And they all liked her as well, so what we're finding is that not only is she now getting visits in the home from her own family and neighbours, but also getting visits from other residents' family members because she'd taught them in the past!  And she loves it!  She used to get visitors when she lived in the family house but not nearly so many as she gets now in the nursing home.  I'm so pleased it's all worked out for her, and that she found such a lovely place to be.

Anyway, that was a bit of a side track but the upshot was that we ended up not doing anything for New Year's Eve because we were, frankly, a bit knackered by the time we got home.  We managed to stay up until midnight and toasted in 2013 with a cup of tea (we know how to party) and then I went to bed.  Phew!  Rock 'n' roll!

This morning was a very lazy affair and I made an American breakfast for us - pancakes, sausages, crispy bacon and proper maple syrup - because, well, we like them a lot, hadn't had one for ages and we've been doing marathon TV watching sessions of all 5.5 series of Breaking Bad and watching Jesse and Walt eating at Dennys diners had reminded us of actually just how much we do like them.

And now, of course, I have a whole bottle of maple syrup that we'll need to get through.  I suppose I'll just have to get more pancake mix....

A short while after, TLH's sister first-footed it through our door but didn't bring us a lump of coal (isn't that what they're supposed to do?) but we gave her a cup of coffee anyway. 

After she left I decided that, as the weather was so beautiful today, I'd go for my first run of the year.  Just a short one, to see how lumpen I felt having not run at all since 17 December.  Answer: Extremely.  Did 2.5 miles but wasn't exactly quick and did walk most of it back but at least I got out there and have made a start on my 250 miles in 2013 challenge.  Only 247 to go!!

So, as I type, TLH has taken himself upstairs for a nap and I'm about to take the opportunity to try and catch up with a bit of the telly that I've taped over the last week, while I gird my loins to cast on the Celestarium shawl I told you about in my last post but as that involves learning a LOT of new things (like how to use double pointed needles, and then using circular needles, and reading a chart, and adding beads as I'm going along), it's a bit daunting but faint heart ne'er won fair maid so I'll take a deep breath and have a go.

Tomorrow.

Over for another year...

Well, that's Christmas done and dusted for another year.  I'm pretty glad it's done.  I've always found Christmas to be stressful - the lengthy buildup, the expectation, the demands on your time from people you don't particularly want to see, the non-invitations from people you really would like to see, the teeming hordes of Christmas shoppers (although online shopping is a boon in that regard, as long as the delivery couriers don't nick your parcels - long story...), the hell of doing the shop for the Christmas food.  I mean, yeah, this happens every year.

But this year I had the added bonus of being circled by the Black Dog again.  Except it wasn't quite as much of a Black Dog as the episode I had and wrote about last year, so perhaps it was more of a Black Puppy lolloping around.  But that makes it sound more adorable than it actually was.  This year's Christmas Episode of Woe luckily didn't involve my inner critic whispering in my ear how fucking useless I was and how no-one would miss me if I died, although I could hear her trying to get in through the door.  No, this year involved walking around for a good couple of weeks with The Stone of Misery heavily lodged in my chest, accompanied by much Deep Sighing and a complete lack of desire to Get Anything Done.  There was some sobbing and consideration of huge life changes, all undertaken in privacy in the garage and now all discarded as just me being mental (I've come through the other side and am now 'normal' again) and being oversensitive although there were extenuating circumstances.  But never mind, I'm back on an even keel again and that's to be welcomed.  Obviously I'm keeping an eye on these episodes and should they start getting more frequent and/or more intense, I shall head off to my doctor so fast you won't see me for dust.

So Christmas was 'interesting'.  We stayed at home and didn't see anyone on the actual day.  We had chicken with all the trimmings (no point in a big turkey for just the two of us - Sylvester the Cat doesn't eat real poultry anymore), opened our presents to each other - I got a Garmin GPS running watch thingy and a brilliant wireless hifi system, called Sonos,  to play music in every room in the house (I can highly recommend it - you can control it from your smartphone, laptop and tablet).  I also got a selection of stuff from my Amazon wishlist which makes me sound rather alarming - a three book set on the history of the Third Reich and two of the operas in Wagner's Ring Cycle.  We'll just draw a discreet veil over that, shall we?

I also got this brill thing called the 'Big Head Squirrel Feeder' which I spotted earlier in the year and thought was one of the funniest things I'd ever seen.  I laughed till I nearly had an accident.  The Lovely Husband had been paying attention and secretly got one for me for Christmas.  It's a large, hollow, caricature of a squirrel's head that you fill with seed and suspend about a foot from the ground.  The squirrels come along and eat the seeds while looking incredibly comical.  Look:

How could you NOT want one?

We've not set it up yet but I promise there will be photos when I do.

My lovely mum got me a painting that I'd taken a fancy to at a local arts society exhibition, my brother and his family got us wine.

We went to my brother's yesterday for the family get-together and present swap.  I gave my brother and his wife a painting I'd done of their two littlest kids taken from a photo he'd taken of them, which, I think, they liked:



I'd also made little crocheted rose brooches and knitted some twirly scarves for my sister-in-law and my two oldest nieces:
 

which they all seemed genuinely delighted with (thereby declaring themselves knitworthy), but none more so than my littlest 2-year old niece who grabbed her mum's scarf, wrapped it round her neck and went running around the room!  This, of course, means that I will now knit her her very own one in pink for her birthday in February!

So food was eaten and drink consumed (I now know I like Amaretto...), and a most convivial time was had by all.

We're now in that liminal period between Christmas and New Year, when thoughts turn to 2013.  I'm not normally one for New Year's Resolutions and there are some which will go without saying, such as 'do more painting', but I do think I'd rather like to try and lose some weight if possible and I'm definitely setting myself a new total distance running target because - drumroll, please - I ACHIEVED MY GOAL OF RUNNING 100 MILES IN 2012!!



I actually achieved this goal a few days before Christmas but couldn't be bothered to blog about it (see references to the Black Puppy above), but I did do it.  I actually ran further because I only set the target at the beginning of March so it doesn't take into account January and February's distances but, on the other hand, there were at least 6 to 8 weeks between March and December when I couldn't run at all due to crappy feet issues so perhaps it all evens out.

I decided to take a complete break from running over the Christmas period and will start again in the New Year.  And I've decided to stick my neck out and try and run 250 miles in 2013.  I'm pretty damn sure I could do 200 miles fairly easily - after all, that's only 3.8 miles per week or 16.66 miles per month, and my last two runs were both 5 miles each.  So adding an extra 50 overall increases that to 4.8 miles per week (i.e., only an extra mile)/20.8 miles per month.  I have at least two online friends who have both run over 1000 miles in 2012 alone so I'm thinking I can achieve a piddling 250 - as long as my feet hold out, though.  This year I've had to contend with a neuroma in my left foot and plantar fasciitis/tendonitis in my right but both seem to have sorted themselves out - fingers crossed this lasts.

So that's the running.  As for crafts, I'm joining a Knit-Along project with a group on Ravelry of a circular shawl in the form of a star-chart of the northern sky, with beads for constellations.

 I'm doing mine in a very dark blue with silver-lined glass beads for the stars.  A mass cast-on is scheduled for 1 January and I'm hoping that with approx. 200 other people also doing it at the same time as me that there'll be plenty of help available.  I sincerely hope so!  Anyway wish me luck!

I'll also do my best to try and blog and bit more, I think.  I know I'm not the most interesting and scintillating of writers but this blog does sort of act as a kind of diary and I'm currently finding it especially useful for keeping track of the arty painting stuff so for that alone it's worth keeping it going.

And with that, I shall love you and leave you, and wish you all the very best for 2013.

Iris Scarf - Taa-daah!

Not had a Taa-daah post for a while but I've finally finished something so I can show you!

You may recall this post way back in the mists of February this year when I went to the Unravel Show at Farnham Maltings and came back with some lovely hand-dyed wool and a kit from The Natural Dye Studio to make a rather stunning crochet scarf.

Well, I finally got round to starting the scarf in June this year and half-heartedly worked at it, on and off, throughout this year's 'summer' until I eventually got into it and knuckled down about a month ago, finally finishing it off yesterday.

I couldn't get my head around the pattern for each 'snowflake' to begin with, and then the pattern called for joining them as you go, which further did my head in, until I had a word with myself, started to concentrate a bit and realised, actually, that the pattern was pretty easy and the joining was logical as long as I paid a bit of attention.

I tend to do my knitting/crochet at night in front of the telly and, yes, there was some unravelling necessary when I got distracted by Dexter or The Walking Dead and realised I'd cocked up the stitch or, more likely, had forgotten what came next so this, for me, was most definitely not a mindless piece of crochet-as-meditation - I actually had to be actively involved!

But it's finished!  And it's lovely!  And the colours are stunning! And, no, I'm not going to block it because that would drive me insane!

As it's a gorgeously sunny morning here today at Jones Towers, I took the opportunity to drape the scarf over the bridge handrail to photograph it in all its glory for you all:

Isn't it lovely?

I have a bit of wool left over in all the colours so what I'm going to do now is make up some more of the individual 'snowflakes' to hang as Christmas decorations, either on the tree or in windows.

If you fancy getting one of the kits yourself, you can get it here although I think they're out of stock at the moment.  The kit comes with all the wool and the pattern but you'll need to get yourself a 2.75mm crochet hook.  And it really is very easy - if you can crochet a chain, a half-treble and a treble then you can make this scarf.

Yarny love...

And a damp, dry, mild, cold, rainy, sunny May Day Bank Holiday to you all.  I've given up on us getting decent Spring weather this year - the last two days here it felt like March and therefore entirely appropriate that I finished my first big knitting project!

Back in March, I did a post about going to the Unravel show at Farnham Maltings, and I showed you the lovely yarny goodness that I bought, one lot of which was this gorgeous hand-dyed and -spun blue-green wool from a company called NiMu Yarns:



And I decided that I was going to make a very simple knitted wrap around vest/waistcoat.  I started it in the middle of March but something went wrong that I couldn't sort out so I decided to unravel it.  I'd only knitted about 30 rows which doesn't sound much, but each row was 104 stitches so they were quite long rows!  I put the whole lot away in disgust and didn't touch it again until the end of March, when I started again.  I went very carefully and fairly slowly so I was less likely to cock it up again and finally, a few days ago, I finished it! I'm really rather pleased with it, as it's actually wearable - you can leave it open, draping down the front or pin up one side at the shoulder (as I'm wearing it below).

And this is what it looks like - I apologise that the photos are not that great, but the waistcoat is hip length and drapes in the front to halfway down my thighs and my arms are just not quite long enough to get all of it in the photo!  I've asked TLH to take some photos for me but it's not stopped raining long enough yet to go outside where the light's better to take them!  So I'm afraid these will have to do for now:






Yeah, and they're mostly out of focus as well but they look more arty that way!

Talking of arty, there was no art class this last Thursday, it had to be cancelled due to the tutor having an exhibition to stage so you'll be pleased to know there's no crappy drawings for you to suffer!  Next week though....

Finally, I've gone back to hooking again!  I found a very nice and easy pattern for roses, so this week I spent a couple of days hooking these while catching up with the entire first series of 'Homeland' (did you watch it?  Bloody brilliant - the last episode was so damn tense I thought my blood pressure was going to do me in!!)  Anyway, these little flowers and leaves are unbelievably cute and my plan at the moment is to make these into brooches which I will put on my VenerableBead stall for the next few craft fairs I have and see if anyone's interested.  If you fancy one yourself, drop me an email (via my profile page) and you can have one for £4.50 plus postage!

This is a red rose one, about to have its brooch back attached:



And this is the collection of hooked roses, waiting to be assembled - aren't they sweet?:



Well, I think that's it from Jones Towers for this week - hope the weather hasn't dampened your spirits too much!

In which some stuff happens and some doesn't....

And so another week passes, as it will do, and I can hear you all clammering (is that a word? Oops, seems it should be spelled 'clamoring', neither of which look right....) for details of what has passed for excitement in my life as it is lived at Jones Towers.

Some things have been achieved - one of which I'm particularly proud of - and at least one thing I was very much looking forward to didn't happen at all, and one long-term project looks like it's going on the back boiler for now (if not permanently, but I hope not).  But let's not dilly-dally, I know you're all desperate to read how I pass my fun-packed days.  That last sentence actually reads sarkier than I meant because it has been a not bad week.

Pluses:

- I finished my third and, for now, final twirly scarf.  I won't post details as it's going to be a christmas present for another member of my family and I'm not sure if she reads this blog or not.  Probably not.  Most people - in fact, I'd hasten to suggest practically all people - of my acquaintance don't. But I don't really want to take the chance so, suffice it to say, it's been made in a nice chunky wool in a lovely colour (one of her faves, so I've been told).  So there.

- The Broad Bean seeds that I sowed in little pots about 10 days ago are starting to germinate.  I start off all my vegetable plants at home and then transfer them to the allotment as it's easier for me that way.  So as today was another gorgeous sunny one, I spent an hour sowing sugar snap peas (mange tout, by any other name) and beetroot.  With a great deal of help from Bruno, the neighbours' young cat who has, rather suddenly, started licking his own fur off his back legs and is, consequently, looking a bit mangy these days. I hope his humans are doing something about it...

- I discovered the Polish chilled food aisle in my local Sainsburys!  I have become a bit of a fan of Eastern European food since spending some time self-catering in Hungary a few years back - for example, I discovered that the chocolate you could get there was not only MUCH better than Cadbury's (sacrilege to say so, I know!) but also about half the price, their yoghurt was just all-around fabulousness in a tub and their version of Jaffa Cakes (which, instead of orange, had fillings of strawberry or cherry or peach) would make a saint cry, so I was more than pleased when I found the new chiller cabinet in my local store.  Yesterday, for lunch, we had Pierogi (a cross between dim sum dumplings, ravioli and gnocchi) filled with cheese and potato.  I boiled them in a pot of water for 3 mins, then transferred them to a large frying pan in which I'd melted a shedload of butter and added sliced onions.  I fried the Pierogi in the oniony, buttery lusciousness until they start to take on some colour, then bunged them in a bowl, grated over some cheese.  If I'd had soured cream on hand, I would have added that but I had full fat plain Greek yoghurt so a big dollop of that was added.  It was very, very yum and incredibly stuffy.  Today, I made a start on the Zawijaniec Sledziowy ze sliwka:

which is, as any fule kno, rollmop herrings stuffed with prunes.  Much nicer than you'd think, trust me - the flavours go together well and the textures complement each other.  But do bear in mind that it's helpful if you like rollmop herrings in the first place, which I do.

And after that, I opened the large pot of pieczone jablko-flavoured yoghurt:

This is Baked Apple yoghurt.  It has pieces of apple and raisins and cinnamon and is one of the yummiest things I have EVER put in mah mowf.  EVER.  I had to force myself to put down the spoon and walk away from it for fear that I would just shovel the entire tub into my gaping maw in one sitting.  It's. That. Good.

Next time I go shopping, i.e., tomorrow, I think I might investigate the various flavours of Kielbasa (smoked sausage) and attempt a small tub of sauerkraut.  Oh, and perhaps one of the other pierogi varieties.  Yum yum.

- So with all this additional calorific intake, it's probably a good thing that - ta-dah! - I completed my first ever 5km run last Thursday!  This is the thing I'm most proud of.  I wasn't quick, oh dear me, no - took me 57 minutes in total - but I did cover 5km (that's 3.8 miles in old money) and, I'm pleased to say, there was more running than walking.  If you recall, I've registered for a 4km fun run at the end of April and, in an ideal world, I'd love to be able to get round that without stopping to do any walking at all so, hilariously, you could say I am now in training!  I was hoping to get out today - Sunday - to do another 5k run but there were other things I needed to do first so I haven't managed to go (and probably won't now) but I'll try and get out tomorrow.

- Last night TLH and I went to the Guildford Civic to see that latest in our classical music concert programme, which was the European Union Chamber Orchestra with soloist Julian Lloyd Webber on cello.  It was fantastic.  A nicely balanced programme, they started with Handel's 'Entrance of the Queen of Sheba', followed by Elgar's Serenade for Strings.  Then Julian came out and they played Haydn's 'Cello Concerto No. 1 in C Major' and I was left totally gobsmacked at his talent.  Look, I found a youtube clip of him playing the last movement of the concerto with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra a few years back (please to be ignoring the frankly alarming shirt):

I played the cello for a year or two in my early teens and, to be honest, I think I prefer the sound of the cello to that of the violin, so this was just glorious.

After the break the orchestra then played Barber's 'Adagio for Strings' which was lush and utterly fabulous.  Even if you're not familiar with the name, you'll know the music, it's been in tonnes of movies and was turned into a trance-house chillout tune by, I think, William Orbit.  I found a youtube video of the entire thing (it's about 10 minutes long) that didn't have any adverts at the beginning.  This performance was from the Proms, four days after 9-11 and was a tribute to the victims, so apologies for the quality but just bear in mind the emotional state everyone was in at the time this was played:

They finished with Mozart's Symphony no. 29 in A Major which I'd not heard before and absolutely loved.  Sadly, I couldn't find a decent enough sounding vid on Youtube but feel free to have a wander over there yourself for a listen, if you fancy it - I recommend it!

- Add to all this, I finished reading Bram Stoker's 'The Jewel of Seven Stars' and enjoyed it far more than I thought I would.  As compared to H P Lovecraft's 'At the Mountains of Madness' which I'm determined to finish even if it's like wading through treacle.  Lovecraft was writing in the early 1930s and Stoker's book was published in 1903 but Stoker's is a much more 'modern' read than Lovecraft.  And it's also easier to read than Thomas Hardy.  I would almost describe it as 'rollicking' except that I thought the ending was a bit of a let-down.  Briefly, without giving away spoilers (because I do recommend you read it, and it's a short book in any case!), it's the story of an Egyptologist who gathers artefacts together at his house in London in an attempt to resurrect the mummy of a dead Queen who, uncannily, looks exactly like his daughter.  And, yes, it's the inspiration for every Mummy film you've ever seen.

Minuses:

- In general, there have been few minuses this week.  The biggest disappointment is that the band I'm in, The Fugitives, was meant to be playing a gig at a Charity Auction Ball at Twickenham on Saturday (i.e., yesterday) but due to the unavailability of our guitarist, we couldn't do it.  This was a huge shame as we've not had a gig since the wedding we did back in April last year.  Oh well.  The upside to this was that TLH and I were able to see Julian Lloyd Webber instead.

- Secondly, the plan that my friend Bev and I had to play gigs together as a duo to backing tapes is looking very unlikely to take off.  At least, not in the immediate future.  She's decided to go back to Cape Verde for a while, to see if she can find work as a musician there.  She has other reasons for going back but I'm not sure how much of her life I should tell you about, let's just say there's a lot to pull her back to the islands.  So on the one hand I'm pleased that she's being positive about where she wants her life to go, I'm quite sad that the resurrection of Casual Sax will have to wait a bit longer.

And that, in all honesty, are probably the only slight bummers to occur this week at Jones Towers.

It's not a bad life, after all, is it?

Ooh, shiny, woolly goodness!

It's Sunday afternoon.  The temperature has dropped and I'm sitting here, laptop on, um, lap, Goldfinger on the telly, TLH playing Skyrim on the computer downstairs and I'm watching the snow starting to fall outside.  Quite big flakes too.

My immediate plans for today, when I was formulating them earlier this week, were to do one or more of the following - go for a run, clear the large pile of prunings that I left in the middle of the lawn with help from TLH, do some digging at the allotment.  Then on Friday lunchtime I went out for lunch with my lovely friend Bev and in bending down to deposit my handbag on a chair, my back went into spasm.  Damn, it was painful.  Extraordinary how such a small, twisting movement can wreak such damage.  It was like getting a really bad crick in the neck but around and underneath the left shoulderblade.

Paracetamol was my friend here (Ibuprofen would be better as it's an anti-inflammatory but it's not good for the stomach - and I get wicked acid reflux - so I stopped getting it) as well as a hot water bottle.  Sat for the rest of the day with the bottle behind my back, trying not to whimper every time I moved.

Fortunately, although still very stiff and sore, yesterday it was bearable enough for me to do my usual craft fair in Alresford.  You might think that sitting on my arse for around 8 hours would be okay, but the chairs are not tremendously comfortable and I frequently end up with headaches the day after an Alresford show so it was going to be touch and go as to how my buggered back would respond.  I took my hot water bottle and used it, and dosed myself up with painkillers and it was fine.  We had a good day as well, sold 12 items and made three figures so, all in all, not too bad.  But there was no way I was going to be doing anything in the garden; I need to be careful until it settles down.  I'll contemplate a run tomorrow, though, depending on the weather.

Oh yeah, the running - it's going quite well.  Last week I managed 2.5 miles (although there was more walking than running) but a couple of days later I did 2.8 miles, this time with more running than walking.  In my last post you may recall I've signed up for a 4km (2.5 miles) fun run on 21 April and my goal is to be able to do it all running.  Speed is not all that important, just consistency of pace right now.  To be able to get the entire way round without stopping to walk is looking surprisingly difficult just at the moment - but I'm working towards it.

Dang - got sidetracked from what I wanted to post about!  Last Saturday there was a 2-day festival at Farnham Maltings devoted to all things yarn-based.  It's a big show for independent wool dyers, spinners, providers of accessories, etc.  I missed it last year but was determined to go this year.  I decided on my budget - £100 - saved from the meagre profits I make selling jewellery - and I spent the lot!

The show is called Unravel and this was the 4th year.  The town had been yarn-bombed during the week and there was stuff around lamp-posts and hanging from shop signs, including knitted balloons (actually balloons with knitted covers) floating above a bridge over a river.  There was a mother and baby sheep in a pen in the shade (it was a sunny, warm day) just outside the front door of the venue.

The place was heaving.  We got there about half an hour after the doors opened and it was rammed with punters, standing easily three deep around each exhibitor.  I decided I wanted to do a once-round look at everything, to see what was available.  I'd got a design in mind that's going to be my next knitting project - a wrap around sleeveless waistcoat/cardigan type thing, that is basically a rectangle with two slits for armholes.  Look, here it is - simple wrap around vest.  Looks easy, huh?

So I wanted some really nice wool to make it in.  I didn't know what colour but I knew the colour would find me if I went looking for it.  I was first entranced by the Fyberspates stand and my eye was particularly drawn to a 100gm skein of shades of green/pale yellow shot through with gold sparkliness.  I knew I didn't want to make the waistcoat out of it, but I also knew I wasn't leaving the building without owning one of these.  Even though it was £21.50!  Pricey, yes, but also hand spun, hand dyed and hand twisted and that amount of work costs money.  Here's the skein I bought:

Isn't it lovely?  It'll go into my stash for now and I'll decide what to do with it later.  I like to see my yarn in the flesh so I get an idea of what the colour is actually like, as opposed to what it looks like through a computer screen.  This means buying wool when I see something I like because lord only knows when I would find it again, if you see what I mean.

I was extremely tempted by the products of The House of Hemp which is, as you might expect, yarn created from hemp stalks, much like linen.  The kits they have for sale are absolutely stunning - beautiful designs and lovely colours.

In the end, I found my yarn at the NiMu Yarns stand on the top floor of the exhibition. They are a small company (not sure, I think it's a husband and wife team) who hand dye specialist yarns in small batches and I loved, loved, loved their colours.  I absolutely fell for a colour shade called Wicklow and bought 3 100gm skeins to make the waistcoat/cardi (it needs 300gms of wool).  Here they are (with added Bruno, being as helpful as ever):

I've tried to show the colours as best I can - isn't it divine?  All shades of blue including sky blue, turquoise and even the palest blue-green.  Utterly, utterly fabulous.  And reasonably priced at £11 per skein as well, so £33 for enough wool to make the waistcoat/cardi - I don't think that's too expensive.

The next thing to do is to wind them into balls as you can't just use the wool straight from a skein, it gets too tangled.  Mum and I wound one skein yesterday while sitting around at Alresford but I forgot to take a photo.  No matter, I'm not ready to start knitting the waistcoat/cardi yet as I'm still finishing off a third swirly scarf.

I've decided to add a line of sequins to the two scarves I've already finished, the ones that are going to be Xmas 2012 presents for my two nieces.  I've not added them to the fern green scarf yet, but I've done the purple one:

I like the little flash of sparkly that you get, and it just blings the scarf up a bit more and hopefully will be more attractive to a pre-teen.

 So I've yet to finish the 3rd scarf, add the sequins and then I'll probably start the waistcoat/cardi.  Or I might start this crochet scarf kit that I absolutely, positively also had to buy.  The Natural Dye Studio stand held me totally entranced when I came across it.  I didn't take photos (it was hot, packed and not easy to take pics) but I'll pinch some photos off the intertubes to show you why I fell in love:

Heart-patteringly beautiful.  Although I'm not currently crocheting, the stand was selling kits for their Iris scarf which contained the pattern and all the yarn needed to complete it, for £25, which is a good price.  Just look at this and tell me that it doesn't make you catch your breath:

Here's a better picture that, again, I've nicked off the internet (sorry):

Just stunning.  This is the wool that comes with the kit:

 This has added Sylvester Bean, at the door keeping an eye on Bruno, his current nemesis.

See all the lovely colours?  Each little skein is variegated in colour and is made from 100% wool from British Bluefaced Leicester sheep (although this one doesn't look very blue to me...):

The whole thing is crocheted on a 2.5mm which is pretty damn small.  But it's going to have to wait as I have other stuff to knit first and all those little skeins also need winding into balls so, frankly, it'll be a miracle if I get round to doing this this year, but at least I bought it when I could.

So this was what I did last weekend, and I thoroughly enjoyed fondling yarn and spending my hard-earned dough.  Talking of which, I didn't get the job (or even an interview) that I mentioned briefly a couple of weeks ago.  It was for a part-time Document Assistant for the British Museum.  Basically, working on the museum's database of lithic artefacts in its stores.  In other words, data entry.  Yeah, I was massively over qualified for it but I thought it was worth a shot.

Never mind, I've got plenty of other things now to fill my time!!

PS.  Results of boob squishing arrived on Friday - all clear.  Hooray for disease-free bosoms!