This week was interesting since K finally got his stitches out and ditched his crutches - but not after causing huge amounts of fuss and complaining so much that I ended up not going to the Knitting meet up in Dubai - still have not forgiven him for that nearly a whole week later! Anyway he is pretty much getting back to normal now, and has started barking his orders out and shouting at everyone regularly, so he must be feeling better! Do you get the feeling I am not too in love with him right now!!?? Ha ha I guess its all about being married for 17 years I fall in and out of love with him on a weekly basis!!!
So whilst I could not go to knitting, I decided to start on a project with Freddie. He is doing a jungle themed project at school and has to produce various educational projects as suggested by the teacher. Now a lot of these involved paper, paint and glue, and anyone who knows me knows that whilst I love anything crafty I really do not enjoy small children and paint in the same sentence - my sister is brilliant at this sort of thing, but I have no patience and worry constantly about immovable stains on the furniture!!
However if there is anything which could be remotely connected to knitting I am a very happy bunny! So firstly we made different coloured mini snakes using the French Knitting Dolly, each was a different length and Fred had to measure them and write down what he found. However I was not going to stop there...........oh no, I was inspired! So I decided that we should go for a more ambitious project which could get him involved in knitting. Keeping with the jungle theme (and also the emphasis on snakes which he wanted) I decided to cast on the Curly Snake by Susan B Anderson. The project was supposed to encompass numeracy so Fred helped me by counting the numbers of stitches I cast on, then adding the increases so that he could come up with the total number of stitches for the main body of the snake. He then helped stuff it as we went along and measured every little while until we got to the right length! He really enjoyed it and was encouraging me to knit all the time (no encouragement needed of course!). We finished it off on Saturday night and he was thrilled to bits. Now we just have to write about it in his project book - way better than mopping paint up off the floor I think!!
Anyway here is the little snake and photos of Fred helping!
He (the snake that is and not Fred!) was made from some very old sock yarn by Opal that I had in my stash. It must be about 8 or 9 years old since I bought it with the intention of knitting socks for the first time and then managed to get completely freaked out by turning the heel and gave up! So it has been languishing in the stash for a LONG time. Have to say that the Opal wool was one of the first self striping yarns for socks, but boy oh boy its not exactly super soft sock yarn - way more 'traditional' so not too sure I would make socks out of it now. However for this project it was perfect!
Aside from that this week there has of course been a lot of work and I am still really tired and could do with a holiday......but its coming!
I have worked quite a bit on the Serpentine Socks and I think they should be finished by the weekend since I am knitting with my friend Liezl tonight and then again on Friday with the UAE Amiras. I also finished off a baby sweater which had been a UFO for a while now, just need to add buttons to that one!
STILL the mohair bolero/shrug sits in the UFO box shouting loudly to finish it! Its been in there - I am ashamed to say - for 2 years now.................I should finish it, I really should, since if I don't I seriously think its going to haunt me forever!!! But there is SO much seaming to do as all the cuff and collar bands are knitted as seperate pieces and its BLACK mohair..............
Oh well until the next time....................
