The Light Fantastic

More knitting news for you all- I have, as well as finishing my cthulhu, finished my Pratghan square for this month. This is for book 2 of the series (see name of post) and I think I'm pretty chuffed with how it turned out.

I started off by knitting the blue square background and using intarsia to put the turtle and the sun on it. I then added the detail in by hand and embroidered on the fun bits like the elephants trunk, shell detail, baby turtle, and the discworld. The elephants ear and the turtles flipper I knitted up separately and stitched on afterwards. The variegated yarn edging was necessary to make the square the right size but I picked a colour that was meant to represent the swirl of magic that fills the air after the book has been read. I had to crochet this border on which was a new one for me. I really struggled to get that part completed but thanks to someone nice on Ravelry giving me some ideas it got done. I was ready to scrap the whole things at one point and put it through the paper shredder but I'm glad I stuck with it.
The next book is going to be harder I think. It's Equal Rites and so far I can't fix an image in my mind as to what I think might work. I'm still reading the book though so maybe by the time I've finished it I will have figured something out.
Oh, and it is square by the way- it just got a bit scrunched up in my bag.

Excitement

So you know how I said that I wouldn't ever do any crocheting until they made a left-handed crochet hook? And how I said I had a secret project that I was going to spill the beans on today. Well, guess what- I've only gone and done some crochet!

Cthulhu: "Mwhahaha! Hear me brief mortals for I am the Harbinger of Doom!"
Everyone else with fingers in ears: "I can't hear you!"

Ain't he just the cutest? I used the Tiny Cthulhu pattern that a most wondrous lady has posted on Ravelry and given all us mere mortals access to. There is also a blog accompanying this that has even more details than you can shake a stick at.
I've been thinking Cthulhu thoughts for a while now. This was mostly set of by the best friend e-mail me a link to Cthulhu slippers. After having delved a little deeper and coming across him in his many incarnations (most recently in Munchkin Cthulhu which is another topic for another rant as Munchkin is one of the best board games ever!) I realised that I just had to have my own. So I set out to find a pattern and after hurumphing my way around the internet for a few months I gave in and decided that crochet really was the only way to go. I enlisted the help of a friend who has been telling me I should learn this skill for ages and set to it. I think she quickly realised that I wasn't kidding when I said I was cak-handed and inept at crochet but she persevered and lo! Cthulhu was born. To say that I am feeling all pleased and smug would be a huge underestimation. I did manage to turn his head inside out before doing the tentacles so he has a weird ridge around his brain cave but I think it only adds to his appeal. And now that I've figured out how to do the pattern there are plans for more. I already have a mark2 cthulhu underway- this time with a spiffy red jumper, but what I really want to do is a giant cuddly sized version that I can squoosh when I'm watching films in an evening. Finding the yarn for him will be the trick I think.
Anyway, I'm off to play with my new toy :)

Travelling scarf- next installment

Sorry for the extended hiatus people- I have been either lolling around in the doldrums or zipping around like a very busy bee. I do have a number of exciting things to share with y'all now which is good though I'm only going to let you have a little taster today and save the really good stuff until tomorrow. Not that this scarf isn't exciting you understand but I have something really peachy to show you tomorrow- I just have a little bit left to do on it and then I can show you.
Anyway, here is the latest travelling scarf that I have just posted on:

Hmm, the pictures doesn't do it justice at all as it's really lovely in real life. All the colours blend into each other very well and it is so soft in the hands. My section is the top one with the red thread through it. I have taken a close-up photo of it
but as you can see- it's really not that good as it makes it look like a grey blob. I did do something a little more funky than a plain stocking-stitch block I promise. I used some slip stitches with yarn forwards so that there are little lines of yarn across the block in a staggered pattern. The lady the owns this scarf requested something in black or grey and that we keep it manly. I love how many different shades of grey have been added. It's like a little monochrome rainbow.
As I have done for the other scarves that have passed through my hands I have added in some stitch markers. I thought that I'd put in some really pretty girly ones on this occasion.
In other news I have been working busily away on my secret project. I'm not going to say anything else as it deserves an entire post to itself. I have also been getting on with my next Pratghan square. Well, more sort of despairing over it really but I had a break through about three days ago and I'm feeling much better about it now. I had been threatening to put it through the shredder at one point it was driving me that crazy. I think that that was all linked in to the general meh feeling that has been getting me down for the last week or two. Thankfully I seem to have shaken most of it off now and I'm generally in a much more productive frame of mind. I think that this is partly because I have so much to do now that Christmas is creeping closer and closer. I have three big birthdays to deal with in December- my husbands, my fathers and then my mothers (who has her birthday on Christmas eve), so there's lots of organising of presents, visits and parties to be done. It doesn't help that my husband is absolutely pants at Christmas shopping. I knew that this year was going to be both hectic and expensive so I started my shopping and knitting in October. Those presents that I have yet to buy have at least been thought about. I think I know what I am getting for everyone now except maybe my brother-in-law. Yes, you heard it I'm sorting out my brother-in-laws present. I asked my husband this morning about his lack of concern over all this and he protested that he had done some stuff for Christmas as he had already got a present for his father (he bought two birthday presents by accident so it's been sat on the side for like three months now). I pointed out to him that that was all well and good but it wasn't much use it being on the side in our house when his father lives in Scotland. I think I was a bit mean to him bringing this up so early in the morning whilst he's trying to drive me to work but I had this horrible premonition about the next phase of the plan and just knew that it was going to involve me going out and buying wrapping paper, wrapping said item, writing the card and putting it in the post.
Anyway, enough about Christmas as I'm almost bored of it already. What I really want to enthuse about is the Traveling Scarf group that I am a part of on Ravelry (yeah, like you didn't know that already). Other than having the chance to work on all these fantastic scarves that I've been showing y'all I've also been helping out on the Welcome Wagon Team and taking part in the Big Swap. I got my first swap gift yesterday which I still haven't stopped humming about yet. I really wish I had had the sense to take a picture of it as it is just so beautiful. It's a skein of Indigo Moon fingering weight yarn called 'Sunshine' and its a lovely soft buttercup yellow colour. Oh, it's so scrumptious that every time I think of it I get a little warm feeling of squee inside. Now all I need to do is think of a project for it which is almost as much fun as receiving it. Yay! I am definitely feeling a bit more cheery now.

Not quite there yet

Well, I'm almost back to normal. I still have that distracted feeling that is preventing me from really getting on with anything but it's down to fits and starts now rather than a full-time experience. I think it helped that we had friends over for the weekend which distracted me from the meh and after a few hours I was starting to get itchy fingers. I couldn't work it out at first but suddenly it struck me- I wanted to knit. Normally I sit and knit when we have friends over as I'm more than capable of knitting and talking at the same time now after many hours of practice but on this occasion I just hadn't been interested enough to touch it. Once I realised though that the mojo might be sparking a bit I decided that I would deliberately ignore it. I didn't want no bitty bit of mojo- I wanted the whole thing back! So I sat and ignored the feeling and it was almost getting to be too much and then our friends slapped down the trump card and produced the new Mario Kart for the Wii. This then took up several hours as we raced our way around mushroom kingdoms. I won three trophies for coming in first- once just among our little group and twice for winning outright overall mwhahahaha. After this glorious triumph I picked up my needles and started to knit up a storm. I worked on the scarf that I am making for a friend from knitting group and then tackled the next square for my Pratghan. I manged to intarsia a passable discworld, elephant (not sure which one of the four that it will be) and Great A'Tuin all floating around through space. Only problem is that the square is a bit small so I am going to have to pick up some stitches and knit a bit more around the edge. Better that than the other way around though- I can add as many stitches as I need but there's no way to take them back off again. I filled in a whole afternoon with this little diversion and finished it off just in time for bed. The positive feeling of achievement was just delightful and I think it's the first time all week that I felt proud of something that I had done so it was time well spent me thinks.
Two other good things happened over the weekend (and not just that we had lovely guests over). The first thing is that I got my new winter coat on Friday. It is my Christmas present from my in-laws so it's a bit early but I was cold and the coat is just beautiful so I wasn't going to put it away for a month and half. It is a red wool coat. A wonderful fire engine red knee-length warm as toast wool coat. It has a belt with a big buckle round the waist, buttons to do it up and a high collar that can be worn either flat like a normal coat collar or done up so you look like Wilfrid from the Bash Street Kids (only more pretty). I love it. I didn't expect to- I have been searching for a red coat for ages but with extra vigour since the in-laws said that they would get it for me as a Christmas present. I have wanted one ever since I saw one in Paris when I was on honeymoon. I have regretted not buying it ever since and when searching for this one it was the idea I had in my head for how the coat should look. This led to much searching through shops and on the Internet. Nothing quite matched up until I decided to stop looking for a coat like that one and just see what they had in the shops. A week later I own a wonderful coat that I am so so happy with. Just goes to show really...
The second thing that happened was that all the potential problems that I might have had with my swap group on Ravelry have just melted away. No need to stress there then so I am very glad that I decided not to worry. This has left me free to get on with sorting out my first swap gift (which is now complete and oh, how I would love to show you a picture of it as it is just so pretty), my Pratghan square on which you have already been up dated and finishing off the two remaining Christmas presents that are to be done. I just need to keep the mojo revved and hopefully all will be well.

Bubbles make me feel better

So after a looooooooong soak in the bath and a couple of days of not doing anything I am starting to feel a little bit more like myself. My knitting is still on stand-by though I have come with a fab little idea for something to make for my swap partner in the Travelling Scarf Group on Ravelry. I can't share it with you for about another 5 months so I'll try not to mention it again.
Talking of the TS group I feel compelled to mention just how great it is- in fact, it's awesome. Everybody that I have met via this group is just amazingly nice. One of members is real sick at the moment (much love going out there) so what do you think has happened? They've started a collection to buy her a laptop thats what because she keeps on insisting on crawling to her computer just to look after the group. How wonderful is that? It's so wonderful to see the outpouring of emotion and love that is being sent to her to say thank you for all the support she has given us. I've hardly been in the group any time at all and I already feel happy in my new found family.
The swap that the group has been working on has been going real well so far though I have a couple of potential problems in my group. I'm trying not to mention it to anyone at the moment as it's a bit too early to panic. Oops, maybe I shouldn't be saying anything here?- ah well, it really is too early to worry about them so it doesn't matter. Anyway, I'm off this evening to the shops to hunt down the necessary item for completeing this months gift for my swap buddy and then I can get it in the post next week. I really hope I've pitched it right- her main interest is in something that I know very little about so I hope that I'm on the right track. Of course the main problem with all this is the amount of time I have to spend snooping around the internet looking things up. I keep finding stuff that I want all the time. The thing that I now want most of all in the whole world is one of those little sticks and chart kits for working out wpi of yarns. Many of the patterns that I love turn out to be american and say things like 'sport' or 'worsted' weight on them which confuses me once I get into the shops to buy yarn.
Ah, it's that age old problem of shopping isn't it girls?

Can't beat the feeling?

Then join it. I had another frustrating day yesterday where I seemed to spend all my time flipping back and forth between one job and another and not really accomplishing anything. My house is littered with bits of knitting and projects, my office looks like a hurricane passed through it and me?, well I'm starting to think that someone new has been put in charge of the brain controls and they are just fiddling round with all the dials and switches to see what happens.
So today I'm taking a new approach. I figure that if I'm feeling a bit dysfunctional at the moment then instead of fighting it and getting stressed out I'm just going to have to quite literally press the reboot button. So this evening I intend to go home, run a hot bubble bath and sink into it. I'm not going to touch my knitting, think about how much work still needs doing in my house with regards to painting and decorating or how much cleaning there is that could be done. In fact I'm not going to do anything other than lie there until the water gets cold and then I'm going to go to bed. Everything that needs doing to going to go on pause and I'm not going to feel guilty about it at all.
I will probably be thinking of knitting though. The next travelling scarf has arrived and is going to take some thinking about (although not much as it's quite a simple one really), I have to work out what I'm going to get for my swap buddy as her final gift. I have figured out most of it but not what I'm going to get as the final gift that is to be sent in March as it has to be something a bit special. I also have to work out what I'm going to do about gifting the organiser of the swap who has been working tirelessly behind the scenes on our behalf. I have to send some other stuff to her anyway as she has also been running all the competitions and sending out prizes but I think she deserves a little something for herself. The only problem is that she's been getting a lot of RAKs recently so I think that she's going to be stocked up on soaps, candles and yarn for a while.
So there's a few things for me to muse on. I think the important thing will be not to expect to get anything done and then I can't feel bad about my indecision. Hopefully this will drown the meh out.

Gratuitous linking to get extra competition entry

Go here for a chance to win a copy of the sequel to 'Friday Night Knitting Club'. It's a put your name in the hat competition and just requires you to leave a post. Don't say that they didn't make it easy enough for you :)

Meh

Harumph, harooo, am feeling a bit meh. I have had an extraordinarily long day at work and now I am tired and feed up and can't decide what to do with myself. Unfortunately this is not a state of mind precipitated by my day at work, it is something that has followed me since yesterday. For the first time in ages I had a whole day where I didn't have anything to do. No plans, no commitments, no nothing. And so what did I do? I sat around on the sofa watching House whilst being plagued by indecision. Nothing I started seemed to keep my interest for more than five minutes. I couldn't get comfy, I couldn't decide if I was thirsty or hungry, or if I was, what it was that I wanted. I tried reading, playing cards, three different knitting projects and still I could make my mind up and before I knew it it was six in the evening and I had wasted the whole day feeling bad about not doing anything whilst not getting anything done. If only I could have decided not to do anything to begin with then anything I did do would have felt like an achievement but no, that would have been too easy.
Instead I wasted a day, felt bad and then carried on with it today- though I did kinda get good stuff done today but in a very slow, boring, cold way that very few people would appreciate if I told them. What I want is a big, warm, furry project that has loud, brash results that give me the instant gratification and feelings of fulfilment and success. I am fed up with feeling meh but can't do anything but sit here and go meh at the thought of doing anything. A paradoxical situation me thinks but when the meh has got you then there's nothing that can be done but to try and find the reboot button.
Where, oh where did I leave that thing this time? If anyone finds it out there could you give it a good prod for me please? Even my knitting is failing to inspire me at the moment which must mean that its a serious case. Oh well, for this evening I will just have to hope that chocolate has all the answers.

In knitting news

Gosh, for a knitting based blog I seem to have been wandering away from the subject quite a lot recently. So in knitting news: I am working on my pa's socks and a third pair of spirogyras for Christmas gifts. These have kinda not been going anywhere recently as I had to first finish off my Pratghan square for October. The first month was for the book The Colour of Magic and I go a trifle carried away with it all I can tell you. The basic square was very easy to make- I knitted it out of thick black yarn and added in some hand spun octarine wool. This was the first time I had attempted to spin yarn so the results are a bit lumpy but I was pretty pleased with it by the time I had finished.I needle felted the skull on and then embroidered the rest. There are little links to the book all over the square- the octarine is knitted into a octagon shape, there are eight tentacles, the dice add up to eight, I worked snake eyes onto two of them as a sign of bad luck, finally the little symbols stand for Rincewind (wizzards hat), the luggage (check out the tiny pink feet) and two flowers for Twoflower. I am immensely pleased with way it turned out and can't seem to stop gloating to anyone who will listen.
The next book is the Light Fantastic and I have already picked out what I am going to be doing for that one- in fact I knew that before I started this one. I got the yarn for it out of the knitting groups box the other day so I am all set to cast on this weekend.
The other thing that is slowing me up is this scarf:

I got the pattern for this from the Ravelry group 'Almost Knitty' which hosts patterns that were rejected by Knitty for on reason or another. To be honest I'm not sure why I cast on for this as I have so many other things to be doing right now. I guess it was because I thought it would look nice in this yarn I had in my stash and one of my friends from knitting group said she was drawn to grey wool at the moment and it all kinda happened from there really. I've been enjoying knitting it. It is just complicated enough to keep me interested whilst be easy enough that I can memorise the pattern. The only thing I don't like is that it has an obvious front and back- normally I would refuse to knit a scarf with such a blatant error in it but I really liked the finish look and I knew that it would be going to a friend. It is quite a short scarf as well, more the sort you tuck into a coat than the ones that I usually wear that are super super long even after you've wrapped them round your neck three times so she should be able to wear it right side up without any problem. I'm about half way through and have been steadily adding three or four inches a night. Really I should be working on the last of the Christmas gifts but I can't seem to find the enthusiasm for them at the moment. Hmmm, the wips are building up again.
Sigh
Better do some knitting then hadn't I? ;)

Still on catch up

Can't believe how busy this week has been. I think it comes from volunteering myself to help out with the swap that the Travelling Scarf group is doing on Ravelry. I've had sooo much fun and have met so many nice people from doing it but it does mean that I've become totally addicted to checking my rav page every five minutes. I really want my swap group to have fun and for all of it to go really smoothly for them so I've been putting in a lot of time to keep up with e-mails and correspond with people. I'm gonna have to kind of rein my enthusiasm in a bit this weekend though as I need to attend to my own swap buddy and get her first gift sorted out. I have it planned but I need to go buy something from town before putting it into action. I shall say no more...
Anyway, in an effort to finally catch up with myself from over a week ago I want to share just how wonderful my pumpkins were for Halloween this year.

This is Hoshi enjoying a scratch. I was trying to get her to sit next to the pumpkins to pretty the picture up and provide some kind of size reference but she kept trying to get me to stroke her so this was the best that I could do. Both of these pumpkins are home grown. The one on the right is mine. My husbands pumpkin died so technically I win the pumpkin competition but I did say he could have the one on the left after the other snuffed it so he's arguing he won. The massive pumpkin was rejected by both of us as being too weedy- guess we don't know a thing about pumpkins then.
This is what my husband cut out of his pumpkin- a big Red Sox 'B'. My mum found a pumpkin carving kit for him via the internet that has stick on stencils and the most awesome little carving saw with a handle in the shape of a skeleton.

And this is what I did with my pumpkin. You can't see it terribly well (I was taking arty photos at this point) but I carved a quote from Funny Bones on it- it says 'on a dark dark night' round the top and then I attempted to carve a wood, a road and a town with street lights.


Finally, my best friend had given me the cutest smallest pumpkin I had ever seen when I visited Cambridge the other weekend. I decided to go with a more traditional approach for this one and I think it probably ended up being my favourite. It took an entire ten minutes to cut, scoop, carve and get a candle into.