Easterly winds are blowing the Siberian winter cold
down over us; so even though the sunshine, when it’s there, makes it look like
spring is close by, it is bloody cold. I went out around noon to hang new feed
balls for the birdies in the naked branches on the lilac standing beside the
terrace – the same lilac that provides a lovely, dappled shade on warm summer
days – and my fingers were numb after a minute. Good thing, then, that I could
hurry back inside with a clear conscience: the critters are taken care of; and I
made myself some hot coffee in my huge Starbucks Scotland mug.
So, this week is a bit different: on Tuesday, Thomas,
my 17-year old, and his class went off to London for a week. Not that I’m
jealous, though I haven’t been there in almost three years ...
Anyway, I drove him and a couple of girls to the
airport in Aalborg, about an hour’s drive. That was fun, having a pair of
giggling teenage girls in the backseat; with three boys, I don’t get that a
lot. Now, you may wonder why we brought girls along; wouldn’t it be more
obvious to choose boys, some of Thomas’ friends? Well, he happens to be the
only boy in the class.
This is the extreme end, or nearly, of a common
phenomenon in a Danish gymnasium
class: the ones orientated more towards language and literature consist mostly of
girls, and the science classes have about half and half. In my class way back
in the days of the dinosaurs, there were four boys to about twenty girls, the
usual ratio.
And Thomas’ class did start out that way; and then one
boy dropped out, one moved away, and one decided, when they had to make their
final choice of study field halfway through their first year, that he preferred
the sociology line and thus changed classes. Then Thomas had to choose if he,
too, wanted to change his original choice and follow the other guy, or stay
with the languages and the girls. There was also the matter of the Latin
teacher, an old hag elderly lady to be endured for another year; several
people actually opted out of Latin because of her.
In the end, he stuck to his guns, again choosing the ‘super-linguistic’
field comprising English, Spanish, German, and Latin.
Oh, and by the way: the school hired a new Latin
teacher, a young man. I’ll bet some girls regretted changing ...
So, now he’s away in London, going to the Globe
Theatre, Tate Modern, walking the streets and probably visiting some of the
South Kensington museums, as they are staying right around the corner from them
... I was looking into the possibilities of stowing away in his suitcase, but
it didn’t pan out. Of course, with a female English teacher and so many girls
in the class, their schedule includes both the Portobello Road and the
Petticoat Lane markets; and they were advised to not bring any more than
necessary for the trip over.
Well, I have been known to do that, too – though I
preferred to give the kids a morning off to go or not go to markets, as they
found best, rather than scheduling a visit.
It’s not all fun and games, though: as they are
travelling with English and History, they have been studying immigrants in
London, particularly from Bangladesh; so they are going to Banglatown to see
for themselves. And to Westminster, maybe even the Parliament; the Royal
Observatory in Greenwich merits a half-day trip, as well.
They will be landing in Aalborg around midnight
tonight – and yes, they have the Monday off.
The
Knitting:
Ravelry celebrated 3,000,000 members this week – on
Friday, 8th March at around 9:30 p.m. GMT+1.
It seems not very long ago that the 2 million mark was
reached, on 29th February 2012; even though I was new to the site at
that point and hadn’t even started reading or posting anything. So, 2 million
people signed up in the first five years, and a million more in just 13 months.
That is pretty amazing.
Ravelry itself is pretty amazing, as I’m sure you know
– and if for some reason you don’t, get over there and have a look! Five people
are running a huge site, free of charge, with databases of patterns and yarns, discussion
fora (though they call them forums), groups for just about anything you can
think of. And Ravelers are such nice people, friendly and helpful and skilled
and ... you can see why this is my go-to site for anything related to knitting,
including the social part. Why be on facebook? (I know there are reasons to be
on facebook, I just haven’t found one compelling enough to actually do
something about it.)
The Interminable Killer Socks of Doom, aka the Blues Riffs
socks, are done! – I was right about the second sock being much quicker than
the first, primarily, of course, because I didn’t have to unpick and re-knit four
times; but also because I could see the light at the end of the tunnel and so
prompted myself to move faster and get them done with.
The only hiccup occurred when one of my dpns broke: it
snapped right in the middle of a row, and of course it was the one in my right
hand with two dozen stitches on it. And it was one of my new KnitPro cubics! So
these socks have a lot to answer for by now.
But Victor loves them, and that is all that really
matters, after all. Seriously.
In case you haven’t read my lamentations over these
socks, these are the facts: the pattern is Riff Socks by Lise Brackbill, from
Knitty Deep Fall 2010. I made them in Bumbo sock yarn bought at a local
supermarket (føtex), a nice enough, inexpensive workhorse yarn that comes in both
solid and multi-coloured colour ways. I made the XL size for Victor’s size EU
45 feet (UK and US 11); but I left out the final gusset increases and did the
size L for the heel – after I had made the size XL heel and undone it because
it was way too big.
I have officially started working on the next birthday
sweater for my nephew, Emil, who will be 2 years old at the end of this month.
That is all the information I am putting out for now: when it is finished and
given, I will post pictures and details here and on Ravelry; and the pattern
will be written up, thoroughly checked, and put out, too.
In all this, my Juniper jumper has not been entirely forgotten:
on Friday, I had less than 40 rows left on the second sleeve, and then there
were just the plackets, neckband and the final finishing (as if finishing could
be anything other than final) to do. So, a bit of TV knitting over the weekend
should do the trick; and I started on Downton
Abbey. I know, I am late to the party ... what can I say? Mostly, I feel
like I have dozens of books waiting for me, and they are prioritised.
Anyway, three episodes saw the rest of the knitting
done, and the finishing was accompanied by vampire stories on Saturday. A while
ago, Victor bought The Vampire Archives
on Audible, an over 60-hour long collection of – well, stories about vampires.
So I am set up for a while with those; I may break it up, though, to not be
overwhelmed. Audible has broken the book up into eight parts for download
reasons; I could listen to one part each week and alternate with other stuff.
Back to the jumper: I did the plackets and neckband in
ribbing instead of stocking stitch, because I prefer the look, and I’m not
really keen on the rolling edges that you get with stocking stitch. I can see
that my shoulder increases are a bit tight; I will have to remember to loosen
them up next time around (yes, I am planning at least one more driftwood).
And I found some buttons that I bought on a school
trip to Paris back in my teaching days in 2006; they look good with the yarn
and go well with the theme of the jumper, as the yarn itself, Rowanspun DK, was
bought on sale at Liberty’s in London in 2005, when I was there with my sister.
So there you have it – or rather, I do; but you can, too: an easy to knit,
laid-back comfy jumper that has cost me nothing (I know the last bit isn’t exactly
true, but it feels like it).
And after that, I will try the monogamous knitting
thing, until the birthday sweater is done – or until I break down and grab
something different. Monogamy usually
isn’t my thing. I’ll keep you posted on that.
I may find, though, that I need some TV knitting, and
the birthday sweater is too – shall we say, interesting – for that; so I have
dug out a half-finished Hitchhiker scarf to be prepared for that eventuality.
You may remember that I started this Hitchhiker back
in the autumn as a Christmas present for my mum and then put it aside when she
requested something different. Well, after I had dyed the yarn and started
knitting the other shawlette, a Cassandra, she commented favourably on my
Hitchhiker; without knowing, of course, about the one in progress. So I decided
that she is still getting this blue beaded one, for her birthday. Which isn’t
till June, but there is no harm in having it done.
And it will count towards my 2013 goal of finishing or
frogging old UFOs: I had seven of the buggers left over from 2012, either
hibernating or just snoozing; and so far, I have actually managed to get rid of
two of them.
The geekery of the week is Doctor Who-related: I was
listening to CraftLit, episode 249 containing chapter 2 of Gulliver’s Travels – and an interview with Kate Atherley about,
among other interesting stuff, her pattern in Knitty Spring 2012. This Knitty
Surprise pattern is the Bigger On The Inside shawl featuring both a Time Vortex
and a row of TARDISes ... and what was I wearing? My very own BOTI, the one I
made for the Ravellenic Games 2012. And it’s not like I live in it: most days I
have around my neck the above mentioned Hitchhiker, and sometimes the BOTI,
when I feel like it or the colours I’m wearing call more for accessories in blue
rather than rainbow.
That’s not all, though: the girls of Knit 1 Geek 2
reminded us all once again that this is the year of The Doctor’s 50th
birthday, so to speak, and is anybody knitting The Scarf? Well, yes: when at
some point the snowstorms let up and spring really arrives, I will be getting
back out to my well ventilated dye studio to mix up the seven colours for it,
and then I can get into the miles of garter stitch that make up this iconic
scarf.
Victor and I have been watching Revenge of the Cybermen this afternoon, giving me ample opportunity
to study the length and colours of it.
Speaking of CraftLit, I managed to subscribe (on the
third attempt) and thus gain access to the Premium content; so far The Canterville Ghost and Wuthering Heights – and Cool For Cats by Andrew Ordover (the
husband of Heather) at a discount. So now I have three more audio books sitting
in my phone and waiting to be listened to at some point. I may save them for
when I finally catch up with CraftLit; I am used to making a playlist per book
and devouring the whole thing without having to wait for the next chapter, so
that will be tough. On the other hand, it will be nice to get the newsy bits
when they are actually new.
That’s the chat for this week – I will return to the
vampires and the birthday sweater.
I hope you have had and will have a good one; and as
ever: keep happy, keep healthy, keep crafting!
No comments:
Post a Comment