Merry Christmas!

Yes, this will be my last post until Christmas. Tomorrow morning me, Thomas and Hobbe are going down to Borås to spend the weekend at our parents' homes over the holidays. My parents only have sucky internet, so I won't be posting anything until I get home to Linköping again. So I thought I would take some time today to wish you all a very merry Christmas (or any other holiday you might be celebrating)! I hope you all get to have a fun and relaxing weekend, filled wtih family and good food!

I managed to finish all (actually it was only two) my Christmas knitting too, I blocked the last one on Sunday. I can't wait to get to show them to you, as I'm really pleased with both of them. I have to admit that I really don't like working under a deadline though! Even though I enjoyed making both of these projects, some of the joy went out of it as I felt I had to work on ONLY those two projects until they were done. I like to alternate between different projects, so I'm really happy that I get to go back to knitting on my ordinary projects now!

I'm working on three things right now, that have been WIP's for a while. The Evenstar shawl has been sadly neglected for quite some time, but I'm really looking forward to have some quality time with it over the weekend.

I'm also working away on my Paper Dolls sweater, and I've almost finished the body. Which reminds me, I have to bring my dpn's with me to Borås, so I can start the sleeves! This has mainly been worked on at work, as it's been more or less mindless stockinette knitting so far. But after the sleeves are attached, the colourwork will begin, which will be fun. Can't wait to get this finished, as this is the second time I'm trying it!

And finally, I cast on for a pair of socks on Sunday night, and yesterday we had a really slow hour at work, right before lunch, so I've almost finished the leg! This is one of the patterns from the 10 models for €15 that I bought a while ago. The pattern is called Pink Ribbon socks, and I'm using my Limmo Design Handpainted sock yarn in colourway Rosebud, that I bought at the sewing festival this past September. It's great to work woth, and it looks really pink and pretty in real life!

And if you're wondering why I'm writing today in the middle of the day (it's noon here), it's because my stomach is acting up again. It started on Sunday morning (which made me miss Anna's Christmas evening party!), and has been a bit on the fritz since then. Not too much, I've been to work Monday and Tuesday, but today it was worse again. If things don't look better tomorrow I think I'll have to cave in and take an Immodium, because I want to be able to enjoy all the Christmas food on Friday. I really don't like taking those pills, as they sort of stop up everything for a couple of days, which tends to hurt a bit, but for this once it might be worth it.

Oh, and on Saturday me and my sister went to the movies to see the new Harry Potter movie! I was a bit hesitant about it, as I found the last book to be a bit slow (good anyway, but there was a lot of just travelling back and forth). So I didn't know how that would work in the movie, especially since they've divided the last book into two films. But it was surprisingly good, and apparently it's been too long since I read the book because I didn't remeber much. It has a lot of sad parts in it, and now that I'm off my antidepressants and back to my normal, sappy self, I cried a lot. Thank God it's dark in the theatre! I'm glad I don'thave to wait longer than the summer for the last one though, as it's really close to the end now.

And can you believe it's been snowing more and more?! We have about a meter of snow right now, and yesterday it was almost -15 Centigrades outside! Brrrrrr! I'm so over the winter already, and ready for spring, but sadly I think I have to wait a while. Last "spring" the snow stayed until the beginning of April, and I bet it will be the same next year. Ugh! They're saying that there will come a huge snow storm on Christmas eve, bigger than in the pst 40 years or so, so we'll probably be trapped inside for the whole day!

Now I'm going upstairs to see if I can't wake my husband up. He has the day off today, and he likes to sleep in, but now it's noon and I think he should get up and spend some time with me instead. I've been up since 6, so I'm getting a bit bored!

Have a wonderful holiday everybody, and I'll be back next week!

/ Jenny

Busy busy busy!

Yep, it's been a couple of busy weeks lately, but I'm going to start by telling you the most awesome news: I got offered to stay on at a permanent possition at my job! YAY! I was so excited I even forgot to ask what the pay would be, I'm just so glad to have a permanent job! Especially since I love the job, and I love my co-workers, and I couldn't be happier.

Yesterday I went on a shopping trip with my sister, Sanna, and our friend Anna. We were out for about five hours, and I finally managed to find a new winter coat (and you won't see it modelled today, as I'm still wearing my bathrobe and yesterday's make-up).

I've had a brown one for a couple of years, and I can't for the life of me remember why I bought it in the first place. It's too tight, it's got a very unflattering fit, it's pilling, and it's BROWN! So it's going into retirement (I think I'll give it to goodwill), and tomorrow I get to use the new one. We've had our first snow these past two weeks, but it's more or less rained away this weekend. But it's still cold enough (barely) to warrant the winter coat.

I've also been doing a little bit of knitting, with emphasis on little. I'm now up to 560 stitches on the Evenstar shawl, and every row takes me forever. It's continually growing though, although I doubt I'll finish it this year (can you believe it's Christmas soon!).

I'm also working on the Wanida socks, and I've almost finished the first one. The yarn is working great with the pattern, and I really want to wear them, but I'm usually too tired to knit when I get home in the evenings, so I rarely knit on them. I'l get them done though. Probably this year too :)

And finally I'm knitting on the Paper Dolls sweater, and it's coming along nicely. I've finished the waist decreases, and I've almost finished all the increases too. It's looking really good, and this one is probably the one I'm working the most on. I'm working on it at the coffee breaks at work, so I usually work a little on it every day. I know that the ribbing fits this time, but I think I'll have to try it on soon again, to see that the waist is ok this time.

Oh, and I'be bought myself some new books as well! I first picked up a copy of the new Cookie A. book, Knit. Sock. Love. (Ravelry link). I LOVE this one! Cookie must be the most talented sock designer there ever was, and I want to knit ALL of the patterns! Too bad I've still got lots of patterns in the Sock Innovation book left to knit, as I want to knit ALL of those too! 

I also bought the Brave New Knits book (Ravelry link), and I have to admit that it was mostly for the new Ysolda Teague pattern, the Orchid Thief Shawlette. However, this book is a real gem, with lots of mini biographies about all the designers. And there are lots more patterns I would definitely consider making for myself other than the shawlette too, which is really nice. I think I'll read it all through once I'm done with what I'm reading right now (I'm getting to that in a minute).

I also got two books with amigurumi crochet patterns: Välkommen till Virkligheten (It's rougly translated as "Welcome to the Crochet Reality, but it's a pun on word in swedish that doesn't translate) by Annika Messing, and Virka Roliga Amigurumis (Crochet funny amigurumis) by Mia Bengtsson.

These are both swedish books, with lots of cute patterns in. I own the first amigurumi book by Mia Bengtsson too, Virka Amigurumi - Söta Små Glädjespridare (Crochet Amigurumi's - Cute Little Joybringers), and I just need to find the time to actually learn how to crochet properly...

I also picked up some fiction literature, the first being the new Stephen King book, Full Dark, No Stars. I finished it today, and boy was it good! I know, I'm a bit biased when it comes to mr King, but this one was actually a lot better than the last couple of books he's written. It contains four novellas, all dealing with how ordinary people deal with different kinds of catastrophes. I particularly love how mr King writes character descriptins, and these four novellas all contained some pretty awesome character portraits. Just an Awesome book.

I started a new book today too, a graphic novel by Neil Gaiman. I think I've told you before that he's my second favourite author, after mr King, and I LOVE that he does comics as well as "normal" fantasy fiction. The book I'm reading now is Marvel 1604, which is a story about what it would have been like if the Marvel Heroes (X-men, Fantastic four, Daredevil and lots of others) had lived in the 17th century England. I've not gotten very far yet, but I like it so far. Bear in mind though that I've not read any Marvel Heros comics before, so I have nothing to compare it to.

I finally bought the newest Discworld novel, by Terry Pratchett. It's called I Shall Wear Midnight, and I haven't started it yet. But so far I've loved all of mr Pratchett's books, I think he's hillarious with just a bit of edge to the satire he writes, so I'm really looking forward to this one too. I read somewhere a year or two ago that mr Pratchett has gotten diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, and it will be a huge loss for the literary world when he quits writing. Hopefully it won't be for years and years!

Now that I've been on Ad Libris (the swedish book site) looking for pictures of all the books, I just realized that there are TWO books by Joe Hill (Stephen King's son, he's almost as brilliant as his father) that I don't have yet! Maybe I'll just have to place a new order tonight...

Today has been a really lazy day! I've just been sitting on the couch reading and having a very nice skype chat with Anna and Sarah! I wonder if anyone knows if you can have a video conference with more than one person at once on Skype? We couldn't find that function, so we've just had audio chats today, but it would be fun if we could all see each other as well. I don't think it should be impossible, right?

Now I'm going to pick out my food from the oven (fishsticks and french fries, nothing healthy for me tonight!), but I'll try to be back next weekend with a new update. I hate that it's been two weeks since last!

/ Jenny

It's Alive!

Yey, I've finally gotten my own computer back on track! Well, I say I, but really it was Thomas who fixed it. I bought the hard drive, and he put it in and installed windows for me. Other than that, I've fixed everything else (like, installing openoffice and google chrome...). Now I can FINALLY add photos to the blog again!

So, just to get you up to speed: Here are the two yarns that arrived for me this past week:

Chili Gredelin Madame, colourway Forest Berries (55 % silk/45 % cashmere, 366 m/50 g)

Nyansera Halo 2-ply, colourway Spring Grass Orchid (100 % baby alpaca, 800 m/100g)

Pretty, right? I didn't notice until I got the second parcel that they are actually pretty similar in colour, but the Halo yarn has more orange tones in it, and the Madame one has more pale pinks.

I'll also show you some of the photos from my wool washing. Here is the basket with wool right after I pu it in the tub with HOT water. Notice how the dirt sort of seeps out from the basket into the water?

Here it is after three washes with shampoo and two rinses with water:

I haven't gotten a photo if the teased wool yet, but I'll show it to you once I've got a little bit more done. For those of you who don't know (I dodn't know until about three days ago), teasing is when you pull the locks of wool apart, to make carding a bit easier. It's a great way to remove any left-over vegetate matter that's still in the wool after the wash, and also to remove any matted or otherwise damaged wool.

I've also knitted a lot these past few days, but I haven't gotten around to blocking anything until today. Here is my Owls sweater drying upstairs:

I haven't pinned this one out as I don't want to increase te size. I just patted it a bit into shape, just to get the stitches more even-looking. You can't really tell in this photo (stupid flash photography, we're having grey skies and wind today), but the eyes are some purple oil-coloured beads I found in my stash. I'll get a photo of me wearing it once it's dry.

I'm also blocking my Guinevere gloves right now, but I think I'll wait to show a photo of those until I can get a photo of me wearing them. The bright blue colour of this yarn made it almost impossible to photograph, and the tiny lace pattern was completely obscured by the flash. They are really pretty though, and I am almost looking forward to Winter so I can wear them!

I've also made some progress on my India Stole:

I've finished 3.5 of the 12 charts, so a quarter done at least. I love, love, love this yarn (Chili Gredelin Simone, colourway Sheer Apricot, 30 % silk/70 % alpaca, 800 m/100 g)! 

And if you haven't noticed, there is also another project lurking among my WIP's (as you can see in the right column): The Evenstar shawl. I haven't really started this one yet, as I think I want to finish the India Stole first, but I can just barely keep myself from casting this one on. It is just so pretty, and I'm going to use my Wollmeise Lace yarn in colourway Sabrina for this one. I made a swatch a couple of weeks ago, and talk about stitch definition! It is going to be awesome!

Other than that I've not done much this past week. I actually managed to come down with food poisoning Thursday night (I think it was te pizza), which wasn't much fun at all, but it was over pretty quickly at least. I've also gotten a pretty boring cold, and I'm almost coughing my lungs out, but I think it's marginally better today. Which is good, as I'm going back to work tomorrow, and I can't call in sick as I'm very, very needed. I think I'll have to be almost dying to actually get a day off these coming weeks :) But it will be good to get back to work, and get some steady routines again.

Ok, back to knitting! I'm so enjoying having finished all my non-lace WIP's, so I can focus on the lace shawls again :)

/ Jenny

Found a pic!

Hi again!

I'm still not quite finished with my thesis, so I haven't gotten around to taking any pictures of my work. But I remembered that I acually have one picture of a tiny cat-sweater I made for my previous cat, Gizmo. He was a Devon Rex breed, so he had very little fur, and with a sweater on we could go outside in the spring and fall, even if it was a little cold. So I knitted a sweater from a pattern I found of a dog-sweater, and this is how it came out! It was finished around mars 2008. Sadly, Gizmo passed away in september 2008, so he didn't get to "enjoy" the sweater for very long. But we decided to bury him in it, so that he won't be cold in cat heaven.

On a happier note, I think I have decided to order one or two english books on knitting. One of my summer projects is to learn the knitting terms in english as well, so I can read english patterns, so I thought I would start with a book. I found out today that I got just over 2000 Kr (which equals about 200 Euro) etra on my paycheck, so I think I can afford a couple of books this month. The university that I work for gives a contribution if you're a union member, to pay for union fees and such, so that was where the money came from. But since I've already payed my fees, I think I can spend these money on something nicer.

Now, I'll get back to writing for work again. Hopefully I will finish the thesis tomorrow, so I can go on vacation!

/ Jenny