Darkside of Knitting

What the???

Mobiles, crop-tops, perfumes: Would YOU buy these items for your children?

We all knew the world was mad didn't we???

posted by Suzi @ 2:14 PM 1 comments

Knitter warm thyself!

Here they are finally done, I finished them on Tuesday, I wore them out for the first time today, not quite warm enough for today's weather unfortunately I don't think. May need to work on something thicker.
(Side note: Still the only project on Rav is mine, I am Googling now, someone else somewhere has to have made these???)

I was out yesterday, and had taken my needles and the yarn to start the matching leg warmers to go with my new arm warmers but discovered I had forgotten my pattern. Always something, but the elderly lady I was visiting lent me some needles and offered me a selection of yarn choices from her stash so I'd have something to do.

I give you what I have dubbed Bubblegum Lolita...

The yarn is something she bought from a discount store while holidaying in Queensland, I'd take a confident guess that it's acrylic by the feel. But anything else about it is a mystery.

I am making a textured scarf with it, a very simple 6 pattern repeat and I absolutely love it. It is so not what I'd normally buy myself, but the colours were so funky I couldn't resist them at all.

I'll try and take a picture of the current view outside, a real pea souper if ever there was one. And having watched the a documentary about the alleged Vampire Princess from Bohemia who may have inspired Bram Stoker, well what can I say? Now I'm all inspired!
Edit - Here it is! Imagine if you will a mad woman hanging out a window to take this, a wild haired woman in slinky arm warmers having vague photo journalist aspirations...

(Another)Edit - Not sure about the swirly smoke, maybe someones fire? I don't think I really got what I was hoping for.

posted by Suzi @ 4:41 PM 1 comments

Doh!

I've mislaid my diary which had my piece of paper with all my details of the arm warmer I was working on written in it.
Because I last worked on it, about three weeks ago, I don't even remember where exactly I was up to.

I am most annoyed because I am up to the middle pattern section and it was flying along at great speed and I actually thought I would be getting it done and starting my leg warmers by now. It's just driving me mad.

But aside from that I have been keeping some very unsociable hours watching P!nk and Bill Bailey. Made my stomach sore after attempting to do belly rolls, eventually got it, rolled up from the bottom to the top, then top to bottom and back up again, then down. And then I couldn't get it to do anything, must have been a bit of a fluke.
What prompted this was I got a new DVD, arrived from America in a week which surprised me, I wasn't expecting it for at least two the usual time for anything to get here. I've been quite excited about it as it's with Ariellah who I have read loads of good reviews about both the DVD and of her live workshops people have attended. The DVD also has quite an extensive yoga section for both warm up and cool down, and since yoga is about the only sort of physical activity I am actually quite reasonable at I feel I am getting some use out of my DVD if I decide I don't like belly dance after all.

Until now I have been obsessed with Sharon Kihara (if Angela from Bones and Abby from NCIS had a love child it'd so be Sharon). Attempting to blunder along to her DVD, 10 out 0f 10 times my upper abs will work, 9 out of 10 my lower ones won't and I don't have nice floaty graceful arms either. Personally I think I look like some mad person trying to fly, only in slow motion.

I keep debating about baking, I seriously think a chocolate cake is in order. One with chocolate frosting, yum! Or even just Nigella's Totally Chocolate Choc Chip Cookies again. So good!!!
Although something I haven't eaten in forever and I am madly craving Welsh Rarebit!

Much to my excitement I did actually find frozen raw prawns that Nigella always talks about and I am always despondant I can never find in my supermarket. I brought them home and popped them into the freezer, I've always wanted to try the yellow Thai pumpkin and seafood curry she had in Nigella Bites. Although while I have always seen red and green Thai curry pastes, I have yet to strike yellow? But I saw someone on one of the cooking shows making something the other day with yellow paste so there may be hope yet, but it is possible to sub out red or green according to Nigella so I may have to make a green version. There's always green curry paste knocking about as it's in the Curry in a Hurry which is an absolute gem of a curry.

Something else I am loving at the moment is the new TV series Castle, it is exactly what I have been looking for! It's not just another crime show, which Miss Stash suggested it might be. We watch it every week now, I like that it's actually funny and it's not too serious about the writer they need to have solve their crimes for them. Miss Stash finds it has grown on her and she really likes it now. But tonight we find out if we like the new Miss Marple. The last one truly got my goat, Miss Marple is just the harmless fluffy little old lady sitting knitting, remarking how someone reminds her of the butcher's boy or the so and so's nanny. The last Miss Marple wasn't like that at all, she was a bit too forward and they did have a tendency to fiddle with the stories a bit. Some of them they took the artistic license a bit too far I felt.

I'll be watching tonight with bated breath and a vodka cruiser in hand!

posted by Suzi @ 2:23 PM 5 comments

Tweet tweet!

No I have not acquired a little birdy, but signed onto the Twitter madness. You can find me there as DarksideKnitter and mostly hear about how much I loathe Economics and my fears for my impending doom as the exam rolls around. It's the day after tomorrow. Eeeep!

Twitter has also allowed me a bit more of a glimpse into the life of Matt Hardy. Long time readers will be familiar with my lust fueled obsession of Mr Hardy. For new readers unfamiliar he's kind of the non-thinking woman's Mr Darcy.
Since I also have a lustful obsession with food I have been following with great enthusiasm what he's been eating, yep he tweets about it, I know where he went and what he ordered. Which I find most intriguing, but mostly because I love hearing about what people are cooking and eating or ordering and eating as the case may be.

But getting back to what I most want to talk about, is this too much information? Is telling us all this merely pouring petrol on an already lit fire? Someone with far more game than I have actually rang the restaurant Matt Hardy tweeted about while he was there and asked to speak to him. While I like having this kind of all knowing all seeing look into his life, well I like this about everybody's life, I am quite nosy I love knowing how other people live.

Well if anybody gets any phone calls that are heavy breathing followed by "So what are you eating tonight?" you'll know who it is. It is I suppose slightly classier than "What kind of underwear are you wearing?".

posted by Suzi @ 9:15 PM 1 comments

School's Out!

Well not exactly summer, maybe winter, and technically there is still exams, but I am taking a couple of days to decompress, which are very very badly needed.
I'm just a teeny tiny bit stressed and crabby, but the final assignment went in today so I can breathe a sigh of relief for the time being.

The second arm warmer is knitting up quicker than the first, I think because I have the pattern still etched in my brain. After this those leg warmers are going to fly by! Yeah! Then I can plot what to make next and buy some suitable yarn for it, double yeah!

Having seen the new issue of Family Circle I am in love with a chunky yarn rug, just the sort of thing I need now the weather is getting cooler and I have more evenings free to watch late TV! Or simply re-watch Bill Bailey DVD's. Miss Stash can't get over how often I can quite happily sit through these even though I've seen them a thousand times.
Well what can I say? It makes me laugh everytime, it's never not funny. Which is I think is a really wonderful thing.
And I am also really inspired by the Owl Song, especially as just before seeing it I spied an Owl-omtery someone had made. Very cool! I love owls they are such beautiful birds.

I anticipate to get most of the second armwarmer done tonight, just make myself at home in a comfy chair and get stuck in.

posted by Suzi @ 5:01 PM 1 comments

I find myself with just 2 weeks of classes left at school which includes 3 tests and 1 massive project!
Then the joy of study week, the blasted Economics exam would fall on the very first day of the exam period, fortunately not till the afternoon, if it had been 8am I don't think I would have coped at all.

I caught some of Insiders on ABC, and how scary is this, I actually knew what they where on about when they had a chart on screen talking about deficit and GDP. I can't believe I know that! Or that I can actually relate it to something in Real Life. Weird.

Writing a blog post is just another attempt to put off studying for Economics, I really don't like Economics. I'll be glad when it's all over, however I would have liked the exam to be on the very last day giving me a bit more time to revise.

On the other hand Bus Info Systems is shaping up to be my star subject, Distinction on my first assignment and then a High Distinction on my first test! I've got one test and the big project to go (and no exam another reason I love it!) so I'd like to give it more time to keep my good streak going.
I've unofficially decided (as my mind never seems to stay made up)to stay for an extra year and squeeze in a second degree, probably no surprises here, computing. Alas I fear (or should I say know) for a degree in computing at some point there is programming. Yuck.

My life at the moment is a major explosion of recipes and knitting patterns, possibly as I subconsciously seek to occupy myself with things other than school work. We had Curry in a Hurry the other day, every time I eat it I can't wait to eat it again. So nice, I'd also like to do the Irish Cream Tiramisu again.
Since I am kind of in the mood for something sweet, Instant Chocolate Mousse or the Holiday Hot Cake with Eggnog Cream would also be nice. I love steamed puddings haven't had one in years, and I just so happen to have a bottle of Advocaat lurking about in my cupboard. A lot of obscure liqueurs lurk in my cupboards.
There's just something very retro about them all, and cocktails in general and I love that! It's like cookbook's from the 60's and 70's, it's like looking at another world!
Most excellent!

posted by Suzi @ 2:40 PM 1 comments

Onwards and upwards! Or maybe that should be downwards?

***EDIT***Had to add the latest photo!



***End Edit!***

After handing in an assignment yesterday lunchtime I was able to go home and get stuck in to my knitting, I had Happy Days in the DVD player and I just knitted merrily away.

This is where I got up to last night by the end of Midsummer Murders...just two pattern repeats to go and then the final rib and casting off! So working down to the hand is perhaps the description I want? Or working up to it?
Mine is the one and only project for the Slinky Arm warmers pattern on the Rav. Which I am disappointed about as I would have loved to have seen other people's of this design. I may have to Google and see what turns up.
As Miss Stash said to me it is kind of an obscure book, roller derby themed knit book is not going to be as wide spread as say a SNB one. (Of which I am still waiting to hear more about the next one!)

Heres a couple of lovely shots of me actually modeling the arm warmer, the first allows you to admire the fab colour changes and the second will hopefully give you a close up of the "clover" pattern!

And does it ever feel good on! Really lovely, I can not stop raving about this yarn! I'm actually wondering (not in this colour though) how it would do for Intolerable Cruelty?

posted by Suzi @ 1:13 PM 1 comments