Saturday evening staying-in indulgences: wine, knitting, and home-grown strawberries/raspberries. As I write this, please excuse the frequent pauses to take sips of wine. Also, the increasingly slurred writing as I proceed through this post…
The Stoic Spouse is away for a few days visiting relatives, so I’ve been pottering about at home with the Toddler Twinnage, observing the garden:-
Now I’m not someone who likes pink (sorry), or roses (sorry), but even I concede that the above is quite a beauty.
Anyway, despite distractions by camera cases and so on, the knitted mandala is most definitely proceeding. Witness:-
(Look, you can see a bit of the reverse there, right at the bottom of the picture. Anything longer than five stitches and I’m ‘catching’ my yarn, in order to avoid over-long floats.) Actually that photo doesn’t really show much of the design. Let’s try again:-
Those needles were part of the Deramores prize (a set of Knitpro Symfonie Rose interchangeables). They’re rather lovely and smooth and warm to work with. None of the roughness of bamboo, or the cold over-slipperiness of metal. I read somewhere that they’re painted to look like rosewood rather than being actual rosewood, which does seem a tad cheaty. (Huge apologies if I’m wrong.) But as I said, knitting with them is pure pleasure, and I’m most definitely grateful for this bit of the prize.
Anyway, I’ve finally been able to put my crocheted hanging basket away, because the real hanging baskets are at last beginning to raise themselves off their lazy floral backsides. Here are a few sample blooms:-
And some fuchsias. I have fond memories of fuchsias: a kind-hearted woman called Joy looked after me in the evenings when I was a child, and she was the most amazing artist. I still treasure a beautiful painting of a fuchsia that she gave me, partly because it’s a stunning piece of her artwork and partly because I know that she loved these flowers so much.
Anyway, it’s fortunate that the allotment has come along, because my fruit-and-veg crop from home is pretty rubbish this year. Basically, I’ve been feeding the slugs and snails. Hope you enjoyed it, slimy invertebrate blighters. But today has been about strawberries and raspberries. Yum. Look!
And look!
‘Til next time, yarn-lovers. And bastard veg-thieving slugs.
I’ll admit to being less impressed with the needles and more so with the fact that you appear to be knitting this mandala impeccably from the sketch you made of a mandala!! [Which fact totally blows my tiny mind!] And what are the dangly gold beads for? Are they being knitted in or are they a marker of some kind? And before I forget again – because they have featured in previous posts – I LOVE your scissors 🙂 So cute!! All in all most impressive! Especially as all the while you are parenting a twinnage of the toddler persuasion. I am getting almost nothing done whilst [attempting] parenting one pup!
Ah, the scissors. 🙂 They get more attention than anything else on here. I’m thinking of giving them their own blog. Actually they’re just cheapies from Amazon (about £3), but they are quite cute.
The dangly gold beads are a stitch marker, marking the start of each round. I’ll be cutting the knitting down that line when I’m done. Eek!
As for the toddler twinnage, they pretty much parent each other. 😉 A puppy would be much harder work. How is he?
Sounds like a perfect Saturday night in!
Yup. 🙂 If you’re going to stay in, you may as well enjoy it.
What a lovely Saturday evening. Your slugs have been fed the very best; if I were inclined to eating slugs, I imagine that they would be tender and delicious. 😉
Please feel free to come round to my house and eat all of my slugs ANY time. I will give you my address. I will pay for your taxi here. Anything, as long as the slugs are gone.
Ummm…would it be possible to incentivise (never bribe, of course 😉 ) the toddler twinage to be my proxy agents? You know, 10 slugs will earn you 2 strawberries, sort of thing? 😀 It would be a great counting game! And cheaper than sending me a taxi.
Hmmm, sadly the toddler twinnage are weirdly unbribeable (which is frustrating, because that was pretty much the only parenting strategy I had up my sleeve). Sorry, but the slugs are yours.
What a nice post,Phil!And I have the same knitting needles at mine and I completely and totally agree with you!It’s a real pleasure handling and working with them!
Thank you. And yes, these needles are lovely. They make knitting a joy.
Nice to be reminded it is summer somewhere – whilst we are in the midst of winter down under
Oops, hope it doesn’t count as tactless, posting about sunny days! Actually I love reading on people’s blogs about the different weather and seasons we’re all experiencing. You can get your revenge in November when I’m whinging about the rain and cold!
Love your photography.
Thank you. It’s a work in progress, but I’m learning slowly.
Beautiful pictures and colors and textures! But no photo of the bubbly? 🙁
OK, OK, would you like some champagne? *Passes bottle and a glass. Snatches back glass to check it’s clean. Passes it again.*
I’ve been reading The Mandala Book by Lori Bailey Cunningham (the one you were thinking of getting) – beautiful photos of mandalas occurring naturally in the universe, plus some intriguing insights into sacred geometry and the spiritual significance of mandalas.
Oh wow, that sounds like everything I hoped it would be. Glad you’re enjoying it. I’m so so so tempted to be naughty with the credit card… Seriously, would you recommend it,given that it’s quite expensive?
Yes, I’d recommend it, but don’t splash out on a new copy – I got it second hand in good condition from World of Books on Amazon for under a tenner.
Thank you for sharing this insight into your saturday night in you really had me smiling with the closing comment. I love reading your posts, you make it feel like a conversation, I feel you could almost be in the next room calling out to me.
Awwww, thank you. You’re very kind. It is fun to write these things, and I’m a lot less shy about randomly chattering on here than I am in real life.
Now, on to more important things. I was at last packing up my crocheted birds yesterday to send to you for your MOST EXCELLENT CHARITY YARN-BOMBING PROJECT when one of the toddler twinnage saw me and cried hysterically at the prospect of losing the birds. So I’m going to have to make something new for you. Is a few more days’ delay a problem?
I’m quite simply mind-blown at how gorgeous that mandala is! The green/cream combo will look fantastic when you embroider in that gold. If it doesn’t end up as a wall hanging, an over-sized jumper would certainly be a show-stopper. Not to mention those strawberries and raspberries are mouthwatering, no luck down here where we’re all freezing to death!
Awwwww, thank you! (As for freezing, I always feel a bit guilty posting isn’t-the-weather-nice comments when half the world is suffering winter. But you can get your revenge in December when I’m grumbling about how cold and grey it is here!)
“Bastard veg theiving slugs”!! Gosh, I love that, made me laugh
Thank you. 🙂 And believe me, if you met our slugs, you’d say the same.
The mandala is looking fabulous, can’t wait to see it finished!
Thank you! (Nor can I, after the number of hours I’ve spent knitting it…)
Very pretty mandala, some projects just take forever huh?? lol 🙂
those strawberries look perfect 🙂
So glad you are taking part in the Liebster Award – maybe you’d like to put those slimy pests into Room 101? ;-D
Knit faster please! x