Bank holidays ROCK!
Oh, how I love bank holidays. That extra day off just seems to make such a difference, and turns a normal "Oh my god I've so much to do" weekend into a "relax, take it easy, plenty of time" type of weekend. And as a result, I'm sure I manage to achieve more ;)
This weekend has been so lovely, not least because the sun has decided to shine throughout. Saturday was a lovely lazy day. Did the weekly trip to Sainsbury's then enjoyed a leisurely couple of hours trawling through the many sock patterns I have downloaded over the last few weeks, in preparation for Socks #2.
I scored a couple of great buys on eBay last week - a ball winder for the princely sum of £3.70 (!!), which I've already had great fun with, and some beautiful botany wool 4 ply hand dyed sock yarn in "Sugar Blue" -100g for just £4.99!!
And so I've discovered another wonderful thing about knitting socks. COLOUR. You see, there are lots of colours I think are pretty, or cool, but which I would never use to knit a garment because the colours just wouldn't suit me, but with socks, well anything goes! So, yes, I can knit something with this oh so girly yarn in candy shades of pink, and cool blues.
I decided in the end to just go with a straightforward 2x2 rib and stockinette combo. I then plan to branch out into a pattern for Socks #3.
On Saturday afternoon, after we had fed and watered the livestock, we and the dogs piled into the car to drive to my little brother's for a gathering of the clan. This was to celebrate my dad's 70th, which was a couple of weeks ago, but they were on holiday with my big (rich) brother at the time. It was a lovely evening. The 4 nephews (Alistair 12, Tim 11 - belonging to rich bro; Ben & Max, 5 year old twins - belonging to little bro) had great fun playing in the garden with the dogs while the adults sat around and ate and drank to excess. What more could you ask?
Unfortunately I forgot to take the camera - doh! Will have to ask little bro to email me one of the inevitable family portraits we had to pose for - pics kindly taken by little bro's friend Chesh who was also attending with his wife Sally and their baby, Jake.
I do just have to mention that 11 year old Tim is over 5'6", wears size 10 shoes, and his voice is breaking. Alistair is of similar size and his voice broke about 6 months ago. Is this living proof of the effect of a couple of generations who have benefited from generally better diet and the NHS?
Yesterday was an equally lazy day. I spent a couple of hours in the morning planning the breeding programme for the goats for this autumn. The bucks have to be put in with the does in a few weeks' time, so it's a case of deciding which does are going to which buck (of 3). We have decided that as we have the space now, we will kid all of our breeding does - that's 23 if they all take! We've only previously kidded 10 at most, so we'll be very busy come next February / March.
In the afternoon, I cast on the socks.
Today I have spent the morning doing housewifely things - changing the bed, hoovering, ironing - ugh!
This afternoon I will settle down in the garden and knit.
This weekend has been so lovely, not least because the sun has decided to shine throughout. Saturday was a lovely lazy day. Did the weekly trip to Sainsbury's then enjoyed a leisurely couple of hours trawling through the many sock patterns I have downloaded over the last few weeks, in preparation for Socks #2.
I scored a couple of great buys on eBay last week - a ball winder for the princely sum of £3.70 (!!), which I've already had great fun with, and some beautiful botany wool 4 ply hand dyed sock yarn in "Sugar Blue" -100g for just £4.99!!
And so I've discovered another wonderful thing about knitting socks. COLOUR. You see, there are lots of colours I think are pretty, or cool, but which I would never use to knit a garment because the colours just wouldn't suit me, but with socks, well anything goes! So, yes, I can knit something with this oh so girly yarn in candy shades of pink, and cool blues.
I decided in the end to just go with a straightforward 2x2 rib and stockinette combo. I then plan to branch out into a pattern for Socks #3.
On Saturday afternoon, after we had fed and watered the livestock, we and the dogs piled into the car to drive to my little brother's for a gathering of the clan. This was to celebrate my dad's 70th, which was a couple of weeks ago, but they were on holiday with my big (rich) brother at the time. It was a lovely evening. The 4 nephews (Alistair 12, Tim 11 - belonging to rich bro; Ben & Max, 5 year old twins - belonging to little bro) had great fun playing in the garden with the dogs while the adults sat around and ate and drank to excess. What more could you ask?
Unfortunately I forgot to take the camera - doh! Will have to ask little bro to email me one of the inevitable family portraits we had to pose for - pics kindly taken by little bro's friend Chesh who was also attending with his wife Sally and their baby, Jake.
I do just have to mention that 11 year old Tim is over 5'6", wears size 10 shoes, and his voice is breaking. Alistair is of similar size and his voice broke about 6 months ago. Is this living proof of the effect of a couple of generations who have benefited from generally better diet and the NHS?
Yesterday was an equally lazy day. I spent a couple of hours in the morning planning the breeding programme for the goats for this autumn. The bucks have to be put in with the does in a few weeks' time, so it's a case of deciding which does are going to which buck (of 3). We have decided that as we have the space now, we will kid all of our breeding does - that's 23 if they all take! We've only previously kidded 10 at most, so we'll be very busy come next February / March.
In the afternoon, I cast on the socks.
Today I have spent the morning doing housewifely things - changing the bed, hoovering, ironing - ugh!
This afternoon I will settle down in the garden and knit.
posted by Carolyn at 1:07 pm
3 Comments:
Thanks for your comment on my blog about the socks and the wedding.
I am very intrigued by your smallholding. Is this something you have done for long? I gather from your blog that you have recently moved - hope it hasn't been too stressful!
Take care now - it's nice to meet you another UK knitter! :)
Iris
x
PS: I love how your clapotis has turned out!!
Thanks Iris.
We started our venture into livestock in February 2001 - just as foot and mouth ravaged the country (we were living in Cornwall at the time and it came very close to us). We started with 3 ewe lambs, 4 pygmy goat kids and 9 angora does in kid. Four years later and here we are with 58 goats and 40 sheep! It's been a steep learning curve - and the more animals you have the greater the chances of something going wrong (illness, difficult lambings/kiddings, birth defects - all of which we now have some experience of). It's great fun though, and I wouldn't give them up for anything.
The move went very smoothly thanks. It's so lovely to see all the animals happy and settled (we've moved 3 times in 3 years, and don't plan to move again for a while!)
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