Snawpaws, finished!

I mean, seriously. How could I not knit matching mittens for my super-excellent snawheid? Especially when Kate Davies was offering the snawpaws pattern for half price to those of us who had already bought snawheid?

I know.

I cast on, had a wonderful 10-hour-round-trip to Durham in the car for epic knitting sessions (thank you, husband!), and now I have warm paws!

To match my warm heid.

I'm not 100% sure about the length - a lot of people on Ravelry went down to 5 rows of snowflakes, rather than the suggested 6. They are rather long on me but very warm, and I think ripping one set of snowflakes out would make them a little bit too short.

Ravelled, here.

In keeping with the wintry theme, this picture was taken from my office window, a few weeks ago. The frost on everything was absolutely stunning.

Latke season!

Hooray! It's latke season! Melissa Clarke has posted a video & recipe for those of us who do NOT have Jewish mothers to teach us how to make them.

Oh, and it's also hat-making season.

And model-making season (for the Husband).

Autumn (and a review)

It has felt really autumnal this week - the clocks went back on Saturday so it is now Properly Dark when I leave work. It has been windy and rainy but not super cold (yet), which is nice.

John has been making hot chocolate - lactofree milk, cocoa powder, and a little bit of brown sugar. James wanted whipped cream last weekend, so we bought a spray can (hadn't bought one in years and years!). Mmmm. There was plenty left, even after the boy put a giggle-worthy amount of cream onto his hot chocolate. Then John went all artistic with the cocoa powder. I feel like it's not a particularly unhealthy drink - a small amount of sugar (no more than you'd put in a cup of tea), a glass of milk, and some cocoa. Ok, well, until you add the whipped cream, anyway. That's only for special treats, I promise!

I finished Jodi Picoult's newest book, Sing You Home, last night. I read it in 2 days (how does she write books that just fly by?). I really enjoyed it, even if parts of it made me gnash my teeth in frustration at the characters. I tried listening to the music that was specially composed by a friend of hers for the "soundtrack" (the protagonist is a music therapist and singer-songwriter). Just, no. Oh, well. It's pretty hard to live up to the fictional amazing songs of a fictional character where every reader superimposes their own ideas of an amazing song onto the music.

Silver linings

Bad news: our shower has been leaking.

More bad news: we couldn't figure out why.

Good news: we figured out why today!

Bad news: it was because the tiles at the bottom came off in John's hand when he removed the grout. Thanks, Crest Nicholson. Tiles are NOT supposed to be attached with grout and hope. You need something stronger.

Good news: our neighbor the builder is coming to help.

Bad news: today was a cold, rainy, and generally grim winter day.
Good news: these daffodils look so much MORE yellow and springy against the grey background.

On the shortest day

Well, I put this little chap up on the shelf a few weeks ago. And the weather seems to have followed his instructions, to the letter. Let it snow, then.

I'm not a huge fan of winter. Christmas in general stresses me out (I'm a buyer, so Christmas starts in March), I REALLY don't like the super-short days, and no matter how much I try to convince myself that I like curling up in on the couch with a blanket, reading my book, with a hot chocolate, I'd much rather it were summer and I could sit outside. 

I do, however, like the following: knitting, flannel pjs, piles of heavy duvets and quilts on the bed, Christmas music (Britten's Ceremony of Carols, Kate Rusby's Sweet Bells, Tori Amos' Midwinter Graces, and traditional English carols). I also like slippers, my Owls sweater, and scarves.

Ok, so maybe I don't HATE winter. Today, however, is Solstice, so while it's cold and dark and snowy (the true Bleak Midwinter), spring is coming! Not just yet, though.

I'm in the middle of the latest Kate Morton, The Distant Hours, and I like it. It feels a little over-long in places, but the story is good and I'm looking forward to the unravelling of the mystery. It must be soon - I'm on page 507! My reserved copy of Wolf Hall (I think I might be the only Book Geek on the planet who hasn't read it yet) arrived at the library and is waiting for me on the nightstand, so I will have something to curl up with between Christmas and the New Year.

dark and light

It's starting to feel properly wintry. I've been wearing my new LLBean down jacket to work, with a hat and gloves (especially on the days when I have to walk to the train station), and today was the Owl Sweater's first outing. Of course, because it's insanely warm, I didn't wear a real jacket with it. Mmmm owl sweater.

It's also now starting to get dark around 3:30. Twilight hits around then, and it's seriously dark a few minutes after 4. This was a picture I took on a bike ride over the summer. All the fields are ploughed and muddy now - the golden wheat has long been harvested.

Here is the sm. boy, with my current quilt-in-progress. It has now been sandwiched and quilted (with blue polka-dotted flannel backing), and the binding has been sewn to the front. I think I need about another 2 1/2 hours of hand-sewing the binding to the back and I'll be all done! Oh, and in case you were wondering, the binding is ORANGE. Like, really, really orange. It all looks rather awesome. You can't see from this picture, but the squares reading as black are actually brown with orange and blue swirls on them. A few Amy Butlers, an Ikea (the green critters), the last scrap of the sheep print from PurlSoho, a tiny piece of leftover Liberty, and some really fun Michael Miller Groovy Guitars.

I also have a small announcement to make: I think I might be a yarn snob. I stumbled upon a new yarn store today, which shall remain nameless to protect the guilty. I eagerly hopped into the store, to discover that it was ALL acrylic. No, wait, there was one very small rack of exceedingly scratchy 100% wool. Who knits with this stuff? And why? When there's so much amazing yarn out there? Shudder.

One more appeal to the interwebs - in last month's Martha Stewart Living they featured several entryway coat racks. I LOVE this one, but it's there and I'm here.

I can't find anything even vaguely similar over here - they're all either really twee or really industrial. Suggestions, Brits?

Photo Catchup

I'm lazy and have only just uploaded a few weeks' worth of pictures from my camera to the computer. Here is Kate Rusby, singing up a storm:


This one was taken from a rooftop parking lot in Cambridge - the light was so wintry and cold - I HAD to take a picture. Brrr.


And this is the Stowmarket Santa. I think it was the Rotary club or something similar- they were blasting carols and collecting money. It was really funny and oddly surreal, though. Sorry he's a little blurry - I still haven't quite figured out all the camera's settings.


Mom & Dad sent us a care package, which arrived yesterday. It had great stuff: some English Christmas lights from the 1980s that had somehow made their way back to New Ro (and still work!), some personalized ornaments, an ornament from my Grandma's tree, matzo ball soup mix, two of my Harry Potters, and all of my French Horn sheet music. YAHOOO! Since I didn't have the matzo ball soup mix when I was sick last weekend, I had chinese noodles with chicken stock and lettuce - it's definitely in the same genre.


It's been really frosty lately - this is our honeysuckle bush, looking like a Christmas tree (according to James).

Snow, again

It's our second snow of the season - eek!

I managed to snap these pictures from our living room this morning - it turned to rain a few minutes later and was a lot less pretty. Oh, and the orange blob isn't the sun - that's me forgetting to turn off the flash. It was at 6:30am so I think I'm allowed a little leeway. It looks really serene and wintry, though.




It's DARN cold in the flat - we saw the new central heating system in the house yesterday and it has radiators that can be set on timers. Decadent, really.

We haven't packed any more boxes - John was in London today for work and the trains were all messed up so I had to pick him up in Ipswich at 8:30 and we've just had dinner. Tomorrow.

What side of the road am I on?

Freda made us a Christmas cake this year - it's a fruit cake with marzipan and fondant on top - YUM!! I was a little skeptical (not a huge fan of fondant, or fruitcake, for that matter), but it's really good. Not sure if I'll be able to wait until next year for more. AND we have a Christmas pudding that we haven't polished off yet - it was homemade by one of my friends and I can't wait to try it. Here's F's cake...

I had a 'what side of the road am I on?' moment the other day - thankfully it was with John and James in the car who both yelped and got me back on the correct side in time. It was, exactly as mom and dad had warned, as I was coming out of a network of one-way streets and making a left turn. The cars in front were going straight, and I was a little bit lost - I knew where I was but wasn't sure where I was going to be going next. Basically, all the usual reference points had disappeared and my brain kicked in to autopilot. And oop...over onto the right I went, headed for some (stopped) cars waiting at the light. I think they were as surprised to see me as I was to see them.

When I wasn't having near misses on the roads, I've been refashioning some lampshades for two Ikea lamps that John and I had on our bedside tables. The lamps are fairly lightweight wood frames with circular glass shades inside them. Only problem with them as bedside lamps is that when you're fumbling in the dark to turn the light on (during these glorious English winter mornings when it's dark until 7:15am), the whole thing tips over and shatters. Lovely. After John and I both killed our lamps in quick succession, I decided it was time for something a little more tip-over-proof. Or at least unbreakable. So I bought a set of really cheap pillowcases and made little shades for the lamps. Blogger's picture upload seems to be working again, so I'll add some pics tomorrow when it's light out.