Why I missed I Knit

You may or may not have heard already, but I'm 40 this year (and you only tuned in to see if there was any yarn yet!) Well, in the worst bit of timing on my part, I'd arranged the garden party for yesterday which clashed with one of the most anticipated yarn events in the calendar in London - but good old alabamawhirly was sending me emails from I Knit updating me on the goings-on.

Despite the torrential rain, it was the best party. We had set up the food and drink in the workshop and a marquee linking the house to the party room .

Cupcakes, Turkish delight and French fancies

Lilies, roses and summer bunting

Guy, Jo and Skein King in nervous anticipation of guests arriving

The rose wine with lemonade and fizzy strawberries went down very well with the ladies and I ended up making about eight or nine jugs of it. There was pasta salad, cold meats, quiches, Spanish tortilla and salad - it all got demolished.

It was so great to see so many friends and I enjoyed every minute. Thanks to Sonia and Debs for my voucher to get some posh treatments, and to Sarah for adding a ballet pump to my charm bracelet and to Unity for booking a trip to the Watermill Theatre AND arranging a babysitter for the occasion and to everyone else for all the lovely presents - I am spoiled indeed.

The official photographer (Skein King) had one beer too many and so we haven't got many photos of the proceedings but he did get a couple. I chickened out of wearing my summery dress:


This was pretty much at the end - the last guests left at four and I went to bed at five - a sign of a good party, I always say. And I'll spare you the photo of Sandra showing off her Rigby & Peller bra!


So, for posterity when I look back on this blog as I head closer to my dotage, I want to thank the following people for coming out in the rain to help me celebrate:

Guy and Jo, Unity and Nick, Sarah and Dave, Sonia and Toby, Debs and Richard, Jo and Allan, Cath and Nick, Sandra and Peter, Sue, Jackie, Maureen, Harriet and Shane, Rose and Phil, Sara and Simon, Chris and Pouran and Ceri and Tony.

There WILL/MUST be yarn by the end of next week as things get back to almost normality.

And I can't believe my little boy started secondary school this week. I'm so proud of him - he took it all in his stride and has his first full week ahead of him next week. Think he was about three in this photo.

And finally, a photo of my Spring Forward socks in progress made in the beautiful Encore SQ yarn.

Party weekend

OK, before you read on, I have to warn you, this is an (almost) yarn-free post - other than to say I've spent the evening skeining and skeining with a bit more skeining.

And to just say I'm planning on putting together a 12 Days of Christmas "collection" (the word collection being totally tongue-in-cheek) of yarns and here's the first. It's called Partridge Pear and is in the 4 ply cashmere/silk Lavish yarn:
Now onto other matters. Firstly, the Big New Haircut. It was rather more drastic than I planned going from long, light and a bit frazzled to short, dark and sleek.
My friend Debbie in the school playground said,
"It makes you look much younger"
My colleague Trevor said,
"Have you lost weight?"
And my Body Attack instructor shouted across the class,
"Debs, you could've been on Ten Years Younger!"
(Did I look that old and fat before? Probably, though I thought I was casually glamorous!)
So I think I like it, all in all! Made my day until I got so behind preparing for the party, then got a phone call from school saying Skein Princess had been sick, and then I got jammed in a parking space and reversed into a car with the mother watching. Then had to go back to school a second time to pick up Skein Prince.

After traumas sorted (SPss was fine - must've been running about too much after lunch), the party. Now I'm not sure I know my readers quite well enough to divulge what kind of party this was. I'll drop a few hints - there were 16 guests, lots of wine and nibbles, some games played (no, you're on the wrong track - it's not that pervy!), loads of laughs, a few renditions of "Bright Eyes, Burning Like Fire" (anyone remember Watership Down? And the kind of creatures that featured in it?), my friend Unity won the "Biggest Floozy" competition and £700 was spent. Got it? We're a classy bunch round these here parts! But what a laugh!

Our oldest friends from the New Forest - Guy and Jo and their children - stayed over for the weekend and my good friend Sarah came over with Dave and their girls for Saturday lunch and the weather was actually nice enough to sit outside - and have a giggle about the night before. We all kind of vegged out for the rest of the weekend and took the kids to the Discovery Centre and for a walk along the canal to get them out and about.
In case you're wondering, shadows of the kids fishing in the lake at the Discovery Centre.

I did my best to turn the conversation to yarn at every opportunity - because I am officially a fully-fledged Yarn Bore and proud of it - and even showed them my studio. Well, when I say studio, I mean an old kitchen cupboard (from when it fell off the wall in our kitchen laden with wedding crystal and Calpol) in the garage, an old table and some shelving laden with recycled plastic milk cartons and juice bottles. They did an admirable job at feigning interest.

And finally, I acquired this during the week - AT LAST, I hear you cry (at least if you read any of my earlier posts) - a vintage ball winder from ebay in full working order - please admire:PS The new skein winder arrived. Skein King offered to have a go at winding up a skein to help out... all I need say is that three days later, I had to scrap the yarn. Would he listen to my advice to avoid a tangle? Would he hell! I do have a photo but I don't think he'd thank me! He was only trying to help (I keep telling myself!)