Memememememe

Modelwidow tagged me for the Peeps I Want To Know More About meme so here goes:

The rules: Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

1) What was I doing ten years ago?
Hmmm. May 1998. We'd not that long been in our own home and it was a new build so in the spring I was busy trying to make something of a garden out of the weeds and building rubble. Battling with poor soil, slugs and drainage issues.

2) What are five (non-work) things on my to-do list for today:
1. I have yet to get dressed. What? It's Saturday!
2. Paint a picture
3. Mow the lawn
4. Knitting!
5. Blog about actual knitting.

3) Snacks I enjoy:
Chocolate and biscuits. I'm having a KitKat phase at the moment.

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:
Donate to charity, of course. Move to the Lake District. Employ a housekeeper. Set my Mum up so she can retire in style. Do a lot of walking, knitting and purchasing of fancy new toys.

5) Places I have lived:
Mostly in houses! - although I did spend a summer in a caravan once. I've had some really grotty flats but now thankfully I have a lovely house with a garden. That lawn still needs mowing though.

6) Jobs I have had:
Boring ones, but they are good at paying the bills. The best ones was working in a toyshop.

7) Peeps I want to know more about:
I shall be mostly tagging people with three letter names: Kay, Noo, Dee, Mel and Ann.

Rain

Today it rained for the first time in over two weeks. I am pleased about this. Now, normally I'm not a big fan of the rain and getting wet and I was happy that it stayed dry while I was on my holiday - however, water is kind of essential for a number of things. Like watering plants and putting out fires.

This is a view over Greenfield in Saddleworth yesterday with the smoke from the big moorland fire up at Littleborough (about 10 miles away) on the horizon, it was so windy that the fire spread really quickly and the smoke could be seen for miles. The fire burned through most of the night and only the rain we had early this morning put it out properly.

Holidays!

Last week I didn't knit anything. Instead, I went on holiday to Keswick in the Lake District. It seemed ages since we'd been out and done much of anything outside, mostly because it has been ages and we needed a serious kick start to get ourselves into gear and out on the hills. And there were hills. Steep ones. With sheep on, so it wasn't all bad.

These were some locals on the slopes of Skiddaw where were walked on Tuesday, up from Latrigg - where someone has conveniently placed a carpark a good way up - over to Lonscale Fell then up to Skiddaw summit via the Little Man.

This is looking back towards Keswick - very nice view and I may also have needed to stop for a breather. Shame it was only about 300 yards from the car park. Once over Skiddaw we turned right at Bakewell and headed back along the Cumbria Way, passed Skiddaw House.

Where there were some sheep enjoying the shade of the trees. This whole area is called Skiddaw Forest, although I assume that the forest part of the name comes from the really old meaning of the word as an area reserved for hunting rather than because of it having many trees, because it doesn't and the tiny wooded area by the house is, well, tiny. This was a pretty long day, considering we hadn't been out for a while and 12,4 miles in total, so we definitely deserved our chips that night. There might also have been beer.

On other days, we went for a boat trip around Derwent Water, visited the Cumberland Pencil Museum where they have the longest pencil in the world which is pretty blumming big and went to Whinlater Forest Park to see a proper forest with trees and everything. Including alpacas, which was quite a surprise.

Corsica

Just in time for summer, I have finished Corsica. Although in a typical British summer, sometimes a big chunky sweater is just the thing. I really liked knitting this, the pattern was well written and it's (as I've probably said loads of times by now) an interesting construction. My only critisism would be that the arms are on the skinny side and it's a bit of a stretch and a struggle to get it on. The same number of stitches are used for all sizes of the pattern at the moment, which I think is rather unrealistic. I know the pattern is going to be published for larger sizes than are available at the moment and they will have wider arms.


Pattern: Corsica by Fiber Fiend
Size: 38"
Yarn: Sirdar Hug in Murmur 170, used 10x 50g balls
Needles: Denise Interchangeables, US10.5
Mods: I did about six more pattern repeats on the arms to make them longer, I like a nice long sleeve that amply covers my wrists and half my hand. I also reduced the number of rows at the back of the neck.

How many needles?!

I have gone back to working on my Corsica after finishing the socks and am now on the row where you join the sleeves onto the body. There's a lot going on.

And a close up of all the needles...

It's certainly interesting!

FO!

A Finished Object! Not being rude, honest :|

Pattern: Garter Rib socks from SKS (Charlene Schurch)
Size: Mens US12, 96 stitches
Yarn: Wisdom Yarns - Marathon Socks, Boston
Colourway: 211
Needles: Knitpicks 2mm circulars

I was gifted this yarn by itgirl as part of a Ravelry swap (thank you!) and it was very nice to knit with and a cool, subtle colourway. I'm not sure if you can source it in GB, but I would really recommend it. It is stretchy and super soft once washed. The ball was 100g and I decided to make them top down and see how things went. The first sock weighed 48g so I was confident as I cast on that there would be enough yarn to make the second but as I got closer and closer to the toe and the ball was getting smaller and smaller, I must admit that I started getting the niggly doubts. In the end, eveything worked out juuust fine...

and there was even some left over to make a toy for Mr C.