September's Crafty Round-Up

Or, Blanketblanketblanket!

It had always been my intention to knit my blanket* as a winter project, to be started as the ship sailed away and to be completed before the arrival of the planes.

At the start of the month I had 37 squares to go, and was still aiming for completion by the return of our planes, around 16th October; however, I made good progress on our winter trip, and began thinking that I could not only have it done before our own planes came back, but maybe before any of the transiting aircraft came through as well; 'Finishing Fever' quickly set in, and I started wondering I could have it finished by the end of September instead. It was all going promisingly, and then, with a week of Night-watch ahead, I decided that there was nothing quite like imposing additional pressure on myself, and started wondering if I could have it finished by 27th - six months to the day after the ship left us for the winter - and I could.

Vital Stats:

234,000 stitches, knitted

7128 stitches, swiss darned

250 hours

117 squares

116 beads

39 balls of yarn

17 buttons

One pair of very tired hands

There is so much I could say about it, but it is so freshly off the needles that I think I need to just snuggle under it for a while and get to know it as a blanket, rather than a series of strips with knitting and darning needles poking out of it.

Chickens Beware!

Having finished the blanket I needed a 'warm down' project and finally finished Fantastic Mr Fox (Outfoxed on Ravelry), who I was test-knitting for Emily Ivey. I did the pattern-testing and knitting of the parts a while ago, but after few rubbish attempts at sewing him together he took a back seat while I worked on the blanket. In the end I frogged his body and re-knitted it, knitting the legs, tail and arms in as I went along. He is another great pattern from Emily, designer of the previously-starred chickens and other awesome small toys. Her patterns make me wish I had more children in my life - while I'm sure Sister-Girl's babies (a semi-feral cat and Springer Spaniel puppy) would appreciate them, I am not sure I could stand to see my knitting ripped to shreds!

Geek-Boy's 30th Birthday was a good excuse to down knitting and head to the chippy shop for a couple of evenings. I'd like to claim it as all my own work, but in reality one of the other girls made the mount for me and the carpenter did the bits of the frame that involved using restricted machinery - we can call it a team effort! The picture inside was supposed to be replaced by Geek-Boy's photo of choice, but he's decided that he likes my stick-man interpretation of base life and plans to keep it. I just hope he doesn't display it anywhere that visitors will see it!

As all knitters worth their DPNs know, next month is Socktoberfest, and with this in mind my projects are all foot-related:

• finish knitting Pomatomus socks, started back in June;
• sew up holes in favourite tights;
• darn work socks (four pairs!)
• darn soles of Twinkletoes slippers, featured in this photo, and attach soles;
• sew soles onto Geek-Boy's slipper-socks;
• mend old slippers, so I can wear them when the current pair need mending; and
• swatch and knit the toes of a pair of socks which I will take into the field with me in the summer.

It is a fairly boring list really, but the way of life down here is such that stuff has to be mended rather than replaced, as replacements are hard to come by!

*From Debbie Abraham's book Blankets and Throws to Knit (Amazon link). The pattern is Lithograph (Ravelry link).