Take over bid!

At the moment knitting has definitely taken over my life. It is my younger sister's 50th at the beginning of March and I suddenly decided to knit her a stole/wrap. So I mentally reviewed what yarn I had in my stash that would fit the bill - something approaching black. I had it - 5 skeins of Posh yarns Camel DK in a colour called Rafish (a dark red/black/navy), like a ripe bruise.

My stash has mostly brighter colours, tending towards the yellows/browns/honey/orange tones with some amethyst and reds thrown in for good measure. I love jewel/warm autumn colours where my sister likes the cooler tones, she is a blond and I'm a redhead, she is pale and lightly freckled and where I am pale too my underlying skin tone is cream not white. I know she would prefer a black wrap ( we had this discussion at Christmas) but (a) I have no black in stash and (b) I didn't want to knit black - too hard to see. It is difficult enough working with the dark yarn.

Next was to find a pattern. I found one on Woollyworkshop, a Fiddlesticks Polka-Dot Stole and as it was for Fiddlesticks country silk the yarn weight was about right. So for the past week I have been bent over the pattern chart during daylight hours working slowly through a large pattern of Polka-dots. Last night I finally reached the end of the intense work and have moved on to the easier more repetitive part which looks like staggered large button holes. There is a middle part of a diamond shaped Polka-dot embedded in the button holes but for the sake of expediency (and possibly my sanity) I decided to keep the middle as the simple pattern. Hopefully I will be able to whizz along at this part as I need a bit of speed if I'm to get this finished, blocked and posted off to my sister in time.

Everything else has taken a back seat.....laundry, cleaning, shopping.... but I'm heading out this afternoon to replenish the cupboards before I clear out the freezer contents completely. The fact that we have no fresh food in the house is starting to tell as our options are reduced to beans, sweetcorn and chips to accompany our meal. My husband had to resort to getting fresh juice on his way home from work and this morning he asked "Have I any clean shirts", "in the drier" I said. Tuns out it is almost a week since they were dried but I haven't put any clothes away in my single minded attempt to get the wrap done in time.

I suppose you'd all like to see a photo, in fact I took some the other day when the sun was out, of course they are still in the camera and I haven't got time right now to upload them. I promise I will be back before the end of the week and the photos will be uploaded by then but right now I must go wash, dress and go up to town to get that shopping done.

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