Bits & Pieces (of interest)

Yay! I can do it!
Crochet that is!
ALL I needed to DO is change my yarn!
I'm now using a plain colour Rowan hand knit cotton and can SEE my chains and have managed to do swatches, successfully, on two different patterns and they LOOK like the book! yay!!
(more on crochet later).

Yay! the book is brilliant!
The Vogue ultimate sock knitting book is BRILLIANT!
It arrived on Friday and I picked it up from the shop yesterday and its BRILLIANT! Its SEW brill, in fact, I've not put it under the tree until Christmas! I've half read it already!!

Yay! Christmas shopping nears completion!
The kids' Christmas pressie list is complete!
Had a marvellous bargain yesterday when we managed to get a couple of leather backed chairs from Staples for their room to further enhance their enjoyment of tv/pc and NEW *PS.3* that we've treated them to for Christmas!
You get what you pay for! (we KNOW!) and last year what seemed like an ultra bargain of typists chairs for a tenner didn't prove to be quite such a bargain after one or two rather more hefty and not SEW light on their behinds, "friends" came and plonked THEIR behinds on the chairs in a manner would best suit, perhaps, a park bench in best WOOD!

Booo! bit of a rant here!
To the Tennis Club!
After volunteering his serives (for FREE) as Treasurer to our local club for the best part of if not more than, 20years (yes. TWENTY YEARS) dh finally decided to step down and "retire" (he has tried before but couldn't find a mug to replace him!) at last one of the "children" has grown up, attended school, college AND uni and is now about to embark on a career as an accountant and HE has suggested it might look good on his cv for future job prospects and volunteered to take the task on!
On Wednesday, dh duly presented the accounts at the AGM and formally announced his retirement ..
Now. what would you think? a round of applause at the least? a round of DRINKS! for sure! a "THANK YOU" for definite? maybe even some token of appreciation like a free years membership! (I suppose a free lifetime membership is pushing it a bit?)
NO! half the audience I suspect were asleep at this point (numbers DO have this effect on most people) and the other half were clearly not bothered/listening/appreciating what was being said.
NO. what he ACTUALLY got was a rather half hearted "ah. err. thanks for what you've done .. (what WAS it? exactly? you've done?) and umm YES! I HEREBY NOMINATE YOU FOR ANOTHER POSITION! ALL THOSE IN FAVOUR RAISE YOUR GLASS AND SAY CHEERS! .."
Well. I suppose if you DO willingly volunteer for such positions you must do so with an open mind, and though he's being brave about it and saying he'd MUCH prefer it this way, I still think its a little unfair, unkind and just a little bit RUDE!

Fittingly sew .. knittingly wise ..
FINALLY. fell (or was I pushed?) OFF the soap box and back to KNITTING!
Read a rather interesting article on swatching and measuring for a successful fit on a hand knit garment this morning and revisited some of the articles whereby the SAME sized garment was photographed on a variety of ladies all of whom were brave enough to reveal their vital measurments! (mind. if MINE were that side of the tape measure, I'd be shrieking mine out in public too!).

It rather put me in mind of when I first started dressmaking course and we had to "measure" our partner and record each number in a box and it took all lesson due to the sensitivies of some of the ladies wanting ONLY the teacher to do certain ONES and they had to be recorded in a code that involved halving it, doubling it, taking a "10" off it and moving a decimal place in order to NOT look like one MIGHT have a hip measurement of some 47" which I DO occasionally have NOW but not back then, some 15years ago had anyone suggested I'd have had a hip like THAT I'd have chucked a box of sharp PINS at them!

I have spread! and greatly increased my measurements and while I feel mostly confident in altering my SEWING projects, this knitting is rather more interesting as the last time I truly knitted garments to wear I was 20yrs younger and more than half the SIZE I am now. ALL articles on knitting-2-fit are, therefore, of interest!