A Happy end to January

Well, January is over now and we welcome February, the month of love and it is actually Chinese New Year's Day on the 14th too, so it will be a double celebration. I received some good news at the end of January. First of all I've won Lisa and Sarah's (A Spoon Full of Sugar) giveaway. Yay! I can't wait to see the lovely craft goodies, that they bought from Japan, with my Rascal. I'm so happy. They are such an inspirational mother and daughter team. I love all the crafts they make and the goodies that they bake. Check their blog here.

My thyroid condition is getting better too, the doctor has lower my medication (a little, but any progress is good).

I've also finished some small knitting projects.

A colourful pair of fingerless mitts. I bought the yarn from I-Knit, it is self patterning and I love the result. Cool huh. :)

I used Debbie Bliss Cashmerino chunky to knit this slouchy cable hat. I'm not sure about the colour, I should really stop buying purple yarn. :) I'm so tempted to buy more yarn in cream, grey, pink or blue yarn this time. Hmmmm.......I can see a yarn shopping trip to the Stitch and Craft Show at London Olympia next month. :)

A Book and A Bag

This is long overdue, but look at what my lovely friends got me for Christmas last year (craft presents only :)) :

This is truly a beautiful book, and there are so many unique patterns and inspiration. These are some of my favourites.

This reminds me of something a heroine would wear in a fairy tale.

This fish net scarve/shawl is so pretty.

I also got a Cath Kidson knitting bag, which has come in very handy. I now carry all my small knitting project in this dainty bag.

Thanks darlings!

Update: Would you like a copy of the book? Please go to Cotton & Cloud's blog and enter the giveaway. She has also written a great book review.

Mitts

Last year, I decided to make some fingerless mittens to give as Christmas presents for family and friends. I tried to stick to making/ buying handmade goodies and books as gifts rather than buying mass produced products. So here are some cool photos taken by Gracie and Viv:

This one was for Gracie, made using Debbie Bliss Cashmerino DK

This one was for Gracie's other half and (my Uni friend)Alex, made with Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky.

Here are the love birds with their mitten on a lovely winter's day. :)

This is the one I knitted for Viv, knitted with Debbie Bliss Cashmerino DK. I do love their photos.

Here is another pair of mitts I knitted for my friend, SY, with Rowan Cashmerino DK.

I also knitted one for my Rascal, I will update this blog once I get more sunshine over the weekend to take some photos.

Yarn Sale

Hi All, I've finally managed to upload my yarn photos. :)

I didn't intend to go to the John Lewis yarn sale over the holidays, but we were meeting some friends for dim sum near Bond Street and it was so cold that we decided to popped into John Lewis to keep warm. We had a few minutes so I thought I'd check out the yarn section, and it was the first day of the sale and boy did they have some gorgeous yarn. There were many people loading trolleys full of yarn and they were reduced to half price. I managed to squeeze into a small space and the Rowan lady passed me some Rowan Big Wool which were reduce to £3.50 each. So I bought 8 as I wanted to knit 'Temptation' from Kim Hargreaves's Thrown Together knitting collection.

The pattern is so lovely, now all I need to do is find some time to knit it, once I finish Mimi, so may sometime later on this year?

I also bought 8 balls of Rowan Wool Cotton to knit 'Hawaii' from last summer's Let's Knit magazine.

Isn't it pretty?

There were also several Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky yarns, which I brought in brown, purple and blue. These were selling like hot cakes, and for under £3, I can understand why. I've knitted a cabled hat using a pattern, using the purple yam, that I made up with some advice from Kyoko, which I will post later on next week (see above).

I'll also blog about some of the small accessories that I knitted for friends for Christmas presents next time. Have a lovely weekend.

Opps no Camera

Remember I said I'll show you all the lovely yarn I bought in the John Lewis sale? Remember I said I'll show you all the lovely presents we received over Christmas? Remember I said that I'll show you some of the items that I have knitted over the holidays?

Well I managed to take some photos on Saturday morning where we got some natural sunlight, instead of the miserable grey sky we've had recently. However, I can't show you the photos because I do not have my camera. My hubs took our camera to watch snooker on Sunday and he accidentally left it with his brother. My mother in law is coming over on Thursday, so I should be able to upload the photos then. :)

In the mean time, I'll just have to read my copy of Sew Hip magazine to keep me entertained. There is a wonderful tutorial for a zipper make up bag and an article on machine foot by Florence which is exactly what I need. I bought my zipper foot over a year ago and I've been too afraid to use it, so I'm gonna pluck up some courage and try it out this weekend.

Have a lovely week everyone, I'll see you Thursday.

A New Optimistic Start - Kids Style

[Designed by my brother in law, Andrew Cheung]

Did everyone have a good holiday? I'm finally back to blogging and to work as well. Everything is back to normal, which is a good thing. Also, my health should be back to normal soon. You've may have gathered that my blogging and crafting went downhill from March/April last year. Well, I've been diagnosed with an overactive thyroid, which explains the unsual weight loss and tiredness. I'm starting to feel better now, my mind is also less muddled. Hee Hee Hee. Hopefully I'll be back to my healthy and organised pre-illness-self soon. The only down side is that I have to watch what I eat now.

What have I been up to during the break? Well;

• spending a lot of time with my Rascal and her friends,


• making gingerbread people,

• visting the Childhood Museum again (I love that place),

[my hubs being silly at the Childhood Museum and lots of 1960s Sindys below]

• eating lots of roast dinners, we also had two steam boat and several dim sum meals,


• yarn sale shopping (I will blog about that later)


• and sleeping really

There is so much to blog about this month, I want to show you the lovely christmas presents we received and a few that I made this year. This will have to wait to the next blog posts. :)

Have a good week everyone!

Holiday

I'll be taking a short break from blogging for the holidays to catch up with family, friends, sleeping and knitting. Hope you will all have a lovely Christmas and a great New Year.

I will see you all in the New Year!