Bursting the bubble.

Yes we are back from the beach, sigh, and reality certainly slapped me in the face.  I decided to head back earlier than Mr and Miss Whizzme who made one last beach visit.  My plan was to have a few hours to myself to unpack and do a little more sewing. Ha! Reality had other plans for me. First discovery on driving in were the sheets on the line, hung out before we left which Mr Whizzme had forgotten to bring in, slap.  That should have been my indication that more reality was waiting, potatoes nearly growing out of the pantry, slap, food in the fridge providing bacterial samples, slap, Miss Whizzme's onion plant sitting in rank water making the house smell, slap, no washing done, slap, the bed unmade, slap.  On the upside after so much time away, I was awash with remembering just how much I love our little house!  And I did manage to get a bit of sewing done this afternoon.  Just to add to my grief though the camera has decided not to allow me to upload any of our holiday photos?!  Instead I have given you a shot of the chevron scarf finally finished. Before Christmas even.  Guess you will just have to wait for the holiday pics.  One more day and school starts.  I plan to practice getting up early tomorrow - new year's resolution: to at least make it to school on time (well most days anyway).

Edited to add: please take the slapping here as tongue in cheek!  really being home is ok!

IF

If I was going to make a Babette blanket I would probably use colours something like this

and my squares would start to look something like this...

but I wouldn't be doing anything so silly as starting another project, so instead here (finally) is the progress I have made on the hexagon blanket:

This blanket is actually the reworking of a wip that was looking like this.

A gorgeous striped cardigan for Miss L in Rowan wool cotton.   Unfortunately, the completed back you see here is a size 2, and given that Miss L is now 5 I might have just left this project a little too late! (now there's an understatement).  There wasn't enough yarn to complete a bigger size so the perfect excuse to start some hexagons.  Miss L is monitoring the blanket's progress quite closely, including sizing it up to her bed!  Nothing like cracking that whip over your mother!!

When my little overseer has retired for the night, I have been trying to still work out a colour way I like for the chevron scarf.  I won't bore you with photo's of all the versions I have tried, but I think I finally like this one - I think!  

And I've also grown attached to this version - in 3 ply hand dyed cashmere (purchased from AK).

So you can see it is really very lucky that I haven't started any other projects this week (she says nudging the Babette blanket under the cushion).  But I know you are really here to find out if you won this month's giveaway.  My helpful little barrel bunny (or bowl bunny as the case may be), Pebble was very excited to be able to choose this month's winner.

The prize is this great book.

And the winner is

so Gwen email me your address - whizzme (at)bigpond(dot)net(au).

Finally, because so many of you have been so lovely about my knitting tote's, there are now 3 available in the shop - all sporting great Aunty Cookie fabric. (hey Jo, look, I finally made something for the shop?!)

Now I hear Miss L saying something about blankets....

chevroning

the whizzme family don't like to stay still for too long, so we popped over to Sydney on Sunday to see one of our nephew's confirmed.I managed to convince R (or Mr whizzme as he is now known) that even for only 24 hours it was very important to bring along my knitting and hence we would have to check in our baggage! sheesh! Miss L complained it wasn't long enough (we only stayed 24 hours) but managed a dip into the sea, lashings of hot chocolate and to bring home a bag of lego.

Thanks everyone for the lovely feedback on my little bag experiment. I am currently still getting back to everyone. But this post is to show you the progress of the Chevron so far (or the knitting project that came to Sydney). I oohed and aahed over the lovely chevron scarves Alex of Moonstitches knitted. The pattern is from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. Even though I had no Koigu I thought one of my *cough* many luscious hand dyed skeins might be suitable. I picked out this beautiful alpaca yarn from Becreatif.

However, after a few rows it wasn't making me gooey with pleasure. I purchased these lovely Koigu's from Purl, so cast on again. Nope - not that either.

(sorry forgot to photograph this version so just trust me ok? it wasn't working!)

I dug around in my stash and found a lonely skein of Koigu (KPPPM P511L) so I combined that with the KPPPM from Purl. This is it so far - ick!

who knew this was going to be so bloody complicated! (and yeah I bite my nails)

I have since purchased the following Koigu's from ebay - hmmm, what should I try next?

or maybe I should combine my alpaca with this another colourway from Becreatif?

any suggestions you have would be most appreciated.

I am also on a Koigu hunt, as I want to try the Babette Blanket next (always one for a bandwagon!!). If you have any Koigu skeins in your stash looking for a new home and you would like to do a swap, please email me whizzme(at)bigpond(dot)net(dot)au

While I ponder the chevron dilemma the hexagons continue, maybe photos of mine by the next post. I also have some more purchases to share and there will be another giveaway this month, so stay alert!