Little Cotton Rabbits

wool, glorious wool

What is it about a new ball of wool that excites me? Am I a bit of a saddo, an anorak of knitting? I love buying new wool, it's full of promise and potential, for with two long sticks and a bit of patience it can be transformed into just about anything you can imagine. I once came accross a website from New Zealand where a group of elderly people had knitted an entire spread for tea including the teapot, loaf of bread with board and bread knife, sandwiches, cakes etc. It was quite accomplished, if a wee bit redundant and just goes to show what you can do with a humble ball of wool.

I've enjoyed having time to myself this week and beginning to catch up with all the things I've not had a chance to do whilst being full-time carer to Toby. I'm really pleased with this shade card. Because I knit with a range of yarns (Rowan, Jaeger, Sirdar and Patons) I often find it difficult to imagine which different colour combinations will work together and so I decided to make a shade card incorporating all the cotton 4ply yarn that I have in stock. I think it's almost worthy of being framed and I'm enjoying looking at it propped in the corner. Well I'm off to enjoy the rest of the day. Funny to think I was dreading this week - wasn't so bad afterall! Have a great weekend all.

fairy cake T-shirt

Toby seemed to cope well yesterday and was pretty calm amd happy after arriving home on the minibus. It's so strange not having him around in the day and I'm like a butterfly - just flitting from one thing to another. As usual knitting is keeping me sane! I've been playing around with ideas and considering that knitted corsages are 'all that' right now I thought I'd vary the theme. The result is a knitted badge / T shirt decoration on my favourite theme of fairy cakes. Modelled here by the lovely Amy:

Will try some more of these and perfect the design - also like the idea of ice-cream cones.

This one's for you Hazel

Well, here I am, trying not to think about how Toby's getting on. It's his first day at school and because he's autistic I wasn't able to prepare him as well as I'd have liked. Still he should like today - they're swimming this morning, PE this afternoon and half an hour of soft play at the end of the day (because it's a severe learning difficulty school they do lots of pyhsical activity and have their own bouncy castle and soft play room!). Tomorrow he's got his first horse-riding lesson - still can't imagine what he'll make of that. Anyway, the point of posting is to take my mind of worrying about him - so I should move on. Back to Hazel...

My new friend Hazel (mum to Madeline and Jack who is also autistic) invited me over to her house last friday evening. She'd organised a charity fund raising evening (Hazel - where do you get your energy?!) selling beautiful handmade cards, children's clothes, Tibetan furniture and accessories, knitted corsages and more. Well, what a great evening - everyone had a fab time drinking, eating cakes (Hazel's chocolate cake is legendary) and shopping (what a heavenly combination). I was chuffed to bits as I sold 10 rabbits and 5 cakes so a big thank you to the lovely ladies of Townshend and West Streets who were so complimentary about my work. These are some of the cakes that I sold for the charity:

walking on sunshine

Hi, at last I am posting!

Today is a real turning point for me and my family - my autistic son starts school tomorrow. It's a real emotional conundrum for whilst I'm a wreck with worrying how he'll cope I'm also brimming with excitement at the prospect of a daily  6 hours of free time for me - weeeeheeee! Anyway, on balance it is a positive - he's so ready for the challenge and has been so bored and restless over the summer hols and I am full of so many creative impulses which need to be put into action before I  burst!

I've been so inspired by reading various weblogs, particulary Hillary Lang's fabulous Wee Wonderfuls that I've been itching to start my own weblog. So here it is.

Basically I'm a non-stop knitter. I created a design for a rabbit around 3 years ago as an easter pressie for my daughter Amy. Pink cotton rabbit was so fun to make that I just carried on and made some for everyone I know - including my daughters playgroup. I always try to make each one different so whilst some jumper designs crop up time and again they are always in different colourways or on differently coloured rabbits. I love the yarns I use - Rowan, Jaeger and Debbie Bliss - pre-dominantly cotton and wool mixes with a dash of cashmere and silk thrown in for good measure. Anyway, enough chitchat - here are some pics of bunnies I've made so far...