My machine knitted cardi is finally moving along. I've now seamed up three of the 4 raglan seams. I'm weaving them, I couldn't work out how to mattress stitch the slanted seam - is it just me? Won't get it done before going away on holiday though. Have been swatching with the yarn for ribbing and button band. I'm not liking it much, so I think that I will end up crocheting it all. I'm pretty sure there's plenty of yarn so it shouldn't be a problem.
This yarn felts if you look at it wrong, so what's the betting on the cardigan surviving its first wash?
Ravelry link is here

Trying to decide what to take on holiday. The february sweater is coming along nicely, but it's kind of big. I want to take something other than socks, though.  maybe I should start a kid's sweater.

Would anyone like any araucania sock yarn?

We are arriving in Edinburgh on the evening of Tuesday 30th June, and are expected in Bath on the afternoon/evening of 13th July. We're not *quite* sure when we're heading south, we might do it over two days. But we will have at least 11 days in Edinburgh.

We need to book a B&B for 2-3 nights, then we'll be house-sitting in Viewforth/Bruntsfield.

After Bath, we're planning a day at Legoland, then we fly home to Santiago on the 21st of July, getting back here the monring of the 22nd.

The boys start Grade 3 and Grade 1 on Monday the 27th. Next Friday, Nico has a sleepver at school - this is a tradition in his particular K2 class. The excitement is almost unbearable. And then, he's turning 6! 6! a week tomorrow.

I don't know if I can stand the excitement...

Half an hour ago there was a 5.4 earthquake about 100 miles away. It lasted about a minute. I didn't notice it.

This is normal. I have only noticed 1 tremor the whole time we've been here, and it was when we were staying in the flat. Either I'm totally un-sensitive, or this house is built like a rock.

But, I@m getting a little tired of being the only one who doesn't notice. meep.

...looks like this:



I got dragged away from a really nice get together this morning by a call from the school. I was needing to leave soon anyway to go home and catch the kittens to take them to the vet to get neutered, but still...

Nico had fallen from the monkey bars and hit his head. He seemed fine, hadn't lost consciousness, and was resting in the nurses station. So I head up to school to get him. He's happy to see me, and ready to go. He gets up, walks just fine, no dizzyness, his head only hurt if you touched the lump on the back of it. We went and got his rucksack, spoke to the teacher, and left the school.

He seemed fine to me, but since the school has an insurance policy with the local clinic, we might as well go and get him checked over, since it's free (hah, still not used to it *not* being free!). The last time he had a head injury was when a loift door sent him flying in the National Museum, and we went to the sick kids then, so I figured we might as well this time too.

We got to the car and he was cheerful and chatty, he called his dad and told him all about it. Given all that, I decided we could pop home, snare the kittens and take them to their appointment with the surgeon before taking N to the clinic.

So, cats caught, deposited at vets, some Spanish spoken at the vets, and then a lot of English when the Vet who speaks English came out, and N and I head for the clinic.

Where after not too long we are seen. He didn't want his blood pressure checked, in case they took all his blood, but after a little persuasion he relented. Then we waited to see a doctor. Pupils were checked for responsiveness, his reflexes checked with the little hammer, and we were sent off to have his head examined, I mean x-rayed.

Then we went back to the exam room, and waited, and waited. And watched some youtube videos on my ipod. Finally, the doctor came back, and told us his head looked fine, there was no fracture. But then he started telling me about all the dangers that can come from head trauma, and the signs i needed to look for, in case his brain started to swell, in 4 stages:

1: Headache and Dizziness
2. Nausea & Vomiting
3. Seizures
4. Unconsciousness

OK, I can do that. *THEN* he tells me to take him home and put him to bed for 24 hours with *no visual stimulation at all*, no TV, no computer, not even reading a book. Then in 24 hours, while he still needed to be in bed, he could have "his computer or his television in his bedroom" (what planet this doctor lives on I'm not sure). If he was ok, he could go back to school on Friday. And he's not to play any sports for a week. He then gave me a slip of paper with all this written down, and asked me eleventy billion times if I understood. I just looked at him and said "He's 5 years old!" to which the Dr replied, yes,and a very intelligent 5 years old, so don't let him read a book. Oh, and I could only give him bland food. In case his food made him sick and we didn't know if it was the head injury or the food. The quack was speaking spanglish all this time, by the way.

So... I smiled and nodded and we made good our escape.

Came home and I tried to make N a quesadilla while ranting to Bill on the phone about the quack, so I burned it. So I made him a cheese toastie. Then we raced to school to collect Thomas. And while we were waiting, I took scientific poll of all the other mothers on whether the Dr was totally full of shit, while N raced around, jumped off picnic tables, rolled around on the grass and generally behaved like a 5 year old who had had the afternoon off school.

Then Nico took me and Thomas to his playground to show us where it happened, and what he was doing at the time. Then we came home, and after Thomas did his homework, we watched TV. Spongebob. Which is probably the worst in terms of visual stimulation (for me at least).

So, did I do the right thing?

Bill made me a cutting and drafting table! Well, I bought the legs at Ikea before we left home, but Bill built it! It's 92cm high. No more backache and sore hips from cutting or drawing.

Lucky me!

I posted most of this to Ravelry already, but never mind...

I took some photos today - the colour in these is much more accurate than the one of the balls in the basket. Made some new stitch markers for it too.



The yarn over increases continue to please me, and the slip stitch edges look pretty wonderful too. I hadn't realised what a difference slipping the stitch wyif makes - I'd always just slipped wyib before, which is pretty pointless.







I'm loving this sweater!

For some reason today I am happy. I've got that slightly excited feeling that means that something nice is going to happen. Well, we got a new veg box today, with two litres of organic milk [1] and a dozen organic eggs. But that's not it. I think the anxiety has maybe transformed itself into nervous energy... Which isn't a bad thing except at bedtime.

So anyway, I did some more sewing this morning. But first I had to do rather a lot of unsewing. last night I got to the point on the new pair of jeans where I could baste a few seams and try them on. It's a real shame that I had sewn the back pockets on before this stage. The fact that I had sewn them on with two rows of topstitching on the marks supplied by the pattern cutter is either bad luck or stupidity....

I'm trying a pattern for a low rise pair of jeans. I've got this flat tummy, or well, I have this tummy that no longer has the pregnancy induced lower tummy fatness. Admittedly I still have just-being-fat upper tummy fatness. But I digress, lots of trousers fit funnily now becasue there's not so much to hold them up, so I thought it would be clever to try a pair of low rise jeans. This pattern is from the "Burda young fashion" range number 7988. [2] So I should have realised that with "fashion" in the title I might be in trouble. Yes, along with the low rise waist, goes low slung back pockets. You know, the ones that start where your bum actually ends, and end somewhere unflattering, down on the back of your thighs? Ahem.

I unsewed the pockets this morning. And *lifted* them to a hopefully more flattering position.



Erm, it's the unsewing you're supposed to be looking at and commiserating with, not just going "aw, cute kitteh". Try this one instead:



WTF? How'd he get in that one too? Persistent wee shite.

I also need to tell you that topstitching down an outside leg seam on pinstriped fabric is quite the psychedelic experience. Have I mentioned that I've been having dizzy spells? I had to stop and regroup a few times...


[1]Milk here is almost always UHT. We have found one that is just ultra-pastuerised, which is slightly better, but it comes in plastic bags and still, sometimes you get a bag that tastes like reconstituted powdered milk. If this organic stuff is good, it will be worth every peso of the $1600 per litre (yes, that's £1.88 for a litre of milk). It came in jars. With screw on lids, just liek their yogurt does. A verdict will be forthcoming tomorrow.

[2] don't know how long that link will last

I took this one myself with the camphone, the last one anyone else took of me was Thomas catching me in my bathrobe, so I think I won't bother posting *that one*.

My hair has been growing back for over a year now, slowly at first, but now I think it might be getting back to normal speed. If only my fingernails would follow the example!

Sorry, you can't see the ringlet affect in this one....

A sock FO! Look!

Actually two socks FO's if we're being pernickety, but I only took a picture of one.

The yarn was a get well gift from land_girl , although I did the toes with a purple I serendipitously had in my stash, because it matched the purple in the main yarn so perfectly.

Used the basic top down recipe in the Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns (also something I have becasue of land_girl , since she recommended it! I reinforced the heel flaps with regular sewing thread.




And just becasue this is a sock post, here's the progress so far on the toe-up crocheted version, in Tofutsies, see those nice stripes?

back from another food shopping expedition with Jennifer.

today we went to a mostly Japanese shop. they also had some Thai and Chinese stuff, but mostly Japanese.

it was tiny, but they packed in a fair amount. it was cash only or I would have spent more.

I bought sesame oil, how had i not bought any before now? citrus flavoured soy sauce - I mean, who woulnd't, it just sounds too good. oh, and "sweet rice" which i'm hoping will do for rice pudding - much as we love rice pudding, I think that using arborio rice for it is a step too far.

what else? oh green curry paste, and lime leaves. I think that may have been all. I thought about some frozen wontons, but wasn't sure if I had enough cash, and I'm not up to the embarrassment of not having suffucuent cash in spanish yet!

prior to the shopping we had gone for a coffee, at the Cafe of the Museo de la Moda. They seemed surprised to see anyone at 10.20, but thy brought us coffee, and little chocolate things. and Vivi had fun rearranging the chairs, and we watched as many people with cameras and three or four very glamourous young women arrived and moved some more chairs and set up tripods around a table which they covered with a cloth of stars. We left before we figured out the object though. I didn't feel glamourous enough to be there. but i will go back to go around the museum though, history of fashion stuff is very much my thing.

anyway, on the way home i had to go to the regular supermercado, so picked myself up some sushi for lunch. once you get used to the cream cheese they add, it's really quite nice. and the avocado. mmmm.

something stir-fried for tea, I think.