Hello March

February has been both a good and bad month for me. The bad was mostly my body deciding to let me down with the fall and the thumb injury and then on Wednesday, I was struck with a particularly nasty bug which I'm only just getting back to normal from. Throw in lots of cold weather plus yet more snow and this all means I'm so ready for spring now.

However there were lots of good things. The Winter Olympics was just fabulous and I loved watching so many of the events. Britain didn't win a lot - just one Gold in the Skeleton Bob but Winter sports aren't so big here. I know there has been a lot of press in Canada about British criticism of the games hosting but that was mostly just the usual nonsense that the nasty British Press spouts. Everyone I have spoken to about the Olympics over here though Vancouver put on a fantastic games and I really think it showed Canada in general in a great light. My Cousin and her family have just moved from Scotland to Lake Country in BC so a trip over there will probably be on the cards at some point, via Ontario as other family stay there.

As I mentioned before, I was taking part in the Knitting Olympics and I managed to finish my socks.



The pattern is called Socktopod socks by Cookie A. Its called after the shop that ran the Sock club, Socktopus run by the lovely Alice. I was lucky enough to visit the shop in September shortly before Alice decided to stop running the shop. A lot of my sock yarn stash and sock inspiration came from the shop so it was sad to hear that the shop was closing. Alice is, however, running a big Knitting event in London during the summer, Knit Nation, which I'm planning to attend.

The stash reduction plan continues. This month, I did have quite a bit of yarn in - 4102metres. I had a splurge at 100pure wool with some lace yarn and yarn for another hat or two for me plus I had the remains of my leaving present from my old job in vouchers for John Lewis so I bought yarn for a Summer cardigan.

However all was not lost as my knitting group had a Swap night, where I managed to trade/sell quite a few skeins of socks yarn. Added to that, I gave some leftovers to a friend for a blanket project and I finished two pairs of socks. That all added up to 4117 metres, meaning I ended the month with 15 metres less yarn than I started with. Now that is a good result.

Two out of three

Olympic knitting has continued around here for the past few days. I had set myself the target of knitting 2 hats plus a pair of wrist warmers during the Beijing games. It was quite an ambitious target given that I went back to work.

I almost did it. I've already shared my finished wrist warmers. Yesterday I managed to finish the first hat but late last night, I conceded defeat on the second one.

This is the finished hat. The pattern is Gretel by Ysolda Teague and its knitted in Kid classic by Rowan. I love both the yarn and the pattern.



I'm only about half way through the other one but hopefully I should get it finished by the end of the week.

I had originally planned to have finished posting China pictures by the end of the Olympics but I appear to have run out of Olympics before I ran out of pictures so I'm going to post the remaining ones over the next week or so.

First up more street scenes from Xi'an. The balloons are for some sort of special event in a department store.



And next a classic Chinese mass bicycling picture from Xi'an.



After visiting Xi'an, we went on to visit Tai'an in Shandong province and went up Mount Taishan. Some of the tour group climbed these steps to get up the mount. Given that it was 35 degrees celsius that day, some of us (including me) took a cable car. Everything that is used or consumed at the top is carried up the steps by porters.



This is a picture of the tour group. The two blokes were the guides and the rest of us are a multi national group - two Australians, two English women, a Singapore Chinese woman and me from Scotland. This picture shows how steep the stairs are.



I had a slight moment on top of this mountain. Very occasionally I get vertigo with heights and I had a full blown panic attack on this weird path where the path dropped down suddenly. Thankfully I recovered quickly as the scenery was amazing.

Catching up

I've been playing catch up for the past week as I finally went back to work last Wednesday. I'm not doing full time hours just yet but I'm completely worn out and I've spent the past few days catching up on sleep and household stuff.

Oh and I've been knitting a bit too. Ravelympic knitting has been taking up a lot of my time. For those who aren't on Ravelry, which is the best knitting website ever, the idea is that you set yourself some projects to start and finish during the current Olympics. There's lots of different events and teams to join. I've got one project in the Mitten medley event and two projects in the Hat dash. Teams aren't compulsary but I'm part of Team Tardis, which was started in the Doctor who themed Who knits group within Ravelry.

I've now completed the first one - My wrist warmers for the mitten medley event.



And I've started the 2 hats. Both designs by Ysolda Teague.

Gretel hat



Rose red hat. This is the same pattern that I knitted in purple previously.



Hopefully I will get these finished before Sunday.

Most of the rest of my time has been devoted to watching the Olympics. The British Olympic team have performed spectactularly well this Olympics and there has been lots of medals to celebrate. The cyclists have been amazing, particularly Chris Hoy, who has won three gold medals in this Olympics alone. Considering that at the Atlanta Olympics, Britain only won one gold medal, whereas they've already won 16 golds this time, is awesome. And only 4 years till the Olympics arrive in London.

Today's pictures from China are from the city of Xi'an. Xi'an was such an interesting place to visit. Its most famous for the Terracotta warriors, which are an amazing sight to see. Everyone is different - different hairstyles, clothing, rank etc. You can't tell from the pictures but they were originally very highly coloured. You can still see tiny traces of colour on some of them



Xi'an has a significant muslim population who've been oppressed in the past. Apparently you must apply to the Communist party if you wish to join any religion, which is pretty bizarre. The Mosque in Xi'an is beautiful. The picture below shows one of the buildings.



Another amazing place in Xi'an is the Forest of Steles museum. Steles are stone carving of important documents and poetry so its kind of a library on stone. Its certainly the most amazing library I've ever visited.



Finally I have to thank Joy who nominated me for a blog award. Its lovely of her to do so. I think everyone that I would have nominated probably has one but I have a little thing on my sidebar which shows all the blogs I look at and I'm inspired by all of them in different ways so please all consider yourselves nominated.

I should also answer Dani's questions about the socks I knit. I almost exclusively wear knitted socks except at the gym. They are the comfiest socks I've ever worn and I don't find them any hotter than ordinary socks although Scotland isn't exactly the warmest country in the world. I do like the colourful aspect of them, it kind of cheers me up to see the bright socks on my feet.

Ravelympic progress

Today I've been mostly knitting and watching Olympic events on the television. I've been watching some of the swimming and gymnatics so far but I'm really looking forward to the Athletics and the Tennis starting I did also spend a bit of time tinking back last night as I forgot that my painkillers that I take at night for my back don't really mix very well with knitting cables as I'm apt to lose my place.

However I did manage to finish the first wrist warmer this evening. Again the colour is off on the picture, its much deeper and much more purple in person.



Today's China pictures are from the Summer palace in Beijing. Its where the Imperial court went in the summer to escape the city. The grounds of it are absolutely massive and really popular with visitors. It was lovely and fresh there too - everything you hear about pollution in Beijing is true, you can just see the pollution in the air in the city centre. The building in the first picture is the stage of a theatre where actors would perform for the members of the court who were in a similar building nearby.

Nihao Beijing

This afternoon I've been watching the opening ceremony for the Olympics in Beijing. I've always been interested in the Olympics and usually watch a lot of the events. I was even born during the 1972 Munich Olympics, though as I was being born, the Olympics were facing their darkest days after the murder of athletes during a terrorist attack.

I would have loved to be in Beijing today for the opening ceremony. In 2000, I was lucky enough to spend 2 1/2 weeks visiting China and having spent time there, I knew that the opening ceremony would be amazing and it was. It was a little bizarre that they had a Scottish pipe band playing during the ceremony but most Chinese people I met were very interested in Scotland.

As part of the Olympics, I'm taking part in the 2008 Ravelympics. I've challenged myself to knit a pair of cabled wrist warmers and 2 cabled hats during the Olympics and I'm hopeful of success. I cast on the wrist warmers this afternoon.



The colour in the picture is off. The yarn is actually a light lilac/purple but my camera isn't the best at picking up purple for some reason. The pattern is Rose's wrist warmers and its a free pattern based on the wrist warmers that Billie Piper wore as Rose in Doctor Who.

Seeing Beijing on the television for the past few weeks has made me think about the trip I took there and I dug out the pictures that I took whilst I was there last night. I thought I would share some of them on my blog during the Olympics.

Both these pictures were taken at the Temple of heaven in Beijing. Like most older buildings in China, they were constructed without nails, just held together with the wood joints.